The Copper Door’s Commitment to Better Beer Bar

I was recently invited to a beer tasting at The Copper Door to try some amazing beers paired with some interesting and unusual appetizers. The event was themed “Belgium and Belgium Inspired Brews” with Joe Corona from the Wine Warehouse. The appetizers were provided by The Crosby, a local restaurant/bar, which were delicious and very adventurous.

The Copper Door is quite possibly one of my favorite bars in Orange County. It seems to be untouched by the “douchey-hipster” vibe that you get from practically everywhere else in Orange County, which is a very good thing. Sometimes you just want to go to a bar, and have a beer, and hang out and relax. Unfortunately most places don’t cater to that preference, or have a good beer selection. Lucky for you, The Copper Door has a stress-free atmosphere with a fantastic beer assortment to choose from. The design of the place reminds me of Belgium/German style design with a very long wooden table in the middle of the bar with wooden benches. The bar itself is underground, which might make reception for you phone hard to come by, but the feeling of stepping away from the norm of reality makes it worth it.

Arriving to the tasting, my fiancé and I sat next to Greg from OC Beer Blog whom I have met before and thoroughly enjoy. Greg might possibly have the best quips and tasting notes on the planet so if you spot him at an event you should follow him around with a recorder because the stuff he says is gold.

We arrived right before the pouring began and Joe started speaking about the beer. We tasted several beers, in a very fast paced-fashion, and talked about the differences in flavor, origin, and complexities.

Chimay Triple White (8%ABV, 99 RB) - Hazy honey in color and served with a medium white head. Light fruit, dough, yeast smell with sweet flavor of fruity esters and yeast. Good carbonation and a bitter, crisp finish.

Lefebvre Blanche de Bruxelles (4.5% ABV, 61 RB) – Light, somewhat hazy yellow color with a lot of head. The carbonation is high, and the mouth feel is widely varied. The tartness is nicely balanced by the malty sweetness. The major flavor profile is the coriander and orange.

Grimbergen Cuvée Ambrée / Double (Dubbel) (6.5%ABV, 88 RB) – This beer was a nice change from the light Belgians, with a chocolate and toffee flavor and dark in color.

Van Diest Früli Strawberry Beer (4.1%ABV, 24 RB) – I like some fruit beers very much, but I was not a huge fan of this one. It tasted like lipstick to me.

Allagash Black (7.5%ABV, 98 RB) - bitter coffee chocolate darker ale with lovely change in flavor profile as it warms. The fuller body and carbonation shines through with a hint of oats.

Unibroue La Fin Du Monde (9%ABV, 99 RB) – “The End of the World” beer. This beer is triple fermented with a blend of different yeasts which give it a very unique flavor and very mild alcohol burn. If you haven’t had this one, you should.

North Coast PranQster Belgian (7.6%ABV, 92 RB) - citrus noise and a hint of apple, subtle spice flavor and mild carbonation. The interesting thing about this beer is North Coast uses a mixed culture of antique yeast strains that results in a floral nose, a full fruity flavor and a clean finish.

Allagash White (5%ABV, 94 RB) - spicy and light flavor. It’s got a terrific yeast profile and has some hints of herbs which remind me of basil.

Chimay Bleue (Blue) / Grande Réserve (9%ABV, 100 RB) – This is one of my favorite Belgian dark beers. This is a Trappist style, bottle conditioned strong ale with varied sweet yeast and malty caramel flavors. This beer gets more complex the warmer it gets.

The beers were paired with:

German Tea Sandwiches: Fennel sauerkraut, head cheese, smoked gouda, sweet & spicy mustardon on pumpernickel bread.

Gruyere Cheese Tuile: Smoked sausage with Gooseberry marmalade.

Red Cabbage Tart: Beer braised red cabbage currants and carrot mustard puree on a dill puff pastry.

