I Scream, You Scream for Ice Cream (and Beer?)

Do you remember the first time you had a root beer float? Cool, creamy ice cream bathed in effervescent sugary liquid...the collision of two things you could probably never get enough of. We rarely drink soda/pop/root beer these days, instead preferring a pint of hop soda but decided to make a compromise, keeping the hop soda and adding ice cream. Could we be successful in balancing our inner child and our adult preferences?

The first order of business was to browse through the store freezers, which turned out to be packed with a lot more flavors than they were back when we were kids, and pick up some flavor standards as well as other things that just sounded good. Gathering at our favorite haunt, filled with plenty of beers to select from, we sat down for a sticky good time of pairing. While some pairings were no-brainers - stouts, light or heavy, with both chocolate and vanilla ice cream - we also came up with some more creative and interesting pairings that we quite enjoyed. Take a gander.

The two most successful "ice creams" were actually sorbets - Open Nature lemon and raspberry - with the raspberry slightly edging out the lemon as Best Pairing with Beer. From the light Saison Dupont to the hoppy Georgetown Lucille IPA to the big, boozy Founders KBS (Kentucky Breakfast Stout) Bourbon Barrel Aged Chocolate Coffee Stout, these sorbets were a hit with the widest spectrum of beers. 

Talenti Sicilian Pistachio Gelato 
Pistachio ice cream surely existed when we were kids although it doesn't stand out as a top pick. Gelato is similar to ice cream and in this case the creaminess is complimented by the texture the pistachios. Whether the solid bits at the bottom of the glass are a bonus or a detraction is a personal matter. Intrigued by the possibility that this would be a flavor that wouldn't work well with any beer we found that in fact its nuttiness meshed well the hop profile of Georgetown Lucille IPA. So, too, did Culmination's take on a KBS-style beer, MCS (Multnomah County Stout).

Haagen-Dazs White Chocolate Raspberry Truffle
As the name implies, this is a rich, very sweet ice cream. Both Saison Dupont, a beer that we'd found to be a great pairing with Girl Scout cookies, and Wild Ride Tarty to the Party Peach Raspberry Sour helped to balance that sweetness. In addition, the subtle lemon in the Saison Dupont was enhanced when paired with the ice cream.

Tillamook Marionberry Cheesecake
Wild Ride Tarty to the Party Peach Raspberry Sour also paired well with this ice cream, with its tartness coming out at the beginning, the cream mellowing it mid-palate and the graham cracker crust bits adding a buttery finish to the experience. Founders big, bold KBS was our optimal dark beer with this ice cream.

Colombian Cold Brew Caramel
An intensely coffee flavored ice cream, it paired nicely with Pelican Tsunami Export Stout. The 7% stout is not of the sweet variety, instead being roasty. Paired with this ice cream, a slight, pleasant saltiness presents itself on the finish.

This type of pairing might not be for everyone but if you're feeling a bit adventurous, grab a pint from the freezer and a pint from the fridge, find a warm sunny place and indulge.

We Paired Beer With What?!?!

If you've been following our beer adventures for a while you might have figured out we have a thing for pairing beer with some unlikely subjects (like Halloween or Easter candy). Well, hold on to your hats because things are about to get REAL weird.

Resulting out of some beer consumed with a last bit of ice cream, you know, the melt-y stuff at the bottom of your bowl/pint/quart, we rounded up seven varieties of coffee creamer (you heard that right). There were some "regular" flavors - French Vanilla, Hazelnut and Vanilla Caramel - and others that started going further afield - Almond Roca, Bailey's Irish Cream, Peppermint Mocha and Bailey's Mudslide. As is pretty easy to surmise, stouts were the most suitable for pairing.

- Fremont Dark Star imperial oatmeal stout had its 8% ABV mellowed by the Darigold Almond Roca and its roastiness kept the creamer from being too sweet.
- Ten FIDY, the big 10.5% double stout from Oskar Blues, made for a nice sipper with the CoffeeMate Peppermint Mocha.
- StormBreaker Opacus oatmeal stout, clocking in at a sessionable 5%, was the most mixable of the beers, combining nicely with Darigold Vanilla Caramel, Darigold Hazelnut and CoffeeMate Peppermint Mocha. In fact, if you'll be having guests around Christmastime, grab some of that Peppermint Mocha either for use in your glass with some Opacus or in your great aunt's coffee. You won't regret it.
- Pelican Tsunami Stout, of the foreign/export variety, was the most coffee-like and combined with Bailey's Irish Cream for something we'd be delighted to find in our mug on a lazy weekend morning.
- Ale Smith Nut Brown's nutty profile found pairings with both of the nut-flavored creamers - Darigold Almond Roca and Darigold Hazelnut. 

