Lazy Sundays on the Beach

The last full day of our Adult Spring Break was spent on the beach. It was a beautiful day, although slightly chilly due to the wind coming off the water. By 11am we packed up the cooler…it could have been the most expensive selection of beach beer we’ve ever taken out to the beach! We decided to bring a few of the beers we bought the day before on a surprise shopping spree at the Piggly Wiggly of all places.

Our Relaxed Beach Beer Tasting:

Terrapin Side Project #2: Roggenrauchbeir

Flying Dog Wild Dog Collaborator Doppelbock

Weyerbacher Blasphemy Quad Belgian

Well’s Banana Bread

Sam Adam’s Blackberry Witbier

In between beer tastings we went across the street to our favorite pizzeria at the beach…Basil’s. Other than eating and drinking we spent the afternoon wrapped up in towels while reading, chatting and taking walks. Tara and I were not exactly smart when it came to remembering that the sun was quite strong and we ended up with a nasty sunburn on our feet. So we headed back to the beach house and set out for ingredients for dinner.

We threw together the most amazing dinner of grilled scallops, NY strips, chipotle lime shrimp, asparagus and the last of the Beecher’s Mac & Cheese. AMAZING!! Dinner was followed by more beer tasting!! Hitachino Nest Espresso Stout, De Struise Black Albert, Dogfish Head Immort Ale, Great Divide Espresso Oak Aged Yeti Imperial Stout and Southern Tier Imperial Choklat Stout. Our last day at the beach was exactly what we needed…it was so nice to do nothing and no one cared that we did that!

Myrtle Beach Beer Fest

Our long weekend at the beach was centered around the Myrtle Beach Beer Fest. Even though it was cloudy and we had a round of spinkly rain, the beer fest was really fun. This was the first year it was held. We’ve been to several other Beer Fests and while this was smaller, it was also less crowded and much more relaxing and enjoyable. Despite a lot of your typical domestic beers, we were able to try a few local brews as well as others we just have not had the chance to try for one reason or another. It was also a great way to try different styles that I don’t normally like such as IPAs. Tara and I were the talk of the festival with our Foothills Sexual Chocolate Imperial Stout shirts! Rick decided to the be the oddball and wear and Dogfish Head t-shirt.

My favorites were Clipper City Loose Cannon, Hook & Ladder Backdraft Brown, New Holland Poet Stout, Foothills Peoples Porter, RJ Rockers Buckwheat, Stone Smoked Porter, New South Nut Brown Ale and Thomas Creek Deepwater Dopplebock.

The festival was held in the new Market Street Commons. Afterwards, we ate at Gordon Biersch for a late lunch where I had the beer sampler, then walked around the shops. The trip was not complete without a beer-buying spree in the Piggly Wiggly of all places. What a great selection…we came out with Founder’s Kentucky Bourbon Stout, Southern Tier Java, Wild Dog Collaborator, New Holland Dragon’s Milk and Great Divide Espresso Oak Aged Yeti Imperial Stout!

We were pretty exhausted from beer tasting, so dinner consisted of leftovers and the most amazing Mac & Cheese from Beecher’s in Pike Place Market…all the way from Seattle. My sister in law, Julie sent it to us since it’s the best comfort food she knew of. We were instant fans and plan on ordering more. It’s shipped fresh and ready to bake! DELICOUS!

Beachin' & Shoppin’

Thursday evening, we departed for a great vacation at the beach with our friends Tara and Rick. Even after arriving at almost 11pm, the night would not have been complete without a very tastings of beer!

Friday morning, we were pretty lazy getting up and relishing in the fact our coworkers had been at work for quite awhile while we enjoyed Lemon Poppy seed muffins and fruit salad in our pjs. Our morning also included a quick walk on the beach.

Since it was cloudy and raining we decided on shopping for the day's activity...a little retail therapy was really needed after the week I'd had! The boys were not too thrilled and dropped us off while they went to the movies. Bad mistake! Two girls running around the outlets for almost 4 hours...we did some damage. We ended up buying out most of Ann Taylor Loft, but there were some amazing deals. We each ended up with a new spring wardrobe and I found dresses for the upcoming bridal showers and weddings in the next few months. Ben and Rick were pleasantly surprised when they picked us up that we had gifts for them too! They got a lot of matching things (including matching cowboy hats and beer boxers)!

