Upcoming Events

For whatever reason this seems to be a busy week filled with some really fun events going on around town.  Things were kicked off this yesterday with Nobi hosting a Karbach Station 68 event honoring the Robert Garner FireFighters foundation.  If you missed out, head to J. Henry's tonight for another Station 68 (this version is a rye pale ale).  They'll also be tapping a cask of Chocolate BBH.  Some other events around town include:

• This Friday Pearland's own Bakfish Brewing will be having their grand opening. Bakfish is a great little brewery that opened up a couple of months ago.  They are out near the wonderful King's biergarten. I've gotten to go out there a few times recently and enjoyed their offerings.  The Double IPA is pretty tasty, as is their wit.  Nothing too crazy on tap, but they seem to be offering beers for a wide range of palates. They don't usually have food (they do encourage you to bring in food from outside), but this Friday for their grand opening they've worked with a number of food trucks.  Festivities start at 3pm with a ribbon cutting ceremony so go check things out.
• Alvin's Fetching Lab Brewery will be having an open house. A good opportunity to head over and try some of their line up. They'll open up at 1pm.
• Clear Lake's Tiki themed bar Volcano Room is having their grand opening Saturday night.  They'll have a full night of events including cocktaills of course, but additionally they'll have some complimentary small bites,
  music, and some hand rolled cigars.  Sounds like an amazing time. The fun starts at 7pm.
• Finally Texas Beer Refinery is hosting Texas Country music act Jake Worthington, with an opening act of Candy Bernaux.  This sounds pretty neat with TBR hosting an intimate music concert.  They'll be
  
  some beer specials during the concert.  If you can't get tickets for the actual concert, they'll be piping the music to outside.  

There are more events going on this week, so go check out the google calendar, and as always if you know of more things coming up, let me know so that I can add it.

First Look: Rosewater

Another week, and another craft cocktail bar has opened up in the Clear Lake area.  It started a couple months ago with Preamble, and then CLC got a tiki style bar with Volcano Room, and now we have a third option in Rosewater.  Its been open about a week, and I've already been there a couple of times to check things out.  I've been excited for this place to open up as soon as I heard about it.   The bar is owned and operated by a former beer distributor, and a NASA engineer turned cocktail enthusiast. (there is another partner, but they are not necessarily involved in the day to day operations).  Those two are usually behind the bar pouring tasty craft cocktails. Now full disclosure, I do know the two folks behind the bar, not extremely well, but we are acquaintances.

Rosewater located on the corner of Clear Lake City Blvd and El Camino is a small shopping center.  The place has housed many different concepts over the years including a coffee shop, wine bar, and a short lived yogurt shop.  When you walk in, you see no indication of its previous tenants.  There is a lot of wood, marble, and brick and moss (there is a framed area of moss on the right when you walk in).  Its a beautiful space really.  On the left are wooden benches with tables and chairs, for 2-4 people to sit.  The right hand side is filled by a long marble topped bar with high backed antique looking chairs. The bar back is wooden shelves filled with a wonderful array of spirits.
The first drink I ordered there blew me away, not for its complexity but for something else. The drink was a well made Negroni which is my go to drink a t a new bar to see how the bartender makes it.  No instead it was the ice.  It was beautiful. Clear, crystal clear.  I turned my glass around and from certain angles it didn't even look like there was ice in the glass.  it was beautiful, and I completely nerded out with the bartender who explained to me that they work with Moving Sidewalk downtown on their ice program.  Some folks may be reading this and be saying TED its only ice!!!

