Dennis and More

We are supposed to awake to many inches of snow.  There is no snow. A light snow begins and continues throughout the day.  Boulder gets at most two inches. It's not often one gets to regress to an earlier time.  By the time today slows to an end, we'll have returned to our college days; and why not when in the college town of Colorado University.

We organized to meet Dennis at the grand opening of Boulder's newest brewery; Vision Quest. We met Dennis and his wife Kathy at the O.B.E.R. Christmas beer festival in Essen, Belgium last December.  Actually we met them the evening before in Antwerp at purportedly the world's most incredible beer bar. Kathy is absent since she takes two year teaching assignments overseas.  She's currently in Armenia.

Arriving shortly after one, he's already there and well known to the owners.  The brewery is collocated with a home brewers supply shop and Dennis is a home brewer of mead. Their double chocolate stout and English porter are very good. Once again we purchase a small growler without having one with us.

Lunch is calling and we transfer the drinking flag to Twisted Pine. The Imperial Stout that we tasted in Denver is on the tap list as is its older brother the 2009.  The aged version is excellent. Their chili beer is the second best after Wasatch in Park City. Carol's white pizza and CJ's Mexican pizza excel. While there we sample a braggot for the first time.  Dennis has convinced us to try mead.

Our next stop is Redstone Meadery. We're walked through a sampling of a nearly twenty meads with expert commentary on quality from Dennis. We find the variety of meads to be varied and enjoyable.  Who knew?

 

 

Our final stop of the day is at Southern Sun Pub and Brewery.  CJ and their general manager, Michael,  have a discussion about our taste profiles. He returns with six very generous pours of complimentary samples; plenty for each of the three of us to sample more than once. We're tempted having nearly reached our capacity for the day to leave without buying a round. We enjoy a final round before going our separate ways.

 

 

 

The  "picture" above is a chalk drawing.  Every week someone comes in and changes the chalk drawing.

We stop at Hazel's, a huge beer, wine and liquor store. At checkout they inform us that we'll recognize more than a $16 discount if we have their club card.  Failing that, they ask if we know anyone local with a card. We offer up Dennis and sure enough he is a member.  What is the chance one comes 2500 miles across the country and then when asked if they knew a local offer up a name and hit the jackpot.

Aspirations of a fine dinner have long been replaced with fatigue and an afternoon of four breweries. CJ continues to wrestle with the idea of a trip up the road to ski at Eldora in the morning.  Stay tuned tomorrow to see how his dilemma turns out.