Blogging again? The rest of SAVOR

Well,
It's been my longest stretch without posting on this blog. And I've finally given into the guilt.
A lot has happened this summer, so I figured I'd finish off with the SAVOR Post and continue with everything else, post by post.
Savor was, as one might expect. Amazing.
Friday, I met Greg at the hotel and he rented a bike. With me on foot, we cruised around the city, stopping at wholefoods, and the NY Farmers Market. We finished the run with lunch at Birraria, the Dogfish Head and Italian Brewer collaboration restaurant on top of the building that housed the renowned "Eataly." The Night was spent going to the Blind Tiger, and a few other bars.
That night was spent having dinner at the hotel with none other than Garrett Oliver, Brewmaster of Brooklyn Brewing Company.
The event itself was glorious. There were samples of food paired with every beer. An Oyster Bar, a Cheese Bar and a Chocolate bar. I met a lot of really great people and ate and drank a lot of fantastic crafted food and beverage. New Holland did a Salon/Pairing with Smaug's Breath and Barrel Aged Night Tripper.
That night we had dinner at a great gourmet restaurant with the guys of Left Hand and Bell's. I took off around 1am and biked home on a Citibike.

I wish there was more to say, but having been almost 5 months ago, and several more posts to go, I'll keep it short.

Pre-SAVOR Day 1

Luck would have it, I get to go to SAVOR!
My first experience with this event was over 2 years ago while sitting in the living room of our senior house, cleverly called "The Dump." We were watching one of the first episodes of brewmasters on the Discovery Channel. It was the premier release of Dogfish Head's "Bitch's Brew" at the Savor event. I told myself I had to go someday.
Well that day is today.

A recap of yesterday:
I got to the Airport around 8:00am for a 9:55 take-off connection to Washington DC, whereupon I would have a 3 hour layover before another flight to NY which would get me in around 4:00.
At 9:15 the lady called me up to the podium and asked why I was hopping around so much? Why don't I just take a direct flight to Newark? Well, hell ya! I said. It left at 11:00 and we arrived at the Newark airport at 1:15.
Following trips on several units of transport, I checked in at the ACE Hotel (the rooms are very hip and cool) and hit the roads for some miles. Did a loop and a half around central park for nearly 11 miles. Got back to the hotel, showered, and met Fred in the lobby for a drink before taking off for the night's events.
Irony would have it,
We waited for a cab for a few minutes, and one drives up. And who gets out? Sam Calgione of DFH. He greeted Fred like old friends, and we shook hands.
This trip is going great so far.
We took our cab to a place called Spuytan Duyval, a beer bar in Brooklyn with an old apothecary atmosphere with old wooden saloon-like decour and jars of vegetables and fruit lining the backbar. Their tap-list was dominated by beers I could hardly pronounce...Aside for the New Holland Tap-takeover we were having.
We hung out there for a couple hours for Fred's debut book signing (an awesome book by the way: The Beervangelist's Guide to the Galaxy)
Ate some dinner from a local place called Fette Sau. I actually ate ribs... But trusted Greg on where they came from.
We left around 9:15 to head over to the Brewer's Pre-SAVOR-party at Brooklyn Brewing Co. Where faces like Charlie Papazian were in attendance. Had some great beer, and mingled with fellow industry folk. They had a couple food-trucks lined up outside (in the rain). I had a bunch of veggie pitas and their Greek feta fries.
Around 10:45 or so they gave last call and we downed our last beers and pitas and headed to a place called Barcade, a large bar with, you guessed it....a lot of arcade games. The taplist was pretty fantastic too. I ordered a Festina Peche (Berliner research), of which would be my last beer of the night. Water followed. By 1:00 I was ready to go. Fred and I and another fellow industry guy left to head back to Manhattan.


I brought my shitty camera, but only got a few photos before it just stopped working, I'll post what I have when I get the chance.

Cheers!

Brewing Kvass at New Holland Brewing Co.

