Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Don't you want to be a pepper too?
Oh man are you in for a treat my dear reader. I have fulfilled all my promises and uploaded many pics of alcoholy goodness and Ikeaocity.
First the brew. Recently SC just passed a law making it okay to serve "high test" beers, aka beer with an alcohol percentage higher than 5. And Nick's serves them too. They have about 7-8 of which I have tried 3. I had one myself and sips of 2 others.
The Plez-U in Pendleton is THE place to go for beer in Clemson. You will be hard pressed to find a better beer selection within 20-30 minutes drive. They also sell individual beers, so you can make your own 6 pack which is what I did and I'm halfway through. (For those who can't read between the lines, there will be 3 more beer reviews shortly.)
It's overwhelming. So many beers. Hefeweizens, stouts, porters, ales of all different creed and color and some lagers. Hmm, I recognize that handwriting and that fist. It's the Flying Dog Brewery's tribute to Hunter S. Thomspon, Gonzo Imperial Porter.
It's 9.0% alcohol and darker than Africa during a new moon. I hold it up to the sun and nothing makes it through. I have found the black hole of beers. It smells deep and rich. A taste. Whoa. That's different. This is a serious beer. No one flavor or scent jumps out at me and at first I'm not crazy about it. Then halfway through, that 9% kicks in, my mouth gets used to the bitterness and it magically transforms into a really good beer. I let the last few sips warm up a tad, just to see if the flavor changes. It's even good a little warm. It isn't for the faint of heart, but I would recommend Flying Dog Gonzo Imperial Porter to any Hunter fan or beer lover.
The next brew comes to us from our favorite Greenville, SC brewery, Thomas Creek. They know what they're doing over there. This particular recipe is their Vanilla Cream Ale.
Opposite end of the dark spectrum from the Gonzo. The smell has a hint of vanilla and it is a very smooth beer with a nice refreshing smooth finish. It's just a hint of vanilla cream and makes it a very good all purpose beer. This should please all beer drinker's palette. J even liked this one and she doesn't really drink beer. Once again Thomas Creek, you have blown me away with your simple and delicious brew.
The next beer that caught my eye in the store was Bar Harbor's Blueberry Ale. I love blueberries and I love beer so it should make for a great combination.
First off, notice that it is darker than Thomas' beer. You can smell the berries but the finish isn't as crisp and clean as the Thomas Creek. It's a heavier beer than I was expecting. My favorite blueberry beer is made by the nice folks at Sweetwater Brewery in Atlanta, and if you're looking for a wonderful, light blueberry ale, I say turn away from Bar Harbor and look elsewhere, preferably to Sweetwater. Decent beer but not what I was looking for.
Now to our new acquisitions courtesy of Ikea. We picked up a set of green tealight lanterns for "cute house decorations" according to J. I'm a big lantern fan so I was onboard. And they were $4/each.
Currently they're sitting on our center speaker, but will get a permanent home shortly.
We took a floating shelf previously purchased at Ikea and made a mantle. Currently it is displaying various wedding pictures and the outrageously expensive and color faded bouquet that was freeze dried for eternity. On top is the handy dandy clock and outdoor/indoor thermometer. Don't know what that cost cuz J picked it out.
Previously all my belts hung on a hanger in the closet. Same sordid tale with my ties. But no more! Thanks to some $8 racks, they're all out in the open and easily accessible. I also had exactly the right number of ties to completely fill a rack. Yes, there are only 3 belts. The 4th one I own was being worn by me at the time. Feel free to buy me a belt if you think I need more. Currently I have 3 black and 1 brown.
If I had any gold chains, I would put those on the rack too.
One of J's goals at Ikea was to get cute decorating stuff for the house. Several of those items have been combined into our own little desert. The container and one of the cacti came from Ikea. The dirt and rocks came from Lowe's and the other cacti and the succulent came from "5% of China's exports"-Mart.
J had a cactus before named Delilah but she brought it over to our house when I was living with 2 roommates and we determined that 3 people were watering her and she rotted from the inside out. So we will not have to remember, there will be a calendar that will show when the desert was last watered. This should prevent all over-watering.
Our veggie garden is doing great. Our tomato keeps growing and should start turning red any day now. I was tempted to pick a bell pepper for lunch today but decided to give it another day of growing before I eat it.
