Memorial Day

This Memorial Day weekend I had Bill in town for a visit, and much beer was consumed! :p

Friday night was a quiet one that saw us drink some homebrew and play Settlers of Catan: The Card Game. This was an interesting take on the board game version. It had the same overall feel with the construction of roads, settlements and cities, and the resource management was handled really well. It was somewhat slow to develop early on, but once we had build up enough to where we could use action cards, the game really took off. Very fun game, and a good relaxing night.

The first order of business on Saturday morning was gorging ourselves on great food and shitty coffee. Highland Park Diner it was! The great thing about that place is that you don't need to worry about food for many hours afterward... though your arteries probably aren't happy. :p

An on-the-fly decision was made to head down to Honeoye Falls, southeast of where we were, to visit and tour the Custom Brewcrafters brewery. That was a very good decision. This is a brewery whose business model is to brew custom batches of beer for local restaurants and bars. They had about 19 beers on tap in the tasting room, which was huge! Of note, their Rye Ale was delicious. It was light bodied, with a rye character that blended nicely with the hops. That one is an easy drinker that I could just pound all day. Yum!

In the middle of our tasting (they allow 6 samples of beer) we were able to get onto a tour of the brewery with three other people. The guide was an older guy that was very enthusiastic and knowledgeable. He gave a great tour with a really good explanation of the brewing process and the specifics of what goes on in their brewery. That was the best tour I've been on so far of any brewery, hands down (though the Cooperstown Brewery is a close second).

Following that, we stopped in Honeoye Falls at a small bar & grill called The Brewery for a pint. It was a small bar with a small deck out back to overlook the falls. There was a pretty good beer selection for such a townie-feeling bar. I remember there being only 4 beers that I wouldn't drink, one being Genny Light (blech!). This was an interesting experience, but we were ready to drink some serious beers....

On to the Old Toad! The Toad is one of my favorite Rochester bars because the beer selection is amazing! They have three casks (which is exceedingly rare in the States), a constantly rotating tap selection, and they refuse to put crap beer on tap. They do serve Blue Light and Amstel Light, but those are in bottles in the cooler behind the bar. I had a Fuller's London Porter on cask that was wonderfully smooth, followed by a Brooklyn Intensified Coffee Stout. Bill had a cask version of Flying Bison's Rusty Chain which we both found wonderfully drinkable and balanced. A great session beer if I've ever had one! He also had a Dogfish Head Midas Touch for the first time in a great while and was reminded of why it's amazing.

NOTE: All of these session beers and beers with more modest flavors that we were thoroughly enjoying led to some interesting conversation on the craft beer movement, extreme beers, and the lost art of the session beer. I'll post on that later.

At this point we decided it was time to hunt down some food action. We headed down to Hennrietta to hit up the bar I frequent about twice a week to drink and watch baseball with some regulars: J.B. Quimby's. This is where I watch most Thursday and Friday Mets games while talking baseball with Jeff, the main bartender, and Dave, one of the regulars. We had a couple beers, ate some good pub food, and saw innings 2 through 8 of the Mets-Red Sox game. That game had all the action occur in the 1st and 9th innings, and we missed all of it. It was an odd evening. :p

When we got to my apartment, we decided to wander into the village of Fairport and hit the Towpath Cafe, right on the Erie Canal, for some coffee and much-needed relaxation. It was a nice night for a walk and that coffee really hit the spot. The rest of the night was spent playing Rock Band, and watching Robot Chicken and The Fifth Element.

All in all, a pretty damn good weekend.