Well that may be true, but ice plays an incredible important role in certain cocktails.  Poorly made ice, that melts too quickly, waters down a cocktail, changing its flavors.  Well made ice on the other hand, won't melt so quickly, and won't give any off flavors to the cocktail.  If a bar puts that much attention on the ice, then you know you are at a special place.  I spent quite some time talking to the guys behind the bar and you can tell how passionate they are about making good cocktails, and making a place of the residents of Clear Lake to gather with a good drink in hand.  They are doing all the right things, fresh juices, house made components when it makes sense, good spirits and liquors, fresh ingredients. All these things help in making well made cocktails.
The other thing that caught my eye was the tap list.  Its not big, only 8 taps, but it was well made which isn't surprising.  What was though were the prices which may be the best priced beer list that I've ever seen in a cocktail bar.  Speaking of prices, the drink menu was well priced as well, with most cocktails around $9 or $10.  They have a happy hour menu from 4-7pm with $7 drinks. All in all I was impressed by their prices for everything including their spirit selection. Their spirit selection isn't huge yet, but they are working on expanding the offerings, although they do have a nice selection of special single barrel bourbons.  Right now there isn't a food program which is a draw back, but they are planning on offering some meat and cheese plates in the future.  I think this will be key as with any cocktail place, it helps to eat a little something even if its just snacks.
The overall feel of the space is very inviting, relaxed, comfortable. I haven't seen it packed yet, but the sound hasn't seemed to carry, although with as much brick and cement that could be an issue.
Rosewater has impressed me from this early stage and is definitely a place I will be a regular at, and very eager to see how this place grows and develops.  I'm excited for Clear Lake as I think the area is one of the more exciting areas outside of the loop for cocktails right now.  There are three different types of places that you can grab a craft cocktail, plus quite a few area restaurants are upping their game.  Its a good time to enjoy craft cocktails and live in the CLC.

Beer Review: Saint Arnold Bishop's Barrel 14

For my money, Saint Arnold has one of the most exciting barrel programs of any brewery in Texas.  They have continuously brought out top quality barrel aged beers.  Some of these are tiny one offs available only at the brewery, others however, become part of their Bishop's Barrel series, the latest of which, number 14 was released yesterday.  As with all Bishop's Barrel this one is released not at retail shops, but at bars only.  If you find it a bar that just does beer and wine, but not liquor you can usually get one to take home and cellar which is always a good idea.
The base of BB14 is a Russian Imperial Stout, the same recipe that they used for their terrific Divine Reserve 5 and 15.  They took that base beer and put it into Woodford Reserve bourbon barrels for 11 months.  This helped take the alcohol of the base beer from 10.1% to a whopping 12.1%.  They then blended the beer with Java Pura espresso.
When I heard that BB14 was going to be released yesterday I made it my mission to get a bottle (or two), and did so at the wonderful J. Henry's in Clear Lake.
The beer poured an almost completely opaque black with a cafe colored head.  The nose was boozy, tingling the nose with alcohol fumes, notes of coffee and vanilla from the barrels penetrated the alcohol.  Chocolate, oaky notes came on the second whiff.  Some dark fruits were there as well.
The beer was slightly warmer than I would have liked, but the mouthfeel was medium to full bodied, not quite chewy.  Some boozy notes hit me at first, but as I slowly sipped, I started to pick up the other flavors, coco powder, chocolate, a light flavor of coffee, although this was slighter than I thought it would be based on the nose of the beer.  Vanilla notes come out on the finish giving the beer a sweet note, but not too sweet since there is also some oakyness to help dry things out.  There is a burn of the alcohol too, that isn't unpleasant, but lets you know this is a BIG beer.  And yes, it is a BIG beer, but its also incredibly well balanced.  Oaky, Vanilla, chocolate, sweet, dry, subtle coffee notes.  Its a wonderful beer that will age incredibly well.  If I had to pick some nits, I'd wish for slightly more coffee notes, and maybe just a bit more mouthfeel.  Not much, just a smidge.  Overall another fantastic Bishop Barrel release.

Upcoming Events

As we head towards Father's day weekend there some really cool events coming up over the next few days that should interest beer, booze and coffee folks.

• We'll start things off with spirits company 86co doing a tasting of their lineup at Volcano Room on Thursday June 16th. Starting at 3:30 and going until 5, means you may have to take off of work early.  But if you do you'll get some education from one of the more exciting craft spirit producers around, and may get to taste some including their amazing Ford Gin or Cana Brava Rum.
• Saturday the 18th is a great day for those that missed out on last weekend's anniversary party at Saint Arnold.  Nobi will be hosting a tap take over including 22 different beers from Saint Arnold.  Their regular line up as well as some special brews will be available.
• Lastly, Barbazzar will be hosting a special Father's Day brunch.  Starting at 8 am and going until 2pm there are quite a few special menu items like biscuits with sausage and gravy, two special pancakes, and of course as always you get to enjoy their amazing coffee.

