Northern California Round 2

After visiting Northern California several years ago I went again this summer. I wanted to finally give a quick summary of the experience.

Breweries:

I visited 4 breweries, 2 large nationally known ones and 2 small brewpubs.

In retuning to Russian River it was obvious that craft beer is alive and well in this country, maybe even too alive and well. People were streaming out of the place carrying full cases of Pliny the Elder and the wait to be seated was over an hour, even middle of the day on a Friday! When we were finally seated we were told it would be another hour wait if we wanted to do a tasting so we passed on the flight and each grabbed a Belgian beer.

With two sour beers and two non-sour strong Belgians it was a nice mix of what RR offers, minus the hoppy Americans. As always great stuff, maybe too great.

Rather than sit around for the hour while we waited to be seated at RR we decided to walk a few blocks to Third Street Aleworks for lunch and a tasting. While the food was excellent (I had a wild boar sausage) the beers were lackluster with all seeming to be an American variant (amber, blond, IPA, pale ale, steam beer, etc) while none were awful some seemed to miss the mark with the others being mainly boring examples of the style. At least we were able to get a seat, food and tasting flight in no time.

Continuing our Sonoma brewery journey we visited the very large (and again very crowded) Lagunitas. Here we ordered 4 more beers, none of which I have seen available and with styles ranging from Brandy barrel stout to a farmhouse ale. All were interesting and enjoyable but, similar to RR, the overcrowded space and uncaring service staff didn't make for as enjoyable experience as it could have been.

One unexpected stop was Magnolia in San Francisco. This brewpub was, like most of these places, super packed and provided pretty good beer. Beers here were fairly expensive however, especially compared to most brewpubs in my area which have cheaper pints than bars. Overall, alright but not good enough to merit a return.

Bars:

The only bars worth mentioning which we visited are The Monks Kettle and La Trappe. The Monks Kettle continued the theme of small, cramped and pricy. We shuffled into tiny spaces at the bar enjoyed our beers and split. La Trappe on the other hand had plenty of space and we enjoyed several beers from their great menu and some nice Belgian food as well. Only downsides were that the service was quite slow and not very knowledgable. Would happily go again.

Wine:

I drank too many wines to remember (to the point that I slept through the 4th of July fireworks). I enjoyed the "castle" tour and tastings. Despite how touristy, cheesy and pretentious the location is, the wines are reasonably priced and fairly good. We also did an excellent food and wine tasting/pairing session at Raymond after Castello. I highly recommend both as fun introductions to wine and the wine/tourist industry that is Napa. The trip certainly added a new spark to my desire to make a wine.

While there were many other drinks consumed and hundreds of other activities enjoyed I'll keep it to these for now...and throw in a picture from one of my hikes in Yosemite.

Northern California

So this is very much a backpost but I feel it is important.  In early June I visited one of my older brothers who fortunately happens to live in Napa.  The trip was great and loaded with lots of camping, poker, a concert, some games of Madden and lots of tastings of all natures.  Sparing the details here are a few highlights of breweries and beers:

• Silverado Brewing Company - For some sort of "completeness" to my Napa beer tastings my brother decided we would stop in here despite having placing them on his "worst of napa" list.  We did a sampler and got the garlic fries.  The fries were AWESOME, as ubiquitous as they are in this region my brother claimed they were the best he had ever tasted.  Served with Rice Bran Oil and a healthy amount of parmesan and garlic they were great.  The beers were nothing amazing with most being somewhat boring, but the coffee stout was near the top of my list as far as coffee beers go and the others were passable if nothing special.
• Calistoga Inn and Brewery - This was near the end of my trip but is a nice little brewpub with good, but not great (at least not nearly as good as Silverado's), garlic fries and the best red ale I have ever tried. The caramel and citrus components played very well and didn't come off with any "cardboard" or "stale bread" flavors that I have noticed in other red/ambers (e.g. Fat Tire).  It's also a nice little place in a quaint little town not too far from a nice little hike where Robert Louis Stevenson honeymooned at a silver mine.
• North Coast Brewing Co. - Having seen this brewery's beers offered in Maryland I had some expectations.  I tried an '08 old ale with my brother that he had been saving for a special occasion.  It was delicious with a nice blend of light hoppiness, moderate bitterness, alcohol warmth and some warm sweet cherry character that made it all around great, and according to my brother more rounded than when it was fresh.  We then hit up the brewery and, while I was a bit disappointed by some of the fair (Old Rasputin Imperial Stout and Brother Thelonious Dark Belgian) their take on a Saison (Le Merle) is the best I have had to date.  I left with a corked bottle under my arm to cellar.
• Anderson Valley Brewing Co. - This "solar powered brewery" is a really cool spot to hit with some great drinks.  Me and Matt got most, but not all, of the items as samplers and we were both blown away by the Summer Solstice Cerveza Crema.  While other beers here were decent, the Summer Solstice was super creamy, had hints of vanilla and other spice and was just the thing for a hot California day. I bought a 6-pack (in cans, sweet!) and only one made it back to Maryland, which has since been consumed. This wasn't meant to be a long keeper but seems to be a beer that anyone would enjoy.
• Russian River Brewing Company - To say I had high expectations for this brewery may be an understatement.  Looking solely at ratings for their beers this would easily be the highest rated brewery in the country, and likely the world.  Their Pliny the Elder (and Pliny the Younger) are amazingly well received IIPA's and their whole line of sour/belgian styles is very popular with those who enjoy that style.  Having had only one or two lambics I didn't know what to expect.  The sampler featured almost every beer they brew including a great hoppy brown and a tasty American IPA.  Many of the Belgians were quite different from what I'd had before but were for the most part enjoyable and I ended up buying a full pint of Supplication to go with my pizza.  Supplication is quite different, the best I could explain it would be that it tastes a bit like a Belgian Strong Dark with cherry yogurt character.

As for wineries here is a (very short) list of the ones I felt worth stopping at again and worth remembering:

• Prager Port Works - Their "Aria" is an interesting white port with notes of vanilla and hazelnut.
• Breggo  - Though I didn't buy any of the wines here they were all quite tasty and well worth the visit.
• Yorkville - Bought they're Sweet Malbec, I like Malbec's and I like dessert wines, this one really stuck with me.
• Girard - Make a lot of nice wines including one Cab that was great (if pricey) and a 2010 Cabernet Blanc that I couldn't resist purchasing.
• Indian Creek - Liked all their wines but especially enjoyed the slight smoke on the 08 Syrah.

There were many others that had good wine but were overpriced or simply didn't seem exceptional enough to buy.

All in all it was a great trip with lots of experiences (both related to and entirely separate from the alcohol)