The appetizers were very interesting and good. I particularly liked the red cabbage tart because the carrot puree was very tasty, and the cabbage was delightful. That’s saying a lot because I don’t really like cabbage. The cheese tuile was also good, and I liked the smoked sausage.

Overall, it was a very enjoyable evening where I had great food and amazing beer with marvelous people. The Copper Door is in downtown Santa Ana, right on the corner of Broadway and 3^rd street and are open Tuesday through Saturday between 8pm to 2am. Come and enjoy a beer with me there! 

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Holiday Rumpkin Pumpkin Cookies

In the spirit of the season, I made some pumpkin cookies with Avery Brewing Company’s Rumpkin Imperial Pumpkin Ale (15.9% ABV, 99 RB). Of course, I had to add more than just chocolate chips because I just can’t help myself which seems to be the perfect frame-of-mind for the indulgent holiday season.

I recently went to Julian with some friends of mine and my fiancé and one of the benefits of going to Julian is getting some of their amazing pumpkin butter. Trust me; it’s better than anything you can buy locally. Substituting regular butter in cookie recopies for “bedazzled” butter like: almond butter, pumpkin butter, etc. can really spruce-up a simple recipe.

Now, you can really use any type of pumpkin beer for this recipe but I chose Avery’s Rumpkin because it has a really unique flavor combination. The mix of oak, rum, pumpkin really pairs well with the cacao nibs, dark chocolate chips and pumpkin butter. The spice profile in the beer also complements the spices in the cookie, plus you get to have an amazing beer to drink while baking.

Ingredients:

2 ¼ cups of all-purpose flour (I added a few dashes of pumpkin pie spice and extra cinnamon and ground nutmeg to the flour)

½ teaspoon of baking soda

1 stick of softened butter (unsalted)

6 tablespoons of pumpkin butter (can use regular butter if pumpkin butter not available)

¾ cups granulated sugar

¼ cups packed light brown sugar

1 teaspoon of coarse salt (use vanilla bean salt if you have it)

2 teaspoons of vanilla

2 large eggs

2 cups of 60-70% dark chocolate chips

1 cup of cacao nibs

1 cup of roasted & chopped hazelnuts

Instructions:

1.       Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and whisk together the flour and baking soda in a separate bowl.

2.       Put both types of butter in an electric mixer with the paddle attachment and add the two sugars. Beat until light and fluffy, about 2-3 minutes. Add salt, vanilla, and eggs and mix until combined. Add the flour mixture and mix only until combined and no more.

3.       Take off the mixer and using a spoon or spatula add the chocolate chips, nibs and nuts and mix until evenly distributed in the dough.

4.       Using a larger spoon or cookie scooper (looks like a smaller ice cream scoop) drop little cookie mounds onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Place either 6-8 mounds on the sheets and no more. Bake 10 to 12 minutes, rotating once in the middle, until golden brown on the edges. Let the cookies cool for five minutes on the baking sheets, then transfer to wire racks. Cookies are great for the first few days but can last for about a week.

Happy Holidays from me to you!

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From Washington to Portland and Back: My Epic Beercation

For beer bloggers, myself especially, any vacation I go on typically turns into a beercation. No matter where I go I try and seek out the good places to go and the great beer to try. Recently I went to Vegas and was so frustrated by the lack of good beer swimming in a sea of domestic crap. Not all vacations are doomed for lackluster beer options! A few weekends after Vegas, we flew to Seattle, Washington to visit my sister. Flying in on a Thursday night, we were ready to go out and get started with our beercation on Friday.

