Confessions of a Brew Wife: October 2014

new york beercation

Laz decided that for his birthday he wanted to go on a 'beercation" to New York. We tend to go pretty often on these so called "beercations" and New York is quite convenient since we know our way around and we stay at my favorite aunts house! Yay!

So for this post I will let the pictures do the talking.... (warning..... beer porn .....)

Happy Birthday Laz! Cheers!

laser wolf

We finally made it to Laser Wolf and I am super happy we did. The experience was even better than I expected. Super chill vibe, friendly and knowledgeable staff, and great beer selection. The place is small but cozy with cool kitsch décor.

and you can enjoy some nice classic films... Bruce Lee vs Chuck Norris?... seriously awesome!

I had a delicious Brew Bus Double Decker English-Style Porter that was passed through the randall which contained chocolate and fresh mint. AMAZING!!

(you can see the randall in the background)

Note:

This awesome contraption was invented by Dogfish Head Brewery, you can read more on that here.

Laz had Brew Bus Cherry Bomb IPA, which is basically a version of their Last Stop IPA treated with cherries.... yum!

...and we also tried this Emelisse Black IPA from the Netherlands, nice strong malty flavor.

We really loved this place, can't wait to go back! Check out their site to see what's on tap!

P.S. they have the funniest video...

tap takeover

A tap takeover, in summary, is when a single brewery temporarily seizes a portion (or all) of an establishment’s tap lines with a variety of their beers.
It is a great opportunity to drink beers that are normally not available because they are limited release beers or just not distributed in the area.

Last night the Lokal and Kush had a tap takeover by Sixpoint Brewery. This brewery has awesome beers, Laz's favorite beers are made by them, and they also have this crazy series called Mad Scientist, which of course I love..... The Mad Scientist beers are quite special because the brewers create a small batch with unique ingredients to make a new style of beer, and they release a new one every two months.

I will say that events like this do have a down side! How on earth is one supposed to decide which beers to try? Sooo many good choices....sooo little time... and even if you do start early in the day, how much could you drink before reaching the dreaded palate fatigue leading to just getting horribly wasted.

Just take a look at the beer menus

I must say that I was really happy to try new stuff, and they were all very, very good....I'm a happy girl!

P.S..... they do exist!

put some beer in my cookies

I guess at this point it is pretty clear that I am obsessed with baking. Cookies, cakes, pies, you name it I like to bake 'em.

I wanted to make some simple sugar cookies and browsing through my favorite blog sites I came across a recipe for Beer and Brown Sugar Cookies. What could be more perfect?!
The recipe is from The Beeroness she is like the goddess of cooking with beer! You can find this cookie recipe here.

The recipe calls for an american brown ale which is great since we have a batch of our very own homebrewed Brown Ale that turned out to be pretty tasty with a smoky aroma and notes of caramel and chocolate.

These cookies are very chewy and buttery, and don't really taste a lot like beer but they are nice compliment to the brown ale.

Soft Batch Beer and Brown Sugar Cookies

Ingredients

¾ cups unsalted butter, softened (12 tbs)

1 ¼ cups golden brown sugar

1 large egg yolk

½ tsp vanilla

1/3 cup American brown ale

1 ¼ cups All purpose flour

1 cup bread flour

1 ¼ tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

½ tsp salt

1 tsp cornstarch

¼ tsp cinnamon

Directions

In the bowl of a stand mixer, add the butter and brown sugar. Mix on high until very well combined. Add the egg yolk and the vanilla, beat until light and fluff. Add the beer, beat until well combined.

In a separate bowl, add both kinds of flour (bread flour is used to make chewier cookies), baking soda, baking powder, salt, cornstarch and cinnamon.

Sprinkle the dry ingredients over the wet ingredients and stir until just combined.

Using a cookie scoop, scoop out balls of dough slightly smaller than a golf ball onto cookie sheets that have been covered with parchment paper.

Place the cookies in the fridge to chill for at least 20 minutes (this prevents them from spreading too much during baking).

Preheat oven to 325.

Bake at 325 for 12-14 minutes or until the edges just start to turn golden brown (for a puffier cookie bake at 350 for 8 to 10 minutes). Immediately pull the parchment paper off the cookie sheet onto the counter and allow the cookies to cool to room temperature.

Enjoy!

the world is getting crafty

It is always a treat to try new beers, and there is a constant growing selection of craft beers from all over the world to discover.
Recently my best friend came to visit from Ecuador and brought us great gifts! Including some craft hand-crafted beer from Ecuador.
We had such a great time, I wish she could have stayed longer.... this is us after a session of Om Brew Yoga at Wynwood Brewery...

So she brought us three different beers from Andes Brewing Co. You can check out their site here. Who knew that Ecuador had joined the craft beer movement? Seriously? It is so awesome to know that slowly this movement is taking over the world. People are starting to realize that mass produced generic beer is something of the past and are demanding taste and quality. Yay! for Cerveza Artesanal!

These are the Ecuador beers we sampled...

They were all pretty tasty and had all the aromas and flavors that you would expect from these beer styles. I am a big stout fan so I was a hard critic on that one... personally, I believe it was lacking body, but it was still pretty enjoyable.

I think its great that brewers in other countries are introducing the quality of hand-crafted beers in their towns and are educating the locals on the brewing process and the different ingredients that it takes to make these delicious hand-crafted brews.

Thanks Lidia!! Miss you!