Even more successful than the dark beers, especially if you're looking for something lighter, were three fruit beer/ciders with Darigold French Vanilla. Stiegl Radler was the crowd favorite that when blended with the creamer came out tasting like an orange creamsicle. Why a grapefruit beer should combine with a vanilla milky substance to produce orange is beyond us. This however was a delicious, super low ABV creation.

A close second was Cider Riot! Berry cider, for a "berrysicle" and then interestingly, Lindeman's Peche. Instead of the sourness of the beer clashing, it pleasantly offset the creaminess. Another "you wouldn't think so" combination was the Cider Riot Berry with Darigold Hazelnut. Not assertive enough to be labeled as a pb&j flavor profile, it's the closest thing we can liken it to.

If you've been keeping track you may have noticed that we haven't mentioned what beer went with the Bailey's Mudslide. That's because there weren't any. We found there to be a strange, chemical taste and while we can't confirm the same would be true if it were put in a cup of coffee it seems prudent to simply avoid it. We chalked it up to "you can't know until you try" and the spirit of exploration that we went into this little experiment with.

Thanks to those brave souls that tried these combos out with us - Chris, Sean, Nicole, Caren, Zach and Mike, to name a few!

Boilermakers with Bulleit

We've been cheating a bit on beer lately, exploring the wide varieties of whisky/whiskey. For the most part we haven't had them together but we recently played around to see if we could find some pleasant pairings, better known as boilermakers. Armed with boilermaker suggestions from Ninkasi Brewing Company using Bulleit Frontier Whiskey and supplied with a couple of fifths, we were eager to try our own hands at it.

Bulleit Bourbon
Ninkasi selected their flagship Total Domination IPA to pair with this "Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey" and we agree that an IPA (even a hazy IPA) is the way to go with this one. We didn't happen to have any Total Domination on hand however we did have cans of their new-ish Prismatic Juicy IPA that created a far more complex pairing than we anticipated. Another local IPA, this time from Culmination in the form of their Phaedrus, made for a pairing that we'd be happy to enjoy for a significant session. Going further afield, the result of recent beer mail, we appreciated the fruity/juicy hops in Track 7 Brewing's Sukahop New England-style IPA as a compliment to this whiskey. Going even more intensely hoppy we also found Pelican's Beak Breaker DIPA to be a pleasant pairing with its combination of Mosaic, Citra and Centennial hops.

Diverting from hoppy beers were two others that to our surprise were also great pairs with the Bourbon. First up was a very interesting collaboration between Rogue and Brew Dr. Kombucha called Kulture Clash. Labeled as an "imperial blonde ale blended with kombucha tea" the 6.9% beer was a bit sweet on its own with a fruitiness that may have come from the beer or may have come from the kombucha. Either way the fruitiness was enhanced quite pleasantly by the Bourbon.

Going to a truly big beer, we cracked open a bottle of Brewery Ommegang Game of Thrones - Hand of the Queen. Billed as a barleywine with a hefty 11% ABV it drank far lighter and fruitier than any barleywine that has ever passed our lips. Putting the surprise on the beer aside, one half of our tasting panel loved the way it created a smooth, boozy pairing that might be further enhanced with a cigar, a lovely evening and plenty of time to enjoy the trio.

Bulleit 95 Rye
A fan of the aroma of the rye whiskey, the flavor takes a backseat to the Bourbon for us and made us more skeptical about being able to select beers that would make suitable boilermakers. Ninkasi chose their Yours Truly Easy-Drinking Ale, a beer with "a sweetly-toasted malt profile and delicate hop bouquet" to pair and we were happily surprised to find Stickmen's lightly flavored The Bee's Knees a winner. Using Pilsner malt, a sweetly flavored,  lightly colored malt, and floral Tettnanger hops this beer likely works due to similarities to Yours Truly. 

In thinking about other beer styles that might work, we reflected on rye-containing beers we've had in the past. Often the lighter based varieties allowed more of the spiciness of the rye to come out more than we would prefer whereas those with a darker base have tended to taste more balanced and "right" to our palate, even some that leaned malty. While overtly malty beers, like Pelican Sea 'N Red Irish Red Ale don't generally make our hop-loving taste buds sing we happened to have some on hand we figured we should at least give it a try. Indeed, when paired with 95 Rye the beer found redemption in our eyes. Here the maltiness of the beer made a fine companion to the rye of the whiskey.  

