More experimentation with food and beer ? this time OUR beer
Andy and I traveled to what seems the end of the world last night (it was actually 30 miles north) to pick up the remaining case of beer we brewed for the BMW Sport Touring Club. Mark and Christine were nice enough to have us over for dinner. And boy howdy, Mark can cook some meat!
Pork with some kind of famous butt rub… chicken tandoori… over-carbonated Roundhouse Pale Ale… over-carbonated Weissguy Hefeweizen. I would say that our beer was the worst part of the dinner, which isn’t to say that it wasn’t delicious, because it was.
All in all, a trip well worth it. I love having friends that cook meat.
A tribute to the faithful pack mule
Meet Andy. It’s Andy’s lucky day.
Andy has been given front-page status for this day only for one reason: he is a pack mule. When you ooze excellence like Jeff, Joel and I, it’s easy to forget the little people that make Monday Night Brewery possible.
Andy comes early every week. He mills grains, cleans carboys, transfers beer, bottles… he does it all. Unfortunately, we can’t repay him in beer since his tolerance for alcohol is so low.
If you haven’t heard, Andy is fast becoming our food and beer pairing expert. So in that sense he’s more like a pack mule with his own cooking show. And his cooking is delicious.
Keep it up Andy. Your work is not unappreciated. Although you probably owe us something for this write-up, so be thinking of how you can earn our love back.
We brew our first anniversary pumpkin ale!
When we started brewing beer together last September, the first beer that really jumped out at us was our then-named Farvonpupin Pumpkin Brau. This name will not carry forward into this year, but the pumpkin ale will.
In addition to the obvious pumpkin, we also brew with generous doses of cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. Essentially, anything good that is in pumpkin pie can be found in our beer.
Things went pretty smoothly, though we did have a hiccup or two. For one, Jeff did not give me EXPLICIT pumpkin-softening directions, so I just straight stuck that pumpkin in the oven.
Apparently you’re supposed to cut it open or something. Whatever. I was wondering why it was taking it so long to get soft… Jeff cut the pumpkin and put it back in the oven. And then proceeded to laugh at me. ME! It’s like, I give and I give to this endeavor, and Jeff just takes and takes. I had to cry myself to sleep last night.
Notice the absence of Joel in the picture. He was in Las Vegas. Poor baby. And let the record show that the lines are now officially open for a name for our beer. As of now Ichabod Pumpkin Ale is in the lead. Top it.
Monday Night Motorcycle Rally
We’ve been running low on beer recently, and one of the reasons is because we were commissioned to brew a few commemorative beers for an annual motorcycle event, El Paseo. El Paseo X took place over the weekend, so photos are starting to roll in. Overall I think response to our beer was positive.
We supplied them with our hefeweizen and pale ale with three distinct labels. Two of the three were actually prank labels. And we’re all about the pranks. Especially when they’re on my Dad (he’s the “Goober” in “Gooberweizen”).
Here are a few pics from the event (obviously I only pulled pics that featured our beers):
If you’re interested you can read up on the event on the BMW Sport Touring discussion board. Lord willing we won’t have another beer shortage for awhile. Unless you clowns keep drinking it all.