For dinner, Ben and I introduce the Kups to T-Bonz...our absolute favorite place to eat the beach. The meal would not be complete without an appetizer of Tommy Fries, baked potato wedges smothered with cheese, bacon and ranch dressing. I could barely eat my dinner! We all brought home leftovers.

Friday night was our official beer tasting night. We tried 8 different beers and different they were. It always seems our beer  tastings end up with all Stouts and Porters, but we had quite a few Belgians included this time. For several hours we spent hovered over tasting sheets, making notes and discussing beers like a bunch of nerds!  Here's our list:

Drunkin' Punkin'
1809 Berliner Style Weisse
Thristy Dog Raspberry Ale
Stone Vertical Epic
Struise Pannepot
Żywiec Porter
Terrapin Side Project #4 Dos Cocoas Chocolate Porter
Thristy Dog Siberian Night Imperial Stout

Finding January & February…

I’ve been slacking in my blogging world, but January and February have flown by. We’ve been incredibly busy getting back into the swing of things after the holidays. Ben’s school load has seemed to pick up and my work seems never ending. I guess with year-end close was expected to be crazy given the crazy market the past few months.

We did get to do a few fun things…lots of beer tastings with our friends Tara and Rick. We also tried a few new restaurants and beer pubs in Raleigh. I highly recommend The Raleigh Times!!

So scroll down to see what we’ve really been up to the past few weeks. Hopefully I’ll have a few new recipes to add soon as well.

Foothills Brewing Company

Earlier this month we took a day trip to Foothills Brewing Company in Winston Salem with Tara and Rick. We were very fortunate enough to get 8 of 600 limited release bottles of their Sexual Chocolate Imperial Stout…which equates to 1.3% of the World’s supply (yeah I’m a math dork).

You know we’re beer snobs when we wake up at 5am to make the drive to Winston Salem and stand in line for 3 hours just for one particular beer. It was definitely worth the trip and the fun times we had in line meeting other beer snobs. And beer snobs are always nice and hospitable – offering tastings of rare beers they brought, such as The Dark Lord Imperial Stout, Abyss, Cottonwood Hazelnut Stout, Highland Kashmir and Mikkellar Black Hole. After we purchased our 8 bottles of Sexual Chocolate, we enjoyed a glass on tap, lunch and a flight tasting of their other brews. Ben had an amazing Cuban sandwich with pulled pork, while I enjoyed a Buffalo Chicken Wrap. As far as their other beers we were all in agreement that Torch Pilsner was not good at all…most of the other beers are just ok, however the Total Eclipse Stout was pretty good too. Of course there is no disputing how great the Sexual Chocolate Imperial Stout is. After lunch we took a short drive a few blocks down the street to City Beverage and bought even more beer. This was a great store with an amazing selection of beer. They had an in-house bar with 3 different beers on tap that you could try. Also, they have great deals on cases at rock bottom prices.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! We hope you had a wonderful 2008 and had fun celebrating New Year's Eve!

Ben and I celebrated New Years Eve with 3 other couples. We had an abundance of food & fun! We ate dinner at Maggiano's, Family Style, and surprisingly 8 adults were able to quickly decide on two of each appetizers, salad, pasta, entrees and desserts within a reasonable amount of time. The food was delicious as always, and I always overeat, but I guess that's what New Year's Resolutions are for!


After dinner, Tara and Rick hosted us to watch the ball drop with champagne and of course an impromtu beer tasting. They had just gotten back from NJ and picked up tons of beer that you can't buy in NC. What better way to ring in the New Year...with good beer and company!


Looking back, 2008 was a great year for us. We bought our house and made it our home, took a few little weekend trips and vacations with family, celebrated our 2nd Anniversary, Ben graduated with the first part of his degree and started the second part at ECU, and of course all the time we were able to spend with each other, family and friends!

In 2009, we're looking foward to seeing the economy improve a little and beef up our savings, complete the backsplash and microwave addition in our kitchen, being apart of my college roommate, Stephanie's wedding in May, possibly a trip to Seattle and enjoying the small things in our lives that make it so great!