Many thanks to the hearty souls who went on this adventure with us. Many thanks to the faithful readers who didn't pass over this post because there was something besides beer in it. We're always open to experiences that expand our minds and palates and hope you enjoy learning along with us.

Beer & Girl Scout Cookies Pairing Year 5

Our annual sugar fest in which we support the Girl Scouts and use as an excuse to play with beer happened Sunday. Last year we split the event into two separate days since we were able to get our hands on some out-of-state offerings and while that was fun, what we have access to here is more than enough to put us into sugar shock.

Here was our lineup:
- Do-Si-Dos (aka Peanut Butter Sandwich)
- Samoas (aka Caramel De-Lites)
- Savannah Smiles
- Shortbreads (aka Trefoils)
- S'mores (the non-vegan graham cracker sandwich version)
- Tagalongs (aka Peanut Butter Patties)
- Thin Mints
- Toffee-Tastic (gluten-free)

Per our usual we gathered at our favorite watering hole (which by the way was just named as Oregon's favorite beer bar by Craftbeer.com's readers), opened all the boxes and started hitting the coolers to pull out beers to pair with the cookies.

First up was Chris' pick of Berried at Sea from Pelican, their Tsunami Stout that was aged in oak barrels with blackberries and currants to re-ferment. Along the lines of a sour stout, the acidic profile somewhat distracted from the overall profile of the beer. Nonetheless, it found a peanut butter partner to its "jelliness" in the Do-Si-Dos and Tagalongs. Going a lighter route it created an acid-expected berry lemonade flavor with the Savannah Smiles, which we've agreed is The Best Beer Cookie (more on that below).

Another beer that made fast friends with the two peanut butter cookies was Fort George From Astoria with Love, the Russian Imperial Stout is the base beer for all of Fort George's Matryoshka variants. Mag was impressed by Do-Si-Do's ability to hold its own against the 9.4% beer while Kris would be happy to sit down with a box and a few cans to fully indulge in the rich pairing. Speaking of decadent pairings, Left Hand Wake Up Dead Russian Imperial Stout made for a great one with the other peanut butter cookie, Tagalongs. For a more complimentary pairing to the Do-Si-Do's, reach for Crooked Stave St. Bretta. Now available in 12oz cans, the beer pleasantly lightened the richness of the cookie while the cookie brought to the forefront more of the dryness in this Saison.

Samoas, historically a difficult cookie to pair due to the coconut and over the top sweetness, found many beer friends this time around.
- Falling Sky Juniper Rye became more malty, in a very pleasant way
- Boulevard Rye on Rye, a rye-heavy beer on its own, was moderated and made more enjoyable
- Baerlic What the Fluff NE-style IPA accentuated the saltiness of the cookie while toning down its sugar forwardness
- Evil Twin B is for Blueberry brought the chocolate component in the cookie to prominence
- Left Hand Nitro Bittersweet found its only cookie buddy here

Falling Sky Juniper Rye, Boulevard Rye on Rye and Baerlic What The Fluff also paired well with the S'mores graham cracker sandwich cookies. So, too, did pFriem Cognac barrel-aged Belgian Style Dark Ale. The 10.3% beer was well balanced between its booziness and its Belgian characteristics.

Toffee-Tastic, the Girl Scout's gluten-free offering, is a cookie that has surprised us from day one both with its flavor and texture as well as its ability to pair well with beer. This year our favorite beer we paired it with was pFriem Cognac which accentuated the rich butteryness of the cookie. For those who prefer to have that buttery quality tempered, we suggest going with Crooked Stave St. Bretta.

Thin Mints, one of the staples of the Girl Scout cookie line up, have typically been most successfully paired with stouts and that trend continued this year when paired with Left Hand Wake Up Dead Russian Imperial Stout. The boozy beer balanced nicely with the cookie's minty profile. Shortbreads were another cookie we'd paired often enough that we didn't dive too deep into that well but found Pelican Berried at Sea, especially once it had warmed, made for a nice companion.

Thanks to our Sunday Monger, David, for keeping an eye on us.

