Adventures in Michigan

A little over a month ago, my cousin, Stephanie, sent me a message with a link to a site – imagine cycling and kayaking up in Traverse City… With breweries in between.

Mind. Blown.

Very quickly afterwards, we picked a date and it was planned.

This past weekend was my first time in Michigan. As we drove up north, I was reminded of Portland with the amount of trees we drove by – it was beautiful. Chris and I drove up most of the way and stopped in Big Rapids, a little over an hour away from Traverse. We arrived in the evening and after doing a quick Google search, found our dinner place only about 20 minutes away.

I’d say we definitely scored big at Reed City Brewing Company. We arrived, sat at the bar and quickly found out the bartenders were super cool and knowledgable. We got some pretty tasty pretzels and nachos (my favorite brewpub meal) as well as several of their brews. I ended up getting their Irish Red, PB Porter… and their Brown Ale (had to have #3 after trying a sample). All three were really good – the Red had some good malts behind it to bring out its flavor, the PB Porter held some delicious peanut butter behind it without being too heavy and their Brown was smooth and flavorful.

We made it back to the hotel for the night and headed off the next morning to Traverse City to be in town for our Kayak, Bike and Brew tour with Stephanie and her boyfriend, David.

We were able to get checked in and picked out our bikes. I knew this was the one for me. And a-way we went.

We rode about three miles alongside the lake and got to enjoy the ocean breeze on a very hot, 90 degree weather day. We arrived at our first stop – Right Brain Brewery.

The brewery had a really cool atmosphere with a lot of fun, nerdy references throughout – like a tie-fighter as well as Homer Simpson hanging from the ceiling. Chris and I ended up sharing a sampler tray – 6 different beers, 6 oz each. We ended up with the Thai Peanut – a brown ale with a slight peanut butter taste and a kick at the end (I loved it, Chris did not), Concrete Dinosaur – a IPA (Chris enjoyed it, and I let him have it (it was okay)), Northern Hawk Owl – a smooth red ale, CEO Stout – a yummy coffee stout, and Apple Pie Whole – a nice subtle fruit beer.

After 45 minutes, our tour guides came around and gathered us back outside. We got back on our bikes and rode onto the next one – The Filling Station.

I ended up getting their brown ale, which was pretty good, but Chris and Stephanie won at this brewery. My cousin got the Green Line, a delicious cider that wasn’t too sweet, and Chris got the Savannah Peach Kettle Sour… With a shot of red (raspberry). Wow. Nice and light for the hot day we were experiencing, but had that nice raspberry taste at the end of every sip.

Unfortunately I did not get any photos of our kayak. Chris and I ended up sharing a tandem kayak. We started off in Lake Michigan and made our way through a small waterway to the third brewery – Rare Bird.

After some time on the water and also probably because of the fact that it was the afternoon, we needed some food. Our tour guide suggested their nachos and cheese curds. We were all very happy we followed her advice. The food was amazing, and I throughly enjoyed my Chief’s Coconut Brown – a nice brown with a light coconut finish.

We finished our trip on the water back towards the beginning of our tour. Chris and I encountered our first, and only, tiff when we got stuck under a bridge with many pillars. We were able to get through it together though and finish at The Workshop Brewing Company.

We were able to cool off in the nice A/C as we sipped on their Bastard Rasp – a golden ale with a slight tart, fruity taste.

Traverse City, even in the heat, is beautiful. I hope to be able stick around in the city longer next time to enjoy more lake time as well as all the various cute shops.

After a quick dinner, we headed to our cabin for a very relaxing evening that included s’mores and a random encounter with two glowing eyes watching us in the dark. It’s easy to say our time outside came to a close then and there, where we finished with some game boards inside.

The next day, since we obviously didn’t have enough craft beer yet, we finished our trip together at New Holland Brewing Company in Holland, MI. I had the 8th Street Amber – an amber with a bit of an aztec zip at the end, and the Passion Blaster – a light, fruity beer that wasn’t too sweet. The food was great as well – if you go, get the pepperoni pinwheels. You will not regret it. And we got pretzels as well. Of course.

I feel super fortunate to have gotten to spend my all-too-short weekend together with these people. Until we see each other again!

PS – I’ve started collecting brewery stickers! What do you do with your stickers?

Drinking my way through the Pacific Northwest

As Emily has mentioned in some other posts, we went to Portland/Seattle a few weeks ago to visit her brother and his family. We did a lot of fun things while we there, and in between them, we enjoyed one of the other things the area is known for: great beer! We didn’t over do it by any means, but we both were very “beer’d out” by the end of the week. We love good beer, so you know it was a good amount when we opt to skip the final brewery Nick and Kim were going to take us to. We decided we should put all that drinking to good use and note all the ones we had for each day, and pick out our favorites! (All scores are out of 5)

DAY ONE

Sprinkles (Everybody’s Brewing) – 3.75
Covfefe (Thunder Island Brewing Co) – 3.5
NW Red (Ancestry Brewing Co) – 3.00
Scaler Single Hop (Backwoods Brewing Co) – 3.75
Kumite (StormBreaker Brewing) – 4.00
Space Cake (Clown Shoes) – 4.5

Small note about this first day – we had a sampler so five of the six beers were just tasters. We didn’t drink as much as it appears!

