First date with a handful of beer

I’m sitting at the coffee shop, sipping a double espresso, my feet kicked up and my mind wandering through the future. What beers will be enjoyed tonight? What hops will I meet and ask back for more? I’m meeting a gal for the first time. Yep, something of a blind date, I guess you could say. And besides one’s eyes, I’ve heard beer is a beautiful window into one’s soul! Wink wink!

I’ve invited her down to the Yard House. And being one of those so-called “beer snobs,” where else am I going to take her but the Yard House? Classic rock, rocking sliders, and more beers on tap than comedian Lisa Lampanelli has booty calls on speed dial. And we all know, she’s admitted to a lot!

I meander through Town Square to the Yardhouse and head through the doors. I always look left before I look right. Gazing into the transparent keg room where up to 600 kegs of tapped goodness find their home. All is well. “We’re not running out tonight,” I laugh to myself as I find a valuable seat at the bar.

Stone Pale Ale

The bartender says hi and plops the drink menu down in front of me, which coincidentally is more like a “drink book”! Without looking I ask for a Stone Pale Ale (http://www.stonebrew.com), and keep the “book.” A cold pint of Stone arrives, and the gargoyle’s smooth ale calms me a bit. Hey, give me a break! Even hardened beer nerds like myself can get a little nervous on a blind date. A few minutes later, I hear a plate crash to the floor somewhere near the front, which is almost immediately followed by my phone purring with a text.

“I just got a plate thrown at my head,” the text reads. Hmmm… I put my phone back on the bar. Well, ladies and gentleman, she’s here…

We find each other and greet. She’s cute and looks like a mix between a sexy woodland fairy and a trendy hippie vegan. I’m sure her shoes are some variation of environmentally friendly fair trade pleather, made by union protected gnomes in a solar powered, grey water equipped, resort-like factory, hidden deep within the Himalayas. Yet it works for her. Sexy and different. I decide against asking if the “environmentally friendly pleather gnomes” have an IPO coming in the near future. I mentally joke to myself about offering libation for the gnomes and find a table for us outside.

Lindemans Framboise

We start chatting it up, and before long our server has arrived. She orders a framboise (http://www.lindemans.be/start/home/en/). Not my choice of beer, but nice. It’s a Belgian beer fermented using raspberries. And she certainly emits the colorful, sweet vibe. I test her beer knowledge, joking that it’s a good thing her beer was not made with “sour cherries.” She doesn’t catch the reference to traditional Kriek beer, which is made with sour cherries and is the inspiration for framboise, but her smile quickly engrosses me, and we chat on.

Our waiter returns, and the two of us order. The California roll looks good to me. Her, the spicy house salad. She double-checks that there is no cheese on the salad. Yep, did I nail the vegan thing or what! To distract myself from the thought of being lectured on the fact that the crab in my Cali roll has a nervous system and felt pain, I have her order the next round.

Dogfish 90 minute Imperal IPA

Smithwicks

I quirk my head to the side in unexpected pleasure when she orders Dogfish 90-min IPA (http://www.dogfish.com), and a Smithwicks (http://www.smithwicks.ie),  pronouncing “Smithwicks” correctly too! 90-min IPA is a staple in my fridge, and the Smithwicks fondly brings back memories of many amazing snowboarding trips. The huge hoppy kick of the 90-minute tempered with a raisin-like citrus aroma says this girl can hang. It says, “I’m not afraid of stepping outside of the fake corporate beer box of piss-colored consumerism to enjoy better.” And she hedged her bet with Smithwicks, a red ale brewed in Ireland’s oldest operating brewery. Not bad. Not bad at all.

We chat and eat away. The California roll is one big roll, which our server says is best eaten with a fork. It’s exactly how a California roll should taste but with the added fun of digging in with my fork. Not one piece of rice, cucumber, snow crab, or avocado goes to waste. It’s nice not to have to make my wasabi sauce for once, with a wasabi soy sauce already on the plate. She’s happy with her spicy house salad as well. She offers me a bite, and I take it. Although it’s a bit of work to try to get broccoli, bean sprouts, carrots, AND wontons on the fork at once, I manage. The spicy mixture melds well. It too tastes good.

We decide to cool off inside and pay our server. She offers to go Dutch, and I instead suggest she leave the tip. I watch to see how much she leaves. 15 on 50. Nice. Hey, what can I say? Good tipping woman are sexy!

Sam Adams Cherry Wheat

Deciding to have a dessert beer at the bar before we move on, I let her order again. Sam Cherry Wheat is her choice (http://www.samueladams.com). Not a home run, yet there is something about sweet cherries on her lips. Is that the 90-min talking? I grab my beer. “I’ll be right back,” I tell her, and walk outside to the edge of the patio for a minute. This has been a great night. Not what I expected, but a great night nonetheless. Hell, who would have guessed I’d learn scallops don’t have feelings?

I turn to return inside after my scallop pondering, only to splash a bit of cherry wheat on a healthy looking plant. I chuckle, and a lady looks over from her table with a quizzical smile. “Just pouring a little out for the gnomies,” I say with a smile. Yep, somehow, it all just feels right.