Upcoming Beer Tastings at Grinders

Grinders hosts a "Taste Beering" with food pairings every 2nd Thursday of each month. The upcoming March 12th beer tasting features several Ommegang beers.

According to their website, here are the menu offerings:

1. Ommegang Hennepin: paired with a floral & citrus shrimp ceviche
2. Duvel: paired with spanikopita
3. Maredsous tripel: paired with a spicy chicken taquito w/ green chile sauce
4. Ommegang Abbey Ale Tripel: paired with bacon wrapped dates stuffed with pecan creamed cheese
5. Ommegang Three Philosophers: paired with a lemon tartlette

(bacon-wrapped dates? HOW HAVE I NOT THOUGHT OF THIS???)

Tickets are $17 prior to the event, $26 at the door.

April's Taste Beering will feature Unibroue (which, I learned on our trip to Quebec last year, is pronounced "OOO-nee-broh"). Details aren't yet posted.

Side Comment - we ordered a basket of 6 chicken wings with "death sauce" and they wouldn't let us order it at first ("we put it on the menu as kind of a joke" they said...). They gave us a little sample taster of the sauce, which was pretty damn hot but tasted quite nice. We were able to order them after some convincing, and they were delicious.

If you've been disappointed at the lack of spicy food in KC, this will definitely renew your faith that spicy food does exist here. And if anyone has some tips on how to get places to believe me when I order food hot, let me know. I've tried everything I can think of, and nearly always get some jalapenos tossed onto the top of my dish. So disappointing. The sauce they use, by the way, is Dave's Insanity Sauce.

And, last but not least, I enjoyed a nice Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier Dunkel. Banana & spice present, of course, and a bit bready. Very nice and easy to drink.

Later, Gator

We went to Barley's in Shawnee for dinner & a couple of beers tonight. I enjoyed a lovely Grimbergen Abbey Ale & a Great Divide Titan IPA. While deciding what to get, I sampled both the Bitch Creek ESB and Abita Andygator. Now, I generally like Abita's brews and highly recommend Turbodog. Andygator, however... I'm inclined to wonder what they were thinking. Helles doppelbock? I'm thinking light in color but malty, dry, a bit boozy.

It's somewhat light & very clear, like a German lager (a bit darker than a helles). The initial taste is a bit cloying, almost honey-like. Then the sweetness lingers... and keeps lingering... There's minimal hop aroma and almost an adjunct aftertaste. It was interesting. Abita's website describes it as having a "dry finish" but I didn't find that at all. It's possible it was a bad keg, but given the reviews on Beeradvocate.com, I don't think so. Someone described it perfectly - "tastes mostly like sweetened water."

Barley's did, however, have Ommegang's Chocolate Indulgence on tap. Get it while you can - this is one delicious brew.

Merry Christmas!

Well here we are on yet another Christmas day. We don't really do Christmas, outside of presents and sometimes dinner. This year I couldn't be bothered to make a nice dinner, so beer & presents it is. I made cinnamon rolls for Christmas breakfast, though, so surely that counts for something.

We bottled John's smoked porter today - pictured there on the right. We made it on Thanksgiving with his mom and bottled it on Christmas day. Surely it deserves a holiday-related name. Fireside Smoked Porter? Yuletide Smoked Porter? Shopping Frenzy Smoked Porter, perhaps...

Tuesday night, I picked up an Ommegang Gift Box at Royal off State Line. It contains Chocolate Indulgence, Hennepin, and Three Philosophers, as well as a nice Ommegang glass (essentially a large flute). I can't remember the exact price, but I think it was $23.99. It was somewhere in that neighborhood anyway. We cracked open the Three Philosophers that night and it was enjoyable, as always. Someone was thinking when they blended Kriek with Belgian strong ale. It has a perfect balance of strong, Belgian fruitiness with a dry cherry flavor. It's not sweet like the Framboise lambic is by itself. I've always enjoyed it, but am moving it up on my "beers I enjoy" list as of late. 

I worked half a day on Christmas Eve, then spent the evening at Waldo Pizza (where they have Boulevard Single Wide on tap), enjoying some of a 12" Choice Cut pizza. Whoever decided bacon on pizza was a good idea should win some sort of prize. I enjoyed a delicious Avery Reverend, which they had on tap. John had a Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale, followed by a Bear Republic Hop Rod Rye (my favorite Bear Republic!), both also on draught.

We then came home and polished off the other two Ommegang bottles, which was an extremely good idea. We started with Hennepin... Now, I'm not a big Saison person. I do, however, appreciate a good one when I taste it and Hennepin is one of them. It has more hop profile than a typical Belgian Saison, which I think makes it a more remarkable beer. I found myself wanting to pair it with a cave-aged Gouda (but then, I pretty much want to eat cheese with anything).

Instead, we just moved on to Chocolate Indulgence. This beer is so fantastic, it is worth trying at least once even if you don't think you're going to like it. It's a pretty complex stout, bringing out not only flavors of chocolate, but ones of roasted coffee and caramel as well. The chocolate is definitely detectable, but not overwhelming. The hoppiness is rather forward, which I prefer, and balances the maltiness of the ale extremely well. I highly recommend this one, even if you're not a "chocolate beer" fan. 

Merry Christmas!