As you can tell by the ratings, my favorite of the day was the Space Cake. It’s an Imperial IPA with an ABV of 9%, so it will catch up to you quickly if you’re not careful. It’s got a good malty taste with a bit of hop to it, and a nice mild bite at the end. The west coast style of IPA is definitely different, and this was a great introduction.

DAY TWO

Inversion IPA (Deschutes Brewery) – 3.75

I didn’t realize until I was looking back that I only had one beer this day. This was actually because we had planned to go to a Bar/Arcade that night, but we were all fairly beat after spending the day downtown and just ordered a pizza and crashed at home instead.

I don’t think I’ve ever had a Deschutes beer that has disappointed me, and the Inversion IPA was no exception. It is a hoppy IPA with a floral taste to it, and is also quite smooth. It went really well with grilled cheese and tomato soup I had to eat. I easily could have had two or three, but had to much walking to do to warrant it.

DAY THREE

I’m just going to preface this with that fact that this was the day we visited Seattle and signed up to go on a Road Dog brewery tour. There is a lot of beers listed here but keep in my mind many of them were samples (although some were larger than what I would consider a “normal” sample size). The brewery tour was awesome by the way, and I would highly recommend it to anyone in the area. Sufficed to say, a good time was had by all.

Supergoose IPA (Hale’s Ales) – 4
Night Troll Porter (Hale’s Ales) – 3.5
Hale’s Cream Ale (Hale’s Ales) – 3
El Jefe Weizen Ale (Hale’s Ales) – 3.75
Pale American Ale (Hale’s Ales) – 3.5
Holy Basil Pale (Outlander Brewery) – 3
Tiramisu Brown (Outlander Brewery) – 4.25
Ancho Amber (Outlander Brewery) – 3.5
Imperial Peanut Butter Stout (Outlander Brewery) – 4
The Sister Imperial IPA (Fremont Brewing) – 4
Proletariat Porter (Fremont Brewing) – 3.75
Keys. Phone. Wallet. (Cloudburst Brewing) – 4.25
Trickster (Black Raven Brewing) – 3.75

I would have to say that the Tiramisu Brown was the winner of the day followed closely by Keys. Phone. Wallet. The Tiramisu was so smooth and easy to drink it was ridiculous. It had some great spice to it as well. I’ve never had real Tiramisu so I couldn’t tell you if it tasted similar, but if it did, I really need to try some.

DAY FOUR

Long Ball Ale (BridgePort Brewing Co.) – 3.5

After drinking so much the day before we decided to take the day off of drinking, and just had one at the Hillsboro Hops baseball game we went to. It was light and crisp, which was perfect to drink while sitting in the stands under the warm sun. It was my first MiLB game, and it was a blast (even though the Hops lost).

DAY FIVE

Pallet Jack IPA (Barley Brown’s Beer) – 4.5
3-way IPA (Fort George Brewery) – 3.5
Supplication (Russian River Brewing ) – 4
Reggie’s Red (Lucky Labrador Brewing) – 3.5
Chris’s Going Away IPA (Lucky Labrador Brewing) – 3.5

I’m going to go against my initial rankings, and have to say my favorite beer of the day was the Supplication. That beer has stuck with me all these weeks later. It’s a sour beer, with a serious bite to it, but it is delicious. It was also one of the more expensive beers I had, although I didn’t know that at the time. It was worth every penny.

I also couldn’t resist getting the “Chris’s Going Away IPA” when I saw it. It was the next to last day of vacation after all! It was a fairly standard IPA, that I’d have again if it I saw it.

And so, we’ve come to end of the drinking adventure. We were in Portland for another day, but took it off of drinking again, as the night before was pretty crazy. I was going to end this with picking my favorite beer overall, but there were so many good ones, that I think I’ll just stick with the daily rankings, and suggest if you like good beer you give those a try. We did a lot more than just drink, which you can read in Emily’s other posts, so it wasn’t just about the beer, but it definitely added to the fun. We had a great time in Portland and Seattle, and are very much looking forward to going back!

Keep Me Weird, Portland – Part 2 [Seattle Edition]

Thursday Chris and I went up to Seattle. Again, Chris had never been in the area before, and I had only been for a weekend… And that was before I could drink.

We first hit the Museum of Pop Culture, which was pretty cool. Things we saw included: a guitar history exhibit, Indie Game exhibit, Fantasy exhibit, Star Trek exhibit (Chris geeked out) and they had a Jim Henson exhibit. I think that one was probably my favorite. I had no idea how big of a deal Jim Henson was; not only did he create the Muppets, he was also along for the ride of Sesame Street and created a ton of commercials for different companies using his puppets. He even created two movies: The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth. Both which I haven’t seen, but now know I need to thanks to several “I can’t believe you haven’t seen them!” remarks.