 

We started our beercation at a poker tournament at a local casino in Kirkland where I hung on for a few hours but ultimately a bad string of cards took me down. Sean, my fiance, was uncharacteristically knocked-out in the first few minutes of the tournament and promptly went to play black jack and work on his All American Badge on Untapped. After the casino, we stopped by Black Raven Brewing Company in Redmond for a few drinks before lunch. I was shocked and fell instantly in love with Black Raven. I am used to seeing breweries in business parks, but never are they as big with as much seating as Black Raven. This is supposed to be small? No way! There was at least 10 or more tables and a bunch of seating, and I loved that all their tables and chairs were re-purposed wood with natural edges...it was a lovely touch. No matter how awesome and obsessed I was with the internal feel, all that really matters is how the beer tastes. I tried their Trickster IPA which was 7% ABV with 70 IBU's and it was pretty fantastic. It was a very drinkable IPA with a great floral biscuit flavor so it comes at no surprise that it won NABA 2009 Silver Medal - Strong Pale Ale category. This is a great local spot so if you are in the area you need to stop by - it's worth it!

 

Later that day, I convinced my sister to take us to Epic Ales because I have heard lots of positive things about them. Little did I know, it was the smallest tap room I have ever been to! It was probably a 9x10 room and a little counter with four taps and 22oz. bottles to purchase. The brewer, Cody Morris, was behind the counter and had two beers on tap but offered an additional taster for us out of a personal growler! Now that's what I call passionate! His beers are so interesting and innovative and prove to be true to the title of craft beer being that all the beer is made mainly by him in small 31 gallon batches. We tasted the Solar Trans Amplifier which is a Whitt with ginger and chamomile that has a nice crisp taste. Another beer we tried was the Cinco Plantas brewed with Epazote which a mexican tea leaf that has similar characteristics of tarragon and fennel. The last one we tried was the Partly Cloudy (from the growler) which was a summer seasonal that had some nice melon (cucumber?) and citrus flavors. We bought La Mesa Negra to take home which was a dark beer with some awesome sour notes. Bottom line: Epic Ales are bravely doing some seriously interesting things and don't seem to have anything I would categorize as boring. Check out their facebook page for event updates including their new "gastropod" beer dinners!

 

The following day we drove from Kirkland, WA to Portland,OR to visit as many Portland breweries we could in one day without getting too drunk. Sounds easy, but it takes some finesse because it's really easy to get carried away when surrounded by so many great places to try. Armed with my list of hopeful visits, we started at Upright Brewing Co. This was the one out of all of them I was the most excited to visit because they are so hard to get in Orange County. The brewery is downstairs in a celler of a business building, which threw me off at first, but I really enjoyed the atmosphere and the "secret society" feel going on down there. We tasted the Alphaphylactic Hop, Four, Five, Six, Offen Weisse, Engelber Pilsner and Flora Rustica. The one I liked the best out of all the tasters was Flora Rustica. It was flavorful and light and simply amazing. Also, I am pretty sure I spotted @SamuraiArtist getting cut barrels from Upright when I was on my way in. I was too chicken to talk to him though. Didn't want to have that awkward "I'm your friend on Twitter" conversation, I just wanted to get my hands on Upright beer.

 

The second place we went to from there was Hair of the Dog Brewing Company. This completely stole the show. The tasting room was nice and open with the garage-door roll-up wall (that seems to be very trendy in Portland and Seattle) and a bunch of stuff that you can order from the menu. Sean was immediately drawn to the 2008 Cherry Adam from the rare bottle list. We settled on that and four tasters each. I tried the Doggie Claws, Fred, Adam, and Ruth. They were all very good but Holy Crap was the Cherry Adam from the Wood 2008 amazing. It had a nice tart flavor with oak-infused alcohol burn. Needless to say, were were getting pretty hungry and Hair of the Dog's menu looked good so we ordered the pickled plate and the meat plate. It came with crusty-rustic bread and (best thing that I am now obsessed with) unsalted butter with sea-salt on it. Can everyone copy this please?! I now want sea salt on all my butter bowls that come with bread.