Saving the best for last, our picks for the top beers to pair with The Best Beer Cookie, the lemony, powdered sugar coated, crescent shaped Savannah Smiles.
- Pelican Berried at Sea, as mentioned above
- Evil Twin B is for Blueberry for a lighter version of the Berried at Sea pairing
- Little Beast Tree Spirit for a trip down the cherry lemonade path
- Baerlic What the Fluff's hoppiness for a pairing that brings out the lemon even further in the cookies
- Crooked Stave St. Bretta for the cookie to accentuate the lemon-citrus notes of the beer
- Falling Sky Juniper Rye for a surprising pairing where the cookie brought out the malty qualities in the beer and increased its drinkability (for our group)

Beer is tasty, beer is fun, beer is better with friends. We're already brainstorming on our next beer and [something] pairing. If you have ideas for what you'd like us to play with, leave it in the comments.

The Best Things We Drank: November 13 - 19

This week's list focuses on our recent trip to the coast, Oceanside and surrounding, for a long weekend getaway. 

Starting out with a newer, and completely new-to-us, brewery is Public Coast in Cannon Beach. Last time we were there in town they weren't yet open, but in the interim we've heard great things about them.
Black Stack Stout - Named after a "very big rock" just off Cannon Beach, the beer presents with a great roasty aroma and a chocolate/slightly chalky flavor. Served as we prefer, on nitro, it is a creamy, drink-all-day beer. 

Checking out a place not far from our Oceanside rental in Netarts we found The Schooner to have a disappointing beer selection overall BUT they were serving the next beer just the way we like it.
Deschutes Obsidian Nitro - This is only the second time we've found this beer on nitro (not that we have been actively searching), the first being earlier this year in Bend. Since that first try, we're convinced that's the only way it should be served and therefore find it nearly impossible to pass it up. 

A second close-to-our-rental joint was the Upstairs Bar & Grill. This place was far superior in many ways to The Schooner and had we been in town longer we would likely have gone back.
Crux Cast Out - The stanky BO aroma and lovely hop flavor from the Galaxy hops make this a solid IPA choice. Add to that a creamier-than-most-IPAs mouthfeel and we could enjoy plenty of these. Fun side note: The name Cast Out comes from the Galaxy hops from Australia, a country once populated by English cast outs/outlaws.

This next place was the find of our trip! Black Squid Beer House was opened just a few months ago by a couple that moved to the coast from the west metro. Located on Hwy 101 in Lincoln City where a surf shop formerly resided, owners Sara and Andy have created a friendly and inviting feel for this bottle shop and taproom. They've also curated a very nice tap list and cooler selection.
Mother Earth Say When - We haven't had a ton of Mother Earth beer but this foray will encourage us to try more. Melony and yum, we love the flavor and would love to see a hazy version that would impart more body. 

Finally, a return visit to the Tillamook outpost of Pelican Brewing. Having stopped in a few years back, shortly after they opened, we were happy to be in the area for more of their beer.
Bad Santa - We know we've seen this beer around often but surprisingly hadn't tried it previously. More chocolately-roasty than bitter-roasty we enjoyed this CDA as is but really would have like to have been able to try it on nitro, too. 

The short getaway was just what we needed to recharge our batteries, both with relaxing views of the beach from the hot tub at our rental and the enjoyment of checking out new places and beers.

Beer & Cheese Pairing - 2017 Edition

We recently got together with friends and fellow cheese lovers, Chris and Lyn, for another play date pairing beer and cheese. We each brought a selection of cheeses (plus crackers, won ton chips, blue cheese scones and dried fruit compote) and settled into our favorite haunt to crack bottles.

We'll start the rundown with an apricot stilton (purchased at Trader Joe's and one of Lyn's favorites) which we found to create a light, summery pairing with Modern Times Fortunate Islands. The beer is available in 16oz cans, making it an easily portable and openable selection for your next picnic, camping trip or outdoor activity.

Not a cheese, but containing our go-to blue cheese (also from Trader Joe's), was the blue cheese scones. Serving not only as another vehicle with which to consume cheese but also as a bit of a palate cleanser between cheeses, they, too paired well with Fortunate Islands. The beer accentuated the pleasant bite of the blue cheese (added with a gentle hand to a standard scone recipe) and mellowed out the butteriness of the pastry.

Each of us contributed a gouda and each of them found a different beer to play well with. The deli sliced version by Boar's Head from Fred Meyer found a happy pairing with a beer we got in trade, Black Hog Brewing Co. Disco Pig Brown Brett Braggot while a double cream version from Trader Joe's went in an opposite beer direction, making friends with Breakside Wanderlust IPA.

