665212 Fri Nov 06 10:32:56 -0800 2009 7 3 California 0 5161210 Today is the first day of the first annual San Diego Beer Week. www.sdbeerweek.org If you live in San Diego and aren't aware of our county's world class brewing scene, this is a great time to check it out. Many knowledgeable people consider this the world's best city for craft beer. Even if you haven't liked beer in the past, you may well find something you truly enjoy from our local breweries - they are producing an incredibly broad range of flavors, including many beers that taste nothing like what you may think of as beer. For those who already appreciate the beer scene here, please get out and enjoy, spread the word and support local brewing! I believe a few CH'ers are involved in some of the events around town, please chime in and let others know if you're involved in this great event. Fri Nov 06 10:32:56 -0800 2009 149239 juantanamera 1 5173506 Green Flash is doing a progressive dinner on 30th st. Thursday Night with a free shuttle. Five fine eateries are participating, Blind Lady Ale House, Jaynes Gastropub, Ritual Tavern, The Linkery, and Sea Rocket Bistro. Each establishment will have a short menu with three small food items paired with a 6 to 8 ounce pour of Green Flash beer. The price for each pairing will be between $8 and $10 including the beer. Start your dinner at any location and travel to the next or stay and have all three items at your restaurant of choice. This is not a ticketed event, its pay as you go so enjoy a course at all five places if your belly has room for it. It is also Liar's Club night at Hamilton's, celebrate the return of the Fuego Melt. Wed Nov 11 13:07:49 -0800 2009 5161210 12980 stevuchan 2 5175568 yep, planning on doing the Beer Dinner crawl haha. Was hoping to go to Hammys too but it will be a madhouse Thu Nov 12 08:33:34 -0800 2009 5173506 91897 MrKrispy 2 5178660 had some nice beer dinner pairings last night. Some good stuff at Blind Lady, nice mussels dish at Jaynes. That one breaks even because 3 of us ordered grilled cheese at Jaynes and 2 of the sandwiches had no cheese on them. If that isn't a stoner mistake I don't know what it haha. I skipped Hamilton's after my friend called me at 6:00 and said it was a 2 hour wait for food. Fri Nov 13 08:45:18 -0800 2009 5173506 91897 MrKrispy 3 5179152 Hamilton's was a mess, luckily some friends arrived early and I was able to get my fuego melt fix. Had the pairings at Sea Rocket, shrimp way overcooked, sauce and veg were really good paired well with the Le Freak, braised pork dish w/ potatoes gratin was good and was paired with Belgium Brown. Think our dishes suffered from spending too much time at the pass (shrimp and broken gratin). I really admire what these folks are trying to do, but that's the third time they've disappointed me, just going to have to stick to the delicious sardines and uni bisque. The Linkery was up next had the scotch eggs with a pomegranate jelly, really enjoyed these paired with an unhopped gruit (yum, wife described it as tasting like a meadow and I agreed), and the house cured Sopressata which was minced sever on greens, on a piece of soggy olive oil soaked bread, would have rather had some nice slices of the Sopressata but all the ingredients were top quality (30th St.). The country ham was the meat board selection and was calling me from the butcher case, gorgeous hunk of pork, not on the beer pairing menu but it was fantastic, some of the best ham I've ever had. Ritual was next but too crowded and our group had grown to 12 by this point, so trying to eat was out of the question. Got the word that BLA was packed, as was Jaynes, it was real fun night even though we missed a few spots. It appeared to be a big success. Fri Nov 13 10:57:08 -0800 2009 5178660 12980 stevuchan 4 5179222 "I skipped Hamilton's after my friend called me at 6:00 and said it was a 2 hour wait for food." "Hamilton's was a mess, luckily some friends arrived early and I was able to get my fuego melt fix. " I too went to Hamilton's, knowing that it would be insanity. We saw the line (about 40 people deep when we got there) and made a beeline straight for the cafe (which was empty) to get some takeout. At that point, they were still sorting out where one of the missing cooks was, and it was 1 1/2 hours for food, so we ordered the fuego steak melt and the artichoke poppers and proceeded next door to Alchemy, where we had a nice and relaxed mini-dinner at the bar, with some of their small tapas plates and some good beers. By the time we left there it had been 2 hours, and we still hadn't been called for our food at the cafe. So, we headed back over, and the line for the bar was exactly the same size as it was when we had last seen it. After a few minutes our food was up. At that point, they had upped the food wait to 2 hours (which probably meant 3), and were informing people that there were no more fuego steak melts, but that they could do fuego steak burgers instead. So, we ended up getting one of the last steak melts off the grill before they ran out. When Hamilton's gets busy (like on a 2nd Saturday, or a proper Fri/Sat night) and there's a line, there is absolutely no point in even sticking around and waiting to get in there. Because if the line is to deal with the overflow from the bar, once you get in you can expect to have nowhere to sit, permanently swamped bartenders, and people standing shoulder to shoulder everywhere. Hats off to anyone who did it, but as the Liar's Club's tap list was mostly the same stuff that's available at O'Brien's, etc. I wasn't looking to go in there for the beer. It was all about the food. Even though I was able to order last night, in retrospect I think that they should've shut down the public access to the cafe and made it only available to those inside the bar. If I had waited two hours in line, only to get into the bar to wait around indefinitely for a seat, and then to find out that the food I'd been waiting an additional 2-3 hours for was all gone, I would've been disappointed as hell. Fri Nov 13 11:16:32 -0800 2009 5179152 189270 cookieshoes 1 5183146 I hit up Hamilton's last night for Port Brewing Night. All of those wonderful beers on tap. Poor Man's, Rip Tide, High Tide, Plant to Pint...The only disappointment was that they only had a cask of Wipeout on, and not a proper keg tap of it. It's a real shame when they put hoppy beers in casks. They end up coming out flat, foamy, overly sweet (almost even syrupy), and they lose all of the bite that the regular versions have. I'm familiar with the process (do it in the natural, old style tradition of brewing, real ale etc.) and the rationale (because it's a rarity from a brewery, and gets some good attention from the purists). On the SD Beer Week site, cask events were all the rage. Sure, it's a great premise, that sounds good, but in my experience it's very rarely a good thing once you have a pint sitting in front of you. I think that brewers are making so many casks these days because everyone else is doing it, and the real ale movement is becoming more popular. To me, it's the micro-brew fad of the past few years. As for Hamilton's usual crowd issues, I went pretty late, and the place was still packed. Funny thing is that most of the people there were drinking bottles, and weren't even aware of the Port theme for the night. Sun Nov 15 09:58:24 -0800 2009 5161210 189270 cookieshoes 2 5183203 I am a big time beer geek and come to realize I also am not usually fond of IPAs/DIPAs on cask. The wonderful hoppy aroma is usually missing, and the mouthfeel is just too odd for a hoppy beer. I love big beers and strong ales on cask though. Sun Nov 15 10:26:58 -0800 2009 5183146 91897 MrKrispy