The New Troegs Brewery

After spending a great hour and a half or so at Spring House, Jo and I headed on to the new Troegs brewery in Hershey, PA. For those that don't know, Troegs used to be in an industrial park in Harrisburg and was pretty much a medium size with a smallish taproom and a retail store about the same size. I always liked it since it still felt personal at that size but things change as places get more popular and I'm pretty sure Troegs was getting mobbed on the weekends so a change was definitely needed. Plus they needed a bigger brewery to keep up with demand which is probably the main reason for the move.

The new brewery is absolutely enormous with a gigantic taproom, a retail store about the size of the old brewery building itself, an enclosed barrel room, and a really impressive self-guided tour. Here's a picture that should give you some idea of the size of the taproom.

Hmm, or not after looking at the picture. I don't know how many people the taproom fits but it was packed when Jo and I arrived on Saturday. The bar has got to be like 100 people long and you can see tables that run through the middle of the room in the picture. There are also some more tables on the other side of the wall on the left that you can't quite see I think.

Pete G Mr. Bawk Ba Gawk Weizenbawk

After our last beer tasting, my friend left me an extra bottle of his homebrew weizenbock. Mr. Bawk Ba Gawk, and I got around to drinking it last week.

Smelled of bananas and caramel. Pretty decent nose. Thick mouthfeel. Some spiciness, some breadiness, and a bit of alcohol in the first sip. The flavors stayed pretty much consistent throughout the glass. Flavors weren't quite as strong as the nose would have you expect. Some of the banana and caramel flavors just didn't come through. I'm not sure if it was overly sweet which killed some of the more subtle flavors or what. Still, decent homebrew weizenbock as it's a difficult style to pin down and I've definitely had worse commercial versions.

Schneider Aventinus 2006

The second interesting bottle I opened for July 4th was a Schneider Aventinus that was brewed in 2006 and cellared at the brewery until released in the US in, I think, 2010. I was interested in opening this one because it's the year anniversary of the trip to Germany with my wife and visiting Schneider. I figured this would be the best time to open the bottle considering it was already five years old. Aventinus is a weizenbock and one of my favorite beers.

Smelled of caramel and plums and deliciousness. First sip had caramel, toffee, and plums with a hint of apple. Most of those flavors continued throughout the glass with the caramel and the plums being in the forefront. From what I remember of fresh Aventinus, this version was more complex with the added hint of apples. Really awesome beer. The only mistake I made was not having a fresh bottle on hand to compare it directly. When drinking older stuff, it's obviously much easier to find differences when you have both versions together but oh well. Still happy with opening this.

San Francisco - Beers and Beer Week

An amazing coincidence occurred with our trip.  Somehow we planned it so that part of it overlapped with the beginning of San Francisco beer week.  I have no idea how that happened.  I totally didn't look it up before we decided on dates and then convinced Jo that it was a good idea.  See, just a big coincidence!  Or I'm totally lying.  Whatever, stop looking at me like that.

While we managed to make it to a couple events, there were a bunch of other places we went as well.  After getting back from Sonoma and all the breweries, Jo and I visited her sister's neighborhood and, lucky for me, that included a trip to the Toronado.

Victory and Yards

Jo and I were going to head out to Lancaster brewing and Spring House brewing, but our plans changed so we instead went to Victory brewing and Yards brewing.  First we drove out to Victory and then we circled back to go to Yards.

The last time we had been to Victory was before they renovated their brew pub and we couldn't believe the difference between now and then.  Before, it was like a creepy school cafeteria and the food was only okay.  Now, the brewpub had really nice atmosphere, the tables looked really comfortable, and the bar was really inviting.

I had read about the renovations to their brewpub but I was not expecting such a significant upgrade.  Now, I'd totally be willing to bring people to the brewery whereas before there is no way I'd suggest it as a place to visit and this is just based on first impressions and has nothing really to do with the beer.

Two for Tuesday

Today was the special release of Dogfish Head's new beer Bitches Brew.

This beer commemorates the 40th anniversary of a Miles Davis album, but regardless of the odd circumstances it was absolutely delicious.  Dogfish Head's description is that it is 3 parts Imperial Stout and 1 part Honey and something else.  It was a pretty apt description.  It started out as a really mild Imperial Stout and ended with a sweet aftertaste.  At 9% it was pretty strong, but there wasn't any trace of the alcohol in it.  All in all, it was another great Dogfish Head beer, but the availability of it may be very minimal so you may not be able to find it anywhere.

After that, Jo and I needed some dinner and neither of us felt like cooking tonight.  We realized it was Tuesday which meant Lucky 7s (a local bar) was having Taco Tuesday so we headed over there.  Unfortunately their taps were unexciting, but they did have a bottle of Schneider Aventinus so I was still pretty happy.

I bought my friend Jon a case of this recently so I've had a bottle since Jo and I were in Munich, but tonight brought back a lot of great memories from that trip.  The Schneider brewery is located in Munich and Jo and I went there twice while we were there so it's pretty cool to order their beers here in Philly.  This beer is a dark wheat doppelbock.  It has a nice brown color to it and an absolutely delicious caramel aroma.  The taste reminds me of a Belgian Dubbel but wheaty.  You get hints of banana and caramel and it goes down incredibly smooth for an 8.2% beer.  This is one of my favorite German beers so if you see it around definitely take a try.  The Aventinus Eisbock is also available, at least in Philly, and it's like a super powered version of Aventinus.  If you are at Devil's Den, order a bottle and prepare to be amazed.