Tag Archives: Philadelphia

Elysian Avatar IPA


Elysian Avatar IPA

Orig­i­nal­ly uploaded by J T. Ramsay

Helen and I stopped in at the Abbaye for brunch this morn­ing and I stum­bled upon yet anoth­er inter­est­ing brew from the good peo­ple at Elysian.

What made this IPA stand out is its sub­tle fla­vors. Elysian’s Avatar IPA does­n’t bowl you over with high alco­hol con­tent or over­pow­er­ing hops. A hint of jas­mine makes this an insane­ly refresh­ing IPA and at just 5.6%, it’s prac­ti­cal­ly eli­gi­ble for ses­sion beer status!

This could be a sta­ple at my house this sum­mer, if I can find it locally.

Philly Brewing Co. Birthday

Philly Beer Co. Birthday

Orig­i­nal­ly uploaded by J T. Ramsay

I was able to sneak over to cel­e­brate Philadel­phia Brew­ing Com­pa­ny’s first birth­day this after­noon with a cou­ple plas­tic cups of Ken­zinger. It’s hard to believe that it’s only been a year since their brand of deli­cious brews flowed forth from the site that once housed the mighty Yards Brew­ery, which has since relo­cat­ed to Delaware Avenue.

In that time, they’ve deliv­ered some great local beers for a great price. If you’re look­ing for a ses­sion beer this sum­mer, look no fur­ther than Ken­zinger. For my mon­ey’s it has all the best aspects Yards Philly Pale Ale offered, but just a lit­tle more refreshing.

My per­son­al favorite? Row­house Red! It goes with just about every­thing, while main­tain­ing its own dis­tinct personality.

No Repeat Beer Week @ Memphis Taproom

Lest peo­ple start to think that this blog is going to focus exclu­sive­ly on the issues fac­ing the music indus­try, I’m writ­ing today about anoth­er one of my pas­sions: craft beer! In the past year or so I’ve got­ten very seri­ous about the beer I drink, thanks in no small part to Bren­dan, Leigh and every­one at my amaz­ing local bar, Mem­phis Tap­room. We Philadel­phi­ans are also for­tu­nate to have Lew Bryson and Joe Six­pack, two of the coun­try’s best beer crit­ics, right in our own back­yard! So while I’m not going to attend any of the offi­cial Philly Beer Week events, but I’m mak­ing the most of Mem­phis Tap­room’s No Repeat Beer Week…and then stum­bling home happy.

Last night Helen and I were joined by our friends — and new neigh­bors! — Rick and Grace for a nice din­ner, which ulti­mate­ly evolved into the girls going home and us boys geek­ing out to some new beers. I can’t think of a bet­ter way to wel­come them to the neighborhood!

What did I drink? Jess was kind enough to loan me a pen and I used one of their handy beer menus as a check­list. I tried one of each of the following:

What did I like? I’m par­tial to every­thing Elysian does. I enjoyed their Bifrost Win­ter Ale immense­ly and look for­ward to try­ing more of their stuff. My local dis­trib­u­tor’s even stock­ing it now! The Loki Lager had an amaz­ing fin­ish that demands your attention.

Any­one who knows me knows that I’m a suck­er for an IPA, even though I’m try­ing to break the habit of default­ing to these some­times over­pow­er­ing beers. What can I say? I’m a total hops-head!

Dog­fish Head makes some of the most nuanced beers I’ve ever tast­ed, and the Red and White was no excep­tion. They’re always work­ing on anoth­er lev­el in my opinion.

My sur­pris­ing favorite? The Ipswich Orig­i­nal Ale. I know! I’m shocked, too! Lew Bryson says it’s going to be a big year for ses­sion beers, and if they’re as sat­is­fy­ing as this one, who could deny him?

Let’s just say it was an amaz­ing way to cel­e­brate Philly Beer Week in my ‘hood! Be sure to stop by and sam­ple some of the great stuff they’re tap­ping this week at Mem­phis and Cumberland!

Happy Birthday, Geekadelphia!

If you’re a Philadel­phi­an and you’re not already read­ing Geekadel­phia, this would be a good rea­son to start. Why? They’ve just cel­e­brat­ed their one year anniver­sary as a blog, which is like a cen­tu­ry in blog years, at least accord­ing Hip­ster Runoff. These guys have been fill­ing the Fun Vam­pires void late­ly with lots of fun stuff, par­tic­u­lar­ly all the deli­cious, nerdy baked goods that they high­light from time to time. Hap­py birth­day, guys!

Fishtown Library Rally on Channel 6 Action News

Chan­nel 6’s Jes­si­ca Borg cov­ered the Save the Fish­town Library ral­ly last night. You can see me sport­ing my Phillies play­offs hood­ie and hat 37 sec­onds into the clip. I want­ed to post this not only because I think that this is a sto­ry that deserves a great deal of vis­i­bil­i­ty, but also because I want­ed to note that not every­one present felt that Bill Green’s com­ments artic­u­lat­ed what we want from the City.

As a Philadel­phi­an, I want it all. I don’t want to sac­ri­fice things like the Office of Sus­tain­abil­i­ty. A lack of sus­tain­abi­ity is how we got here in the first place. The hous­ing mar­ket was­n’t sus­tain­able; now it beg­gars us. I want the City to pur­sue an aggres­sive pol­i­cy toward bik­ing. I ride a bike and want to be safer as I com­mute to work. Why can’t we have that and our libraries, too?

What we may be see­ing is the down­side to May­or Nut­ter and Gov­er­nor Ren­dell endors­ing Hillary in the pri­ma­ry. I hope that’s not the case and that Pres­i­dent-elect Oba­ma can see why our politi­cians endorsed his oppo­nent but then worked hard to ensure that Penn­syl­va­nia went his way in Novem­ber. If there is mon­ey out there for banks, insur­ers, the auto indus­try, and unpop­u­lar wars, there needs to be mon­ey for ordi­nary cit­i­zens, too.

This makes me won­der what’s next for Fair­mount Park. I vot­ed ‘no’ on that bal­lot ini­tia­tive specif­i­cal­ly because the only thing I’ve ever seen the Recre­ation Depart­ment do is close pools. I seri­ous­ly hope Nut­ter and City Coun­cil aren’t con­jur­ing up ways to sell off our com­mon wealth. We real­ly need to do better.