That IPA was not only a group favorite but overall the most pair-able beer of the day. It was one of the few beers that paired nicely with Rouge Chocolate Stout Cheddar, a cheese we were all on the fence about, as well at two others. In the case of the ooey-gooey Trader Joe's triple cream brie the beer brought out a pleasant sharpness in the cheese and in return the cheese accentuated the beer's hoppiness. And for as much as we enjoyed the way the aged cheddar played off the beer, each improving the other, in cold form the consensus was that a hot combination (i.e. beer cheese soup) would be fantastic. Should you try it out please invite us over for a bowl.

Another variety of cheddar that made an appearance was a smoked cheddar found at Whole Foods. Even through the wrapping the smoke aroma was strong and in addition to a similar presence in the flavor there was a mouth-pleasing creaminess. Paired with Clown Shoes Black Currant Saison (a beer that didn't live up to expectations on its own) the smoke became even stronger, which we enjoyed but take that recommendation with a wisp of smoke if you're not into smoky cheeses. Where the cheese really had a chance to shine was with Pelican Father of All Tsunamis, an iteration of their Tsunami Stout. This 11.2% imperial stout made for a very decadent pairing similar to other RIS-blue cheese pairings we've enjoyed. Thanks to Chris for both the beer and the pic!

We had tried diligently to get our hands on a blueberry stilton but were unable to so in its place went a blueberry Havarti from Willamette Valley Cheese Co. Less fruity and more cheese-forward than the apricot stilton, its tanginess created a bit of a challenge to find a partner for. We lucked out pairing Pelican's Tsunami which was able to stand toe to toe with the tanginess.

Closing things out and coming full circle with another lighter pairing - Against the Grain All Funked Up Fruitus the Farmer Beescake and that triple cream brie. One might not think of a luscious brie as part of a light pairing but it brought the cider-like aroma of this Brettanomyces-finished Saison out in the flavor, which lightened the overall feel of the pairing. If there are any cider-Brett-brie fans in the audience please proceed as quickly as possible to your nearest better bottle shop to grab the beer, then over to Trader Joe's for their Le Delice de Bourgogne triple cream brie.

While our pairing play wasn't as structured or organized as our Girl Scout cookie pairings were it was at least as fun (and didn't lead to the sugar hangover). Besides, cheese is good for you, right?

Thanks to my partners in the pairing, including David who was our fabulous beertender that day!

Where Did September Go?

September has been a busy one on this end but a good kind of busy. We had multiple houseguests, starting off with our Minnesota friends Kat & Scott who are Portland pros. Excluding the fact that we now live in Portland, they've visited more times than we did before moving here. Since they're also beer lovers each visit is about showing them new or not before visited places. We had no lack of new places to go in the Portland area but we also ventured out of town to some new to us places.

Newport was our destination and on the way we stopped at Block 15 in Corvallis for lunch. While I have enjoyed plenty of Block 15 beers this was my first visit to their restaurant and brewery where I enjoyed one of the largest salads ever (Oregonzola, figs & chicken) and Framboise Rouge, one of their sour offerings. We could have easily stayed around all afternoon but with half of the drive left we hit the road after fueling up.

Arriving in Newport we dropped our bags (at the Holiday Inn instead of the Rogue B&B we'd hoped for) and hit a couple of the Rogue locations. Rogue is Rogue and with their wide distribution we didn't find anything new to drink. But all was not lost as we were tipped off about a place called Bier One.

Bier One, a bottle shop and taproom, is larger than any of the bottle shop/taprooms in Portland due to the fact that beyond beer they have two pool tables, foosball, a couple of dart boards and a small sidewalk patio. Their tap selection offered us the chance to try beers we'd never had before and while the bottle selection was contained in just a couple of coolers, a quick look at it revealed that while the quantity might be small, the quality was solid.

After a pleasant evening there we took a longer route home the next morning, heading up the coast to Pacific City and Pelican Pub & Brewery. Although it was past Labor Day and a Tuesday, the place was packed when we arrived for lunch. A brief wait, made shorter by a pint of beer and taking in the view from their deck, and we were seated. The food and the beer were good but the setting was the most stunning part. Had we had more time I would have been first in line to slide down the huge adjacent sand dune or just hang out on the patio.

Returning to Portland we had another day before seeing them off. Then it was a short turn around and a reconfiguring of the mind before showing a Portland first timer and inexperienced, yet very willing to try any beer, friend from Iowa around town. More on that next.