I got two treats for lunch that day. First, I got ramen, which I haven’t had authentic ramen for some time. Two, I got to see Chris use chopsticks. Oh the memories.

Next we hit the Pike Market, because tourism. We spent some time looking around there and checking out the ocean and beautiful views.

Afterwards we went to Seattle Brewing where we were picked up by the Road Dogs for a brewery tour. I love brewery tours; you get to go try different beers at different places and hang out with others who share the same passion as you. The guys we actually went out with had JUST got done climbing Mount Rainier. Impressive stuff.

Road Dogs took us out to the Fremont area to three different stops: Hale’s Ales, Outlander Brewery & Pub and Fremont Brewery. Not only was our tour guide a great guy, we had WAY more tasters than we’ve ever had on a brewery tour. It was pretty much a “Oh you want to try that one? One sec, let me get you that.”

Hale’s Ales and Fremont were both pretty good, but my favorite had to be Outlander Brewery, by far. Their outdoor porch area to chill was super nice, and you had hop vines hanging right above you. They also had an electric harp player. What.

I also got to meet the guy who brewed the beer. Before we went in, our tour guide said Outlander’s brewer looked like a viking. He wasn’t kidding. Super tall, but super cool guy who made REALLY good beer.

My favorite was a tie the Tiramasu Brown; slightly sweeter beer, but not too sweet and the Imperial Peanut Butter Stout; because peanut butter. They also had a very interesting Holy Basil Pale and Ancho Amber. Basil is interesting to drink.. But thankfully it wasn’t too strong of a basil taste. Ancho Amber is what it sounds like; slightly spicy start, but a smooth finish thanks to the amber ale.

To complete our Seattle tour, we got to see the troll under the bridge. I even got to do the Seattle thing to do when you get your picture taken with him. Fun fact: Did you know there is actually a real car buried underneath his hand?

Our third stop, Fremont Brewing & the Troll Under the Bridge

Keep Me Weird, Portland – Part 1

Chris and I went out to Portland, Oregon to visit my brother, sister-in-law and my adorable, just over one year old nephew, Trent. It’s safe to say plenty of good times were had.

We arrived late Tuesday afternoon. After getting through the airport to get our bags, taking a Lyft to pick up our car, and then driving through after work traffic to get to my brother’s, it was… Dinner time.

Thankfully my brother and sister-face (inside joke) know pleeeeeenty of good spots. We ended up actually going to Pour Craft House, where you can order food from nearby restaurants. We also had picked up some Japanese pastries from Oyatsupan next door, so Chris and I settled on sharing nachos while enjoying some awesome craft brews. Definitely check out Pour Craft House if you’re in the area – Well worth the visit.

The pastry is known as Mt. Hood, named after Portland’s neighbor mountain. On the tray is Everybody’s Brewing Sprinkles, Thunder Island Brewing’s Covfefe, Ancestry Brewing’s NW Red, and Saint Archer Brewing’s Blonde Ale. My favorite was Oats and Hoes by 54°40′ Brewing Company (not in photo); a delicious, well made oatmeal stout.

After this, we ended up heading back to my brother’s to ultimately hit the hay – Trent was up past his bedtime and we too were pretty sleepy (still running on Central time).

Wednesday was my first Portland run in a while and boy did I miss it. (FYI – I lived out in Portland for a year while attending culinary school. There’s your fun fact of the day.) It is so much cooler and less humid there, so even hitting the hills didn’t seem so bad.

Afterwards, we WERE going to hit the Japanese Gardens… However, apparently that day was one of the first days of nice dry weather in Portland. ALL of the parking was taken up – So we moved onto Plan B: We hit a public parking garage, got on the MET transit and heading downtown.

Since this was Chris’ first time in the area ever, we had to show him all of the tourist-y things. First: Powell’s Books. If you haven’t been, Powell’s Books is known as one of the largest book stores out there. Downtown’s location has AT LEAST six floors worth of books. I ended up picking up the fourth copy of Stumptown (had to happen) and Chris got another Star Wars graphic novel he needed.

Afterwards was lunch time. We ended up stopping at Deschutes Brewery. Funny story: We were all looking at the lunch specials, and someone brought up the grilled cheese sandwich with tomato soup side. You’ll never guess what ALL of us got. So good, especially with that Tillamook cheese… (Yes, we’re all secretly kids.) While we were there, I had the Smash Berry Toast: very good pale ale with a slight berry kick at the end. Yum.

Afterwards we took the Streetcar to NW 21st and 23rd street to check out all of the small shops and to walk off the so good, but so big grilled cheese sandwiches. The full stomach didn’t stop us from hitting up Salt & Straw for some fun ice cream flavors. I ended up with Amaretto Cherry, once again, REALLY good (and vegan!).

It’s hard to go to Portland and have bad food/beer. They know how it’s done.