My wife and I are just about settled into our new place. After about two and a half weeks of being displaced, I can happy to be done this process. Now if our apartment complex could fix our AC everything would be ready to go. I probably will not get back to normal updates till this weekend, but they are coming. A few highlights on the new apartment:
- Gas stove (hooray quicker boils for homebrewing)
- A large walk-in hall closet that my wife has already designated as “the place were all of your stupid beer stuff is going.”
- There is a brewpub down the street
- A beer store exists in the same shopping center as the brewpub, I am going to check out their selection today
- While not beer related, this place is super nice compared to our last place and has a lot more room
I am looking forward to having everything fully settled, but we are close. On another note I have a job, which is awesome. So far everything about the east is better than Texas. To make our move to Delaware official I think a trip to Dogfish Head is in order.
Widmer Brothers Brewing Company was one of the few Portland, OR breweries that my wife and I did not visit or taste on our honeymoon. I’m not sure why exactly we missed it, but we did. Perhaps it was because the town offers more breweries than one can visit in four days, but who knows. Anyway it is a brewery that is talked about a fair amount and when I saw one of their offerings in the store I decided to take a shot.
Drop Top Amber Ale pours an orange amber color and is perfectly clear. The color should not be to much of a surprise for a beer that has “Amber Ale” in it’s name. It also pours with a slight, off-white head. The nose on the beer is malty, fruity, and has a slight hop odor at the end. There are also hints of grape and orange in there as well. Not a super complex nose, but interesting.
The taste is malty upfront. Then some orange and fruity flavors follow. There isn’t much hop there, but the helps dry the finish out and adds a bit of crispness to it. Citrus also makes a delicate appearance in there. There is a strange malty aftertaste in the beer. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it was an odd flavor to have in a beer. Maybe it was the fruit flavors rolling off the tongue but I didn’t really dig it to much.
Overall I think the beer is drinkable. It is not a normal amber ale. The malt and lack of hops is there, but it is much more fruity than what you would normally expect from the style. It comes in at 5.0% ABV so it is very sessionalable and great for summer. If you like fruit beers this one is not going to blow you away with fruit and if you like amber ales this one is going to throw another flavor combination at you, but it is a drinkable beer for most craft beer drinkers. Give it a try, it might not blow your mind but it is a good stepping stone beer if you are just getting into the hobby. read more…
The move went off without a hitch. We ran into some mild traffic jams and a few downpours on our 3 days, 30 hours, 1800 mile trip, but all in all, it went as good as can be expected. The pup is a champion car rider and sat in the front passenger seat of my wife’s car and slept the whole time. We are now back in southeastern PA and will be moving to Delaware in a few weeks. Updates will be back but there are still going to be slow as we are trying to unpack as little as possible until we make the final move. Also sorry about the site getting that 403 error. Apparently the host changed a few permissions on files that were using up CPU space and our index file (the one you see) was a problem. I got all of that sorted out, I just wish they would of told me before they made the move.
It feels great to be back. I enjoyed a few Yuengling’s the night that I went out and was very pleased to have that familiar taste available to my taste buds again. Yuengling was actually the first beer that was reviewed on the site. I think my reviews have gotten much better since then. I am glad to be back home and the reviews will start flowing as soon as we get fully settled here. I have a bunch of homebrewing to get caught up on as well.
My wife and I are moving back to the east coast. It may not seem like a big deal, but if you haven’t gotten the vibe, I’m not a fan of Lubbock (or Texas for that matter). We leave tomorrow and it will take roughly three days and 1800 miles to get back east. We are both looking forward to the move. I will not be posting much until we get settled in back home.
I am looking forward to a bunch of new beers that I can’t get here and saying hello to a few favorites. On a sad note I will lose access to New Belgian beers which is a terrible loss. Anyway I’ll be back online soon, until then; eat, drink, and be merry.
I have noticed that at the end of a few of my beer reviews I have noted how “this beer is a good one for people new to the hobby.” The question comes, is drinking beer a hobby? I would assume that some people would consider it a social problem or a moral problem, but I always just thought of it as a hobby. I’ve never really been hung up on the “is drinking wrong?” question (obviously) but is it wrong to think of something that some people despise of as a hobby?
I am not one of those people or drinks to get drunk. I drink craft beer because I enjoy the flavor and the variety. I am sure there is some aspect of knowing something that others don’t in there as well, but that is not one of the reasons I drink. I like to expose myself to new beers and becoming knowledgeable in a growing “field” is always a good thing. I just don’t know if I should consider it a hobby.
Do people who eat good foods think of eating a hobby? Wikipedia has this as their defination as a hobby:
A hobby is an activity or interest that is undertaken for pleasure or relaxation, often in one’s spare time
Under that meaning, beer drinking is certainly a hobby. I enjoy it, I am interested in it, I take pleasure in it, and I do it in my spare time, Sounds good to me. My wife and I have had this discussion before and I think (hope) we agree that it is a hobby. When you think of a hobby though it is generally more of an activity, not a bodily function. Like homebrewing, that falls under the traditional hobby. What do you think, is beer drinking a hobby or just a bad habit?