 

The third place we stopped was Cascade Brewing Company where I had their Cherry Lemon Quad which was really good. Their tap room was different because they literally had barrels that they were pouring from in the walls. I had met-up with some friends so I didn't get to try everything we ordered but from what I heard they make some amazing stuff. I am kinda upset I didn't get to try the Bourbonic Plague. From there we noticed there was a street fair going on and decided to stop by. We ended-up stumbling upon a Rogue garage sale where they were selling cases of their beer for ridiculous prices. Basically I had to hold Sean back, but that didn't prevent him from buying like 4 or 5 cases. From there we went to Rogue's Pub location in downtown Portland where I had their Raspberry Lambic floated on their Chocolate Porter which was fantastic. I am can't really enjoy a huge glass of Lambic but paired with a chocolate porter was heavenly. Also, I had a blend that was inspired by a Snickers bar which really came close to the real thing. Sean also bought way to much stuff because he spotted the Single Malt Whiskey and the Dead Guy Whiskey so needless to say it was an expensive day. From there we went to the Whiskey Soda Lounge (same owner as Pok Pok) and feasted on their amazing chicken wings and pad thai and oysters. Those chicken wings are seriously addicting! After eating we took the long 4 hour drive back to Kirkland.

 

The following day we went to Vashion Island for a Butchers benefit hosted by Skillet and Farmstead Meatsmith at Island Meadow Farm. There was an awesome video made which you can view here. We brought the majority of the Rouge beer that we had bought the day before, which was a huge hit with all the guests who came to the event. The event was a gathering/celebration for Farmstead Meatsmith who was recently funded on Kickstarter to start educating people about proper butchering techniques via free webisodes. A bunch of people who funded the Kickstarter campaign attended as well as the friends and family's of Skillet and Farmstead. The island farm where it was hosted was beautiful and buzzing with life. It was truly a perfect end to a grand vacation.

 

But wait, that's not all! The following morning my boyfriend proposed to me so I am now engaged! Sorry guys, I know you were hoping to seal me away, but it's too late and you lost your chance. We have tentative plans to have a destination wedding in Ireland! So I went to Washington with a boyfriend and flew home engaged...how things change.

 

 

 

        

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Spotlight on: Bootleggers Brewery

I recently wrote a long article in California Beer and Pizza online magazine all about Orange County Breweries. In the interest of making the highlights of the article, the brewery spotlights, easier to read and more focused I am going to post the excerpt about each brewery and all the photos. One photo per brewery can hardly do it justice, especially when each one has so much character and charm!

 

Excerpt from the article: Bootlegger’s Brewery began as nothing more than a class assignment for Aaron Barkenhagen, who came up with the business plan while enrolled at Cal State Fullerton. Bootlegger’s emerged in April 2008 with a mission to supply the local community with unique, handcrafted beer. Located in Fullerton, right on the outskirts of the downtown area, it sits as a gem of creativity. To me, Bootlegger’s is making some of the most interesting, eclectic and innovative beers in all of Southern California. Their tap room is small but personable. It’s a place to hang out and drink artisan beer out of mason jars and chat with the locals. If you are stuck-up and want to cry about not having enough places to sit, or how maybe their tables and chairs “don’t match”, then Bootlegger’s is not for you. You don’t deserve the amazingness that is Bootlegger’s beer. To me, it matters less what the tap room looks like, and more what the beer tastes like, and Bootleggers has great-tasting beer , period. Among some of the most notable beers is their ‘Black Phoenix’, which is a coffee-chipotle stout with subtle chocolate flavors to compliment the roasted coffee and spicy chipotle peppers. This complex beer is 6.7% ABV and changes the more it warms to room temperature. Also, their special-release ‘Knuckle Sandwich’ is a 10% ABV Double/Imperial IPA that creates lines out the door just to get a taste of it. One of my personal favorites on tap right now is their ‘Plum Riot’, which is a Belgian style at 7.8% ABV. ‘Plum Riot’ has a nice light and fruity aftertaste, and all the subtleties that one would expect from a Belgian style, and a unique flavor of plum. Bootlegger’s continues to push the envelope and make interesting beer that is ever rotating, which makes it easy to keep coming back again and again.

Flickr photo stream here!

 

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