Captain Lawrence 10/30

One of the many reasons why I love Captain Lawrence Brewing Company, you never know what you are going to find on the bar. Today was a cask of the DIPA with pineapples. I am not a fruit beer fan but this was fantastic. Don't ask me how they get those big pineapples into the cask.

It's Back

and it as i remember it.

Last meal in Milwaukee

Back to the Comet Cafe after the last race for brunch. Once again, we got seats at the bar, very little waiting. Spinach and bacon omelette, rye toast, hash browns with a Three Floyds Alpha King. Chris got the pancake, eggs, bacon, hash browns, rye toast and coffee. Not a brunch fan but needed the belly full for the plane ride home.

The Giant Pumpkin

Temporary Halloween store in the parking lot of the Pettit Center. It is a huge pumpkin. Supposedly last year or the one before, this got blown over in a huge wind storm. Now that would be a site.

Caribou Coffee

At the Quality Inn we got free Breakfast but I needed coffee so this was the stop every morning on the way to the rink. A midwest coffee chain, good coffee, changes style, like every other coffee shop, everyday.

Back to NY

New Galrus Enigma, New Glarus Abt, Bells Expedition Stout

Fatty Boombalatty

Furthermore Brewing Company - Belgian Pale Ale. Very nice beer from Spring Green, WI

Jelly Belly Land

So after skating on Saturday, Jelly Belly Land was calling us, only 40 miles south of Milwaukee to a place of yummy goodness. In reality, it is a  trip on some cool disney like trains that just drive around the warehouse. No factory, no seeing Jelly Belly production in process, just Andy driving the train, stopping in front of projection screens shaped like jelly belly's and tv's giving us the history and the how to's of Jelly Belly's
Received a free bag of jelly bellys and let off in the store to sample some and purchase a lot. The coolest thing is that they have the Bean Boozled flavors; baby wipes, boogers, barf, pencil shavings, toothpaste, moldy cheese, canned dog food as opposed to dry food, centipedes, rotten egg and skunk spray. Who are the tasters that sit around and make booger flavored beans, how do they know what boogers taste like. Do they sit around and say" that is a good booger flavored bean that you came up with, jean?"

Gumballhead

Hotel beer. Three Floyds from Indiana. American wheat style, not my style but this beer is fantastic. Usually i find American wheats kind of like pale lagers ut this is one tasty beer. Unavailable in NY so any chance that I can drink some Three Floyds, I do.
On a side note, a friend of mine's brother in law used to work for the brewery. That and $2 will get you a 24oz MGD at Grand Central

Culvers

lets get to the right to the point, i don't eat fast food, you name them, i don't eat them, maybe but once a year i will eat at McD's and feel it an hour later, but when we hit Milwaukee, we need Culver's butter burgers. Culver's is a family owned fast food restaurants located in Wisconsin. It is a standard fast food joint with burgers, chicken, and other items that you would not find on a burger restaurant.
This is a very good fast food joint with, get this, happy employees. When you order your food, they give you a number tag and cups for your soda, you then go sit down and they bring your food to you. even better, in the drive thru you pay and they give you a number, you pull into a spot so the person behind you doesn't have to wait for your order, and guess what, they bring your food to you in your car, amazing.

Table number tag

Car number tag

The best part of Culver's is the burger, it is a normal sized fast food burger but if you notice the toppings are on the bottom with the burger on top.. These are very good burgers and we hit this place twice every 3-4 day weekend in Milwaukee. They also have very good frozen custard.

Culver's is far better than Kopp's in the burger department

Frost

Frost on rear view mirror, WTF? It is only October. Welcome to the midwest

Sprecher's IPA2

Hotel beer to watch with the Phillie's/Giants game. Local beer, it was alright, not what i want in a double IPA, lacking a lot of double. Wasn't that bad, tired from the 3:30AM wake up call that morning to get to Milwaukee, fell asleep and didn't finish it.

Sobleman's

The first place we hit for dinner when we hit Milwaukee is Sobleman's for bacon burgers.
http://www.milwaukeesbestburgers.com

 Thanks to Wisconsin's law that allows minors to sit at the bar and eat, we never have to wait. With the tables all full, we always seem to get a seat at the bar in about 3 minutes. The burgers are good and inexpensive. This is our go to place to start our skating weekend. Bartender put on Phillie's playoff game or should i say the Giants playoff game upon our request

Of course Sprecher's Root Beer on tap in the proper glass
We are there for burgers, beer selection is passable, along with $1.50 MGD 64's special and the bucketload of PBR's that they sell, hey it is Milwaukee, they keep the local Lakefront Stein Beer on tap.

Capital Octoberfest

They serve all of there beers in the proper labeled beer pint glasses. For a glass geek, i appreciate this.

I am not an Oktoberfest style fan, not my choice to order but Capital makes some good beers, is from Wisconsin, ad was between the Lakefront, which i had may times and a beer never tasted, Captial won out and I enjoyed it very much. Not getting into tasting notes because i was in a bar, no pen/paper and i was there for the food.

School Visit - Official Absence

Toured the school

Sample Store - Brookfield, WI

So right after we finish at Kopps, we hit Brennan's, just across the parking lot the greatest sample store in the world. As the sign says, that is what they sell but the reason that they are so great is the samples that they put out for the customers or non customers. every type of fruit is sliced and diced for you to taste; 2 types of pineapples, 6 types of apples, plums, melons, bread, at least 5 different types of chips, salsas, peanut butter, juice. Then you go to the beer and cheese side, no samples of beer but at least 6-8 cheeses, summer sausage, olives. For the sampler folks, glorious.
They have a decent wine selection, a so so liquor selection and a decent beer selection. They tend to have some not to famous west and mid west breweries and tend to stay to the middle of the road in beer styles but i did see a barleywine there. Not a bad selection if you are staying in a hotel and want a couple of beers to drink during your stay. Our last day in Milwaukee they even had there very own, expensive ice cream to sample, sweeeet.

Kopps

Chocolate Thunder - a custard named for Darryl Dawkens??

Sprechers Root Beer- the first of many

Kopps Butter Burger

Milwaukee is about the butter burger. Kopps puts a pat of butter on the bun before they put the patty on it so by the time you get your burger, it is all melted. Supposedly there is a rivalry, per say, between Kopps and Culvers, I will speak on that later. Kopps is a large diameter patty, McDonald's thinness, with free onions, fried onions, pickles, and condiments. They charge you for let/tomatoes, bacon and a few other items and of course they have Sprechers Root Beer on tap. Sprechers is a brewery in Glendale outside of Milwaukee that makes a bunch of style of beers, a large portion German styles and they also make 7 types of sodas, with the root beer the best and most famous.

I did not think that the Kopps burger was really that good, to salty, more bun to meat ratio, so-so.

Kopps does have really good frozen custard tho which i think that they are more famous for than the burgers

Back in Milwaukee 2010

So we are back in Milwaukee for some more speed skating at the Pettit Center. 4 days of training and racing and eating and a beer or two, hey it is Milwaukee.
I took photos with my camera phone and i think that i created this blog just to see how they came out.
Actually got to see some Olympic skaters race in person but really the highlight is watching Chris compete.
Wisconsin is a pretty crazy state, up until June, you didn't need insurance on your car, smoking in bars is still allowed, i think, i didn't go out of my way to find out and if you are 15, you can drink with a parent/guardian, Crazy.

new blog

i really don't know why i am creating a blog, i have nothing to say or am i very interesting. I don't read too many blogs, i think that people write blogs because they need to heard when nobody is listening.

So, i hope you aren't listening.