First the brew. Recently SC just passed a law making it okay to serve "high test" beers, aka beer with an alcohol percentage higher than 5. And Nick's serves them too. They have about 7-8 of which I have tried 3. I had one myself and sips of 2 others.
The Plez-U in Pendleton is THE place to go for beer in Clemson. You will be hard pressed to find a better beer selection within 20-30 minutes drive. They also sell individual beers, so you can make your own 6 pack which is what I did and I'm halfway through. (For those who can't read between the lines, there will be 3 more beer reviews shortly.)
It's overwhelming. So many beers. Hefeweizens, stouts, porters, ales of all different creed and color and some lagers. Hmm, I recognize that handwriting and that fist. It's the Flying Dog Brewery's tribute to Hunter S. Thomspon, Gonzo Imperial Porter.
It's 9.0% alcohol and darker than Africa during a new moon. I hold it up to the sun and nothing makes it through. I have found the black hole of beers. It smells deep and rich. A taste. Whoa. That's different. This is a serious beer. No one flavor or scent jumps out at me and at first I'm not crazy about it. Then halfway through, that 9% kicks in, my mouth gets used to the bitterness and it magically transforms into a really good beer. I let the last few sips warm up a tad, just to see if the flavor changes. It's even good a little warm. It isn't for the faint of heart, but I would recommend Flying Dog Gonzo Imperial Porter to any Hunter fan or beer lover.
The next brew comes to us from our favorite Greenville, SC brewery, Thomas Creek. They know what they're doing over there. This particular recipe is their Vanilla Cream Ale.
Opposite end of the dark spectrum from the Gonzo. The smell has a hint of vanilla and it is a very smooth beer with a nice refreshing smooth finish. It's just a hint of vanilla cream and makes it a very good all purpose beer. This should please all beer drinker's palette. J even liked this one and she doesn't really drink beer. Once again Thomas Creek, you have blown me away with your simple and delicious brew.
The next beer that caught my eye in the store was Bar Harbor's Blueberry Ale. I love blueberries and I love beer so it should make for a great combination.
First off, notice that it is darker than Thomas' beer. You can smell the berries but the finish isn't as crisp and clean as the Thomas Creek. It's a heavier beer than I was expecting. My favorite blueberry beer is made by the nice folks at Sweetwater Brewery in Atlanta, and if you're looking for a wonderful, light blueberry ale, I say turn away from Bar Harbor and look elsewhere, preferably to Sweetwater. Decent beer but not what I was looking for.
Now to our new acquisitions courtesy of Ikea. We picked up a set of green tealight lanterns for "cute house decorations" according to J. I'm a big lantern fan so I was onboard. And they were $4/each.
Currently they're sitting on our center speaker, but will get a permanent home shortly.
We took a floating shelf previously purchased at Ikea and made a mantle. Currently it is displaying various wedding pictures and the outrageously expensive and color faded bouquet that was freeze dried for eternity. On top is the handy dandy clock and outdoor/indoor thermometer. Don't know what that cost cuz J picked it out.
Previously all my belts hung on a hanger in the closet. Same sordid tale with my ties. But no more! Thanks to some $8 racks, they're all out in the open and easily accessible. I also had exactly the right number of ties to completely fill a rack. Yes, there are only 3 belts. The 4th one I own was being worn by me at the time. Feel free to buy me a belt if you think I need more. Currently I have 3 black and 1 brown.
If I had any gold chains, I would put those on the rack too.
One of J's goals at Ikea was to get cute decorating stuff for the house. Several of those items have been combined into our own little desert. The container and one of the cacti came from Ikea. The dirt and rocks came from Lowe's and the other cacti and the succulent came from "5% of China's exports"-Mart.
J had a cactus before named Delilah but she brought it over to our house when I was living with 2 roommates and we determined that 3 people were watering her and she rotted from the inside out. So we will not have to remember, there will be a calendar that will show when the desert was last watered. This should prevent all over-watering.
Our veggie garden is doing great. Our tomato keeps growing and should start turning red any day now. I was tempted to pick a bell pepper for lunch today but decided to give it another day of growing before I eat it.
Labels: beer, garden, Ikea, Plez U, review
# posted by Seth @ 7:48 AM 
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