Of course the google calendar on the right hand page is always up to date.  If anyone knows of any special events going on for Father's Day please let me know so that I can add it.

Book Review: Southern Spirits

While I enjoy writing about spirits, beer, and wine, and of course I rather enjoy imbibing in them as well, what I truly love, is educating myself on those things.  I have a voracious appetite for new books on booze, cocktails, and beer and every time I go to a book store, the first section I head to is the food and spirits.  A couple of weeks ago, in visiting the wonderful Brazos bookstore downtown I ran across this book: Southern Spirits by Robert Moss.  Now here's a book that combines drinks and its role in southern culture, sounds like a book right up my alley.  I must say I was not disappointed, this is truly a tremendous book, capturing almost everything you could ask for in a book about about history, the south, and spirits.  The book reads as part history book, part spirits history, travel guide, and cocktail recipe book.  Its extremely educational as well as book that keeps your attention, and doesn't drag on.  I found it to be a relatively easy read, and not overly dense.  As someone with a large collection of books on spirits, beer, and wine, there was still quite a bit I found to be educational so I think this one is a good pick up for folks with all different levels of knowledge.
The book follows an easy linear pattern, starting off with the founding of the new world, and the first alcoholic beverages made on this land.  Each chapter starts off with a recipe based on a spirit that is the focus of said chapter.  For instance the 2nd chapter that focus on the early 18th century starts off with a recipe for Rum Punch which leads into an in depth discussion of Rum's place in the new world. A later chapter concerned with the golden age of the southern cocktail starts off with a recipe for the classic Sazerac.  All the recipes are great, some are easier to make than others, some are single servings, while others (the aforementioned Rum Punch is one example) are for larger groups of people, some of these cocktails are fairly standard fair familiar to most consumers of craft cocktails, but there are some that stand out or at the very least unfamiliar to me. Another thing I enjoy that this book does is it highlights new produces of spirits.  For example in a brandy drink they call out Carriage house brandy which is out of North Carolina.
The book wonderfully captures the rich history of drinks in the south isolating each spirit to a specific time frame.  Brandy, Madeira, Whiskey, Rum, beer all have a very specific place in southern history.  Yes of course there is some overlap, but I believe the premise still holds, and this book does an exceptional job of highlighting that.  Southern Spirits also pulls no punches in debunking well spread falsehoods on the birth of your favorite cocktails.  From drinks like the aforementioned sazerac to the mint julep, Mr. Ross goes in depth on the history of how these drinks came to be, which is one of the strengths of this book.
If I had to highlight a weakness of this book it would be that it finishes too soon. While this book does an outstanding job of highlighting where southern spirits have been, I think it could have done a little more to highlight the resurgence and where southern spirits is going.  While I understand this isn't the primary purpose of the book, I think its a small miss in an otherwise amazing book.
This is a must add for anyone that enjoys southern culture, spirits, or like me, both.

Upcoming Events

A quick post today to highlight a couple of significant area events going on this week.  I'm hoping to have a second post out this week with a review of a really great spirits book, so stay tuned for that.  Let's highlight two major events going on this weekend:

• Saturday J. Henry's Draught House celebrates their first anniversary with a day of absolutely amazing beers on tap, and some available by bottle to take home.  A sample of their list: Avery Tweak, Boulevard Rye on Rye on Rye, Dogfish Raison D'Extra, Parabola, Karbach Kentucky Habit, Cask Ballast Point Sculpin with some goodies in it.  They'll have some special glass ware and in the evening live music.
• Also on Saturday Galveston Island Brewing is celebrating their 2nd anniversary.  Lots of beers being tapped throughout the day, 2 food trucks, and live music all day long.

So, go hit up J. Henry's for lunch and beers then head down to the island for more beers and some dinner.  

Additionally, I'll put a quick plug in for a puppy adoption event at Texas Beer Refinery on Saturday which will be fun and supports League City Animal shelter.  As always, the barleyvine google calendar is always up to date.