2012 Portland Fresh Hop Fest

I couldn't make it to the Fresh Hop Fest in Hood River last week and for whatever reason I wasn't that excited about the Fresh Hop Fest at Oaks Park this week. In fact I was pretty sure I'd skip it. Then Saturday dawned bright and beautiful and with no other competing plans I had a change of heart.

As per our usual plan we got there early, about half an hour into the fest and there was an expectedly light crowd. It took longer to decide what beer to get than it did to actually get it. As often happens we ran into some beer drinking friends and settled into a routine of chatting, wandering off for more beer and rejoining the group.

Then, suddenly it seemed, the tent started filling up at a very swift pace. According to a tweet from the Oregon Brewers Guild, "We had as many people by 3pm as we did last year at this years Fresh Hop Fest - sorry about running out of beers." Thankfully by the time the lines were getting longer than I wanted to wait in I had made it through the beers I was most interested in trying and I didn't feel bad switching over to a full pour to finish off the afternoon. Another stroke of luck that my favorite beer of the fest, Fresh Hop Farmhouse from The Commons Brewery, wasn't one of the kegs that had blown.

Beyond The Commons' offering I enjoyed Sasquatch Fresh Hopped Healy Heights, Deschutes King Cone and Pelican Elemental Ale. A surprising number I found to be only OK, ones I would have been disappointed to have ordered a full pint of and there were a few stinkers in the lot. Overall though it was a very enjoyable afternoon of drinking beers with friends and even making a new friend with a beer traveler from New Jersey.

After note: Although we went early and didn't experience the full extent of the problem of blown kegs I found it very unsettling that friends who showed up later did. Beyond that, it sounds as though the festival organizers were not informing people about the substantial lack of beer, leaving this unpleasant discovery once they had purchased their glasses and tickets and went in search of beer. Hopefully they'll make better contingent plans for the future.

Beer & Burgers at OMSI

OMSI's After Dark series of events which involve food and booze AND are children-free are a great concept. After hearing about them yet never making it to one last night's was too much of a temptation to pass up as they touted beer and burgers.

Burgers & Brew. Enough Said.
We get serious about warm buns, frosty mugs, and hot, dripping patties. Discern the difference between grain- vs. grass-fed beef, delve into the science of skunky beer, and experience the magical action of yeast. Drink up with beer samples from local breweries while learning how the beer is made.

Seventeen breweries are participating in the second annual brewfest. Brewfest tasting packages include event admission, souvenir pint glass, and 10 tokens for samples.

Science nerds unite for childfree, brain-building science fun at OMSI After Dark!

Not knowing how many tickets would be available and being type A in general I purchased tickets in advance and anticipated the event.

Unfortunately what was a great concept was exceuted very poorly. This was particularly surprising to me as OMSI is a well-respected museum. I'll give a beer festival, especially a new one, a bit of a pass when things aren't well executed but I can't understand why OMSI would make so many amateur mistakes.

1) First of all, they weren't ready at 6:00 when the event was supposed to start. Some of the areas were still closed off and most of the food vendors were still in prep mode.
2) There was zero signage so for someone like me who has never been to OMSI all I had to rely on was a confusing museum map.
3) The breweries were not provided with rinse water and I only saw one water station set up. Bad for beer tasting, bad for beer drinking (hydration).

4) There were only four "burger" vendors. Stock & Barrel was the only one I observed that was ready and actually offering sliders, very tasty quail egg topped sliders. The vendor making water buffalo burgers wasn't nearly ready at 6:00 and although there was a line, I never saw a table of samples. Apparently there was someone on the patio grilling but the line was so long I never braved it. SortaSausage, while offering a surprisingly tasty HempBurger, only provided 1" square samples in condiment cups. Rheinlander, who was at least 30 minutes tardy offered beer cheese soup/dip with rye bread. Delicious for sure but not a burger and before the event was over they had run out of cups.

While the food portion of the event was a complete fail the beer portion was somewhat better even though I'd had 90% of the beers available previously. My favorite of the evening was one new to me, Silverspot IPA from Pelican. Besides a portion of the proceeds benefiting butterfly conservation efforts, it was a very sessionable, bright, citrusy hop beer. A close runner up for favorite was Fort George Working Girl Porter. Summer has been fun but I'm ready for some cooler weather brews and their porter was just the way to start down that path.

I can now say that I've done OMSI After Dark. I can also say that as far as I am concerned it is an overpriced, overcrowded and poorly executed event. But now I know and knowing's half the battle.