I first heard of Kvass during my Junior year in college whereupon I was researching different possibilities  of making beer. This went along with my interests of other fermentates such as Kefir, Kombucha, Saurkraut etc...

Conveniently, my brother at the time worked at a Hyvee Bakery in Iowa City. Almost daily they threw away their stale bread, without even giving it to any soup kitchen or anything. My senior year, I asked Luke if he could save me a couple boxes worth of the bread. Weeks later, he had accumulated three larges containers worth of predominantly stale white and wheat loaves. I knew that traditionally Kvass was formulated on rye and other dark breads, but I had to use what was available.

First kvass Homebrew (Feb. 2011)

My first attempt was a bit of a crap shoot. I sliced all the bread into smaller pieces, threw a couple pounds of malted wheat along with clove, cinnamon sticks and bay leaves, all into the mash. I don't particularly remember the rest of my procedures, but do recall that it was fermented with a wild (house cultured) yeast and blended with Lemon and Kombucha. This sat for nearly six months to fully reach its potential. The finished product tasted extremely similar to a pilsner and was just as bright!
I brought a bottle to my interview at New Holland.

Brew Day inventory (300+ Loaves)

Fast forward a couple years later from my first kvass brewday and I got the opportunity to brew a version on a commercial 10 bbl system at New Holland's brewpub. I had been collecting bread from various festivals for nearly 4 months prior. Similarly, De'Boer's bakery would drop off the occasional box of hardly stale, sliced bread; and I would frequent Crust 54 on most weekends to pick up what was left of the stale bread. By February I had accumulated nearly 300 loaves, all that was left was tank space and a brew day to fit into the schedule.
Brew Day

Every type of bread

April 2 rolled around and I had my opening. The night before I took all the bread out of the pub freezer and let it defrost in the brewhouse area. I had planned my recipe around some traditional aspects, but with the intention of balance and complexity.



To the mash:
 - 200 Ibs Pilsner Malt
 - 50 Ibs various malted grain (Abbey, Special B, Ruby, Pale, Crystal 45)
 - 300 Loaves of bread (Wheat, White, Rye, Raisin, Spiced, Multigrain, even some cheddar bread!)
 - 20 x Cinnamon Sticks
 - 1 Ib crushed Coriander

The decision behind this recipe was to use the malt to be more of a fermentable sugar and biscuit backbone to fuel the bready flavor profile. Using just the bread would not get my intended gravity of 2-3.5% ABV (though the traditional Kvass stands only between .5% and 1.5% ABV). Similarly, Kvass utilized whatever ingredients could offer a source of sugar, therefore to comply with that tradition, I used whatever stale grains that were left in partial bags around the brewery. The cinnamon sticks and coriander further encouraged some bready, spiced complexity.
I preheated the mash and began mixing in the grain. Once all the grain was added, I continued to maintain temperature around 160 to ensure enough body and residual sugar in the finished product. My next step was to add the bread. This took quite sometime, as half the loaves were whole and unsliced. I did my best to slice all the bread. The mashing process took a little over an hour. One recommendation here is to use as much water as possible so as you work on adding the bread, the grain bed settles and the makes its own floating mash and doesn't make a sticky aggregate of soup, thus potentially clogging the mash when it comes to sparging.

Filled the entire Mash-Tun with bread!

The run-off went well and the boil lasted 90 min, during which 1 Ib of cascade was added and 2.5 gallons of molassas. I used our normal house yeast for fermentation of which will take an undecided extent of time. Gravity came out to be around 9.5 Plato, and it's finishing around 4.5-5.0 Plato. This ultimately will get us an alcohol of 2.5% ABV...Perfectly sessionable. The wort smelled of ginger snap cookies and toasted rye bread.

I will post tasting notes upon its packaging.

Cheers!

Tim

Sticky mashout

Weekend/Day Beer Adventures: Sour Beer tasting in the Quad Cities

Man, has it been a while since I last posted. After such a long hiatus, I'm going to get to posting again, and limit other external distractions that have prevented my time for posting (i.e. facebook).
Here is a tasting I attended at Against The Grain Brewery & Alehouse a while ago. Rich is trying to host one at least every quarter. Everyone brought a bottle or two as an entry into the event. It was limited, which was nice - as everyone had an opportunity to try everything in an adequate amount.
One of the show cases of the night was a 50+ year old Belgian Sour that had made its way from a deceased mans basement collection in the 1950's through several Ebay driven beer geeks hands into the Quad Cities. Anyway here is what we tried:

Lindemans Cuvee Rene

White wine complexity and grapes skins. Balanced along with fruit and apricots

50 yr old Belgian Lambic

Musty kombucha and slightly acidic

The Bruery's Mother Funker

Lemon sour warhead and warm pineapple undertones

Crooked Stave L'Brett D'or

Malty, fresh fruit finish and peach pith notes. Grapefruit and muscat grape

Mikkeller Sour Bitch

 Definitely more faint. A dry tannic lycée fruit element

Brouwerij Fonteinen - Schaerbeeske Kriek

 Barnyard smell and scratch and sniff aging cherries. Smells and tastes medicinal. Acidic finish

Crooked Stave Nightmare on Brett

Blended plum fruitiness complexity. A little hot dry empty/hollow. Still green

Cuvee De Ranke

Balanced tart plum. Encourages a swollen tongue

Brouwerij Fonteinen Oude Geuze

Nectarines. Lots of hops bite in back of throat. Dandelion notes in the finish

The Bruery's Sour in the Rye

Rye malt is heavy in character with some caramel. Really sour bite at finish and grapefruit aftertaste

Note: this was my first actual sour beer tasting! Thanks to all the QC folk who invited me.

Not pictured: New Holland Blue Sunday and New Holland MI Nightmare

Weekend/Day Adventures: Hop Cat Hoptoberfest

I had known about this festival for several weeks prior to the event date, but was unsure whether or not New Holland was attending. Late in the week preceding the event, Eamon let me know that we were indeed entered in the fest. Here goes round 4 of festival season:

Friday 9/14/12:

The Scoby/mother

Rewind a bit just to include some cool stuff: I spent part of the day tasting through some barrels in the warehouse to decide what will making it to the Festival of Barrel Aged Beers (FOBAB). The latter half of the day was spent kegging my first creation at the pub, and New Hollands first ever, Kombucha! After work I hit the roads for an 8 mile warm-up and then the track for 3 x mile, avg 5:03 for all of them. With 13 miles in for the day, I was ready for some beer. 

Deciding which bottle was Charkoota/Dragons Milk

The plan was to meet Eamon at 8th St. for the Short's tap take-over, but with the bar being overly crowded, we ultimately decided to skip that and head immediately to Grand Rapids. There, we and picked up Dave, made a few more stops and then headed to the Hideout for their multi-tap release. The event entailed beers ranging from: Sour-cayenne stouts, to harvest hop and Michigan based Octoberfests. Still, I found myself enjoying their mainstays over all else. Spending several hours there eventually got the best of us and we decided to make our way back. Again, thanks to Teresa for hooking us up!

Saturday 9/15/12:

Where to begin...

Woke up. Ran 5 miles. Fed the miles.

THEN, the drinking begins.

Poet is a Smoked beer???

I had yet to experience the famous Logan's Ally, that I hear so much about. Apparently they cater to a lot of 3rd shift workers, and conveniently make their "Happy Hour" from 7AM-11AM! We took full advantage of this and made a quick pit-stop to peruse the menu. We eventually split (ironically) New Belgiums Hoptoberfest. Delicious.

Our Crew

We made it to the Festival around 11:05 for set-up. Our beer was already fully hooked up and ready to

 pour. The line-up consisted of Hatter, Poet and Ichabod, with a Firkin of Poet under the table. We set up the banner, decorated the table and distributed what swag we had been provided by the events crew. Interestingly, the kegs were not on ice, but were perhaps chilled enough to hold some temperature throughout the day. The tap boxes were coils and stocked with ice, so fortunately that was enough, it seemed, to ensure an adequate serving temperature. I did manage to get one of our kegs into the Founder's ice bins for some extra chill. Thanks guys.

We met our volunteers/pourers, and I walked them through a quick tasting to get acquainted with our beers. 

The festival started at 12.

It seemed that the first two hours consisted of a trickle of people, but gradually picked up after that. By the start, Jack had joined us and we perused the booths discusssing and tasting a wide variety of Michigan breweries (The festival was exclusively Michigan, FYI). I've found that attending these festivals are great opportunities to meet local brewers, sales reps, and brewery owners, as well as a chance to learn a great deal of all facets of the industry. 

Hop Cat Bean Wrap

For the 12 hours we were there, time did in fact go pretty quickly. 

Midday, around 3:30 we decided it was probably best to eat something. Taking a break from our festivities, I got an opportunity to taste some of the food at Hop Cat. I ordered their bean burrito spinach rap. Not bad, and it was also the first time I actually ate fries in as long as I can remember. After lunch, we went right back to it. Much of the rest was pretty consistent with what we normally do at most fests. Meet people, talk beer and New Holland, and have a good time. And, because we've been attending so many festivals lately, we're getting to see some pretty familiar faces. Shout out to Chaz, brewer at Schmohz.  And Zara, whom we met at the Mitten Bar at the Ludington beer fest. Also, thanks Kaitlin for the beer.

The man on stilts

The end of the night resulted in a dropped growler of some high end beer. Nice work, Eamon.

And we finally wound up getting dinner at Brewery Vivant. This was the first time I had a chance to try their food, and it was pretty damn good. I ordered the Vivant Burger, which Jack claims to be the best in Grand Rapids. I know, you're saying - "Tim, YOU ate a burger?" Yeah, I figured if I was going to have one, what better place to do it than somewhere that really puts work into their food. Still, I think prior to that night, I hadn't had a burger since....Junior/Senior year of college? Anyway, it was great. Eamon got the Duck Confeit  Nachos and a beer he probably didn't need. I had limited my drink consumption for a couple hours, so I DD'd it home for the night.. 

What a day.

Sunday 9/16/12:

I had been thinking about jumping in to bandit the Credit Union Bridge run 10 miler this morning, but that wasn't going to happen.

Over the night I realized I hadn't had much water, so I ended up consuming several pints of water. Woke up feeling pretty good, except for the normal creakiness that comes from running so much. Anyway, the Hop Cat was hosting a brunch for the attendees of the festival, which guaranteed breakfast and coffee/OJ with the presentation of your ticket or badge. We decided to get our running in and ran to the event. With 5 miles under the belt, I was pretty hungry when I arrived. To be honest, though, the food was to be expected when you're catering for 2,000 some people, and not very conducive to someone who, up until Saturday night is rather health conscious and vegetarian. but props to them for going the extra mile!

The plan with brunch was they were to open at 10 and start pouring the left over beer at 12. We were too early to wait around so...hit the roads for more miles and more beer. The next destination was Logan's Ally again. We ordered the Short's Stout and Finch's Threadless IPA.

Logan's Ally

The final stop on our brewery/bar run led us to Harmony Brewery, and a worth while stop indeed. They had just opened their doors and were in the process of doing a photo shoot for the November Grand Rapids Magazine issue. We sat at the end of the bar and ordered some beer as the Adam (the photographer) did shots of Heather (the bartender) pouring pints/samplers and mix drinks. To our luck, the drinks headed our way! I have very little experience drinking mixed drinks, in fact my first one was only a couple weeks ago at the pub. Man, they tasted good! If I knew the names of them I'd tell you, but I'm at a loss. One was chocolate and patron infused and coagulated a bit if it went untouched for several minutes. Another was, from what I can best describe, a Grapefruit Mojito? and a few others.

And, better yet, we got some good photos too, with the chance of being in that issue too!

We also had the chance to talk beer and barrels with Heather (co-owner) and perhaps the chance of getting Harmony a New Holland barrel for some collaboration?

After that, and with 12 miles under my belt, we headed back to Eamon's house, and I got a ride back to Holland.

What a weekend. Until next time,

Cheers!

Weekend/Day Adventures: Ypsilanti Summer Beer Fest 2012

This weekend marked my first beer fest experience with New Holland. The Ypsilanti Summer beer fest is a two day event taking place Friday and Saturday July 27-28th. This beerfest was celebrating their 15th year of presenting and worshiping amazing craft beer within the state of Michigan. I was fortunate enough that the week leading up to this event, we were testing the waters with brewing 4 batches a day. Taking the 10 hour shifts throughout the week freed up Friday to drive down to Ypsilanti (Aside for some minor technical difficulties earlier in the week that would push a Dragons Milk to Friday). Thanks to Dave for taking/finishing the rest of the brew so I could go.
Friday 7/27/2012
In any case, I arranged to start the brew at 7:00 a.m. - to get in a couple more hours for the week before leaving. 10:00 rolled around and Steve and I got some last minute things into the Star Rental Truck and we hit the road.
We arrived around 1:30, or so and started the day by blowing a tire right as we entered the festival park. Luckily we the truck had double tires. Unpacking went quickly, unhindered by the brief rain storms that were in an out for the first couple hours. New Holland took the end spot of one of the big tents. We set up "Elvis" alongside one of our 6-tap barrel bars - of which would face the public. The other barrel tap -bar that we apparently normally bring to these festivals was out of action so we used a typical 5-tap tap box cooler for the remainder, ultimately totaling 14 tap-handles. Most of my time was spent preparing the taps and figuring out what beer would go for what taps. We decided Elvis would take Beerhive, Dragons Milk and the 15th Anniversary. The 5 head tap-box-cooler got most of the mainstays and the barrel bar hosted most of the hatter. The day was a blast, even with the sporadic rain. The VIP/Brewers tent was catered by a local restaurant. They even had Veggie burgers (I think I ate 5-6 of them). I sampled some great beers from around Michigan, of which I had never had. Finally, as festival day one wrapped up, we did some cleaning and organizing and I hit the roads for a run (I know, I can do that after a day of drinking). The rest of the crew went to the brewers tent for the time being, and we all planned to be back at the hotel around 11pm. I ended up getting in a solid 15 miles on the roads!
To round out the night, we drove back down to the festival grounds, parked and went and got a pizza dinner at "Aubrey's"?. I was gassed by the end.
Saturday 7/28/2012
I was hoping to get in another run in the morning, just so I wouldn't have to make it so long after the fest. THAT DIDN'T HAPPEN. Groggy and sore, Isaac, Steve and I just got a light breakfast at the hotel and continued down to the festival grounds. It was the big day for the fest.
I had the chance to get a lot more exploring done. With the sun out and the heat rising, it made for the perfect conditions for a summer beer fest. Brett and Fred also arrived today. Similarly, I had a good homebrew friend drive up from Iowa to attend (well, he was more there because his girlfriend just moved to Detroit, but it all conveniently worked out) Thanks Ben!
I had the opportunity to also talk extensively to the folks at Unity Vibration to learn what it takes to produce commercial Kombucha, both with alcohol and not.
Throughout the day I would stop back at the tent and help pour for an hour or two, but we seemed to be overstocked with volunteers, so my job was made easy....get out there and talk/learn.
Around 3:00 was the tapping of the firkins, in which a "Firkin Virgin" was selected to tap their first firkin. It definitely brought on a show!
Because I'm writing this nearly 2 months later, the rest of it lacks much detail, but nevertheless, The festival ended around 7pm? and we packed up the truck (now with a fixed tire). I hit the roads for another run, only 9 this time. Got back to the hotel, showered, and everyone headed to a barbecue bar that was hosting a New Holland Tap Takeover. Much of the menu was meat, so I ended up getting mostly fried okra and mushrooms. However I did try some ribs!
By 11pm I was ready to pass out. We got a cab and headed back to the hotel for a brief sleep, only to get up at the crack of dawn to head back to Holland.

Thanks to all for a fantastic weekend, and I'll try to get these out more on time next time. Below are the photos from the fest:

The tire to start it all

Isaac Shotgunning with some Brewers

Not sure why meat is on there?

Unity Vibration

Next to a tall guy

Firkin Virgin!

Chugger

Happy 4th of July

Drink beer, enjoy fireworks and savor the outdoors!
I know I did...

Sitting atop a rock mound on Lake Macatawa drinking a
GRB Farmer Brown

Weekend/day Beer Adventures: Grand Rapids, MI

The Mural outside Pyramid Scheme

This past weekend, as some may know, I biked to Grand Rapids. Since moving to Holland, I have already made the trips to Grand Haven (22) Saugatuck (17) and Hudsonville (14) but had yet to really experience the night life in GR. Jen and I had made a quick trip out there to check out some of the brewing scene, but I wanted something more thorough. Eamon had offered to show me around and provide some housing during the trip, which would work out perfectly. So, following work on Friday (6/22/12), I dropped my pay case of at home and rounded up some stuff (i.e. running shoes, shirt, wallet, camera and hammock - just incase) and headed out. It was pretty hot out and I didn't bring any water. Therefore, I hit up the halfway mark at White Flame in Hudsonville for a quick pint. I had heard they had recently tapped a new hopped wheat, and for every pint a dollar went to breast cancer research fund. It was worth it. Drinking for a good cause, what's better? While there, several publicans heard I was making the trip and they started telling me of all these different routes I could take - only to confuse me more. I will one day, but the objective here was at least to GET to Grand Rapids. I settled up and hit the road.

Friday (6/22/12):
Grandville was a bit dodgy, but to my surprise, after speeding down a hill on Grandville Ave, I found myself in front of Founder's Brewing Co! I gave Eamon a call and we figured we could meet at Harmony Brewing Company as I had been there before and I relatively knew the general direction from where I was. I arrived an ordered a pint of the Cranberry Wheat (See the rest of my visit at Harmony).

BOB Spotting

Following Harmony, the decision was made to check out the Pyramid Scheme, of which was one of Eamons favorite wattering holes in the GR area. He had told me that they had a special connection with Short's Brewing Company and therefore was fruitful with their taps. Traveling by bike, we hit the down hill and made it there in a matter of minutes. The atmosphere of PS reminded me a bit like Three Floyds, but with a theme of Dynosaurs and Pyramids. Very colorful, but dimly lit. They had an arcade room and an open front that reminded me a lot of bars in Australia. We sat at a high table and ordered some beer. The taps certainly were over run with Short's. We split a pint of the Mustard Seed Pilsner - which carried the must common to the ground seed, but with a pleasant sweetness and the common bite in the finish from noble hops. And a basic session ale (the drink of the night predominantly revolved around session ales, as we were hitting quite a few bars). We had been in contact with Jack (the newest member at New Holland before me), so he arrived and we drank one more while contemplating our next stop. Decision landed on the B.O.B. as long as they didn't have cover, which they did. We finally decided on checking out Brewery Vivant, where we would meet up with Jack's Wife. With crumby bikes, we staggered back up the hill towards Eastown. Arriving we found a table right on the patio and ordered drinks. I got the Hefe, and I'm unsure what everyone else got, by then I was beginning to feel the taxation of the biking and beer. We stayed at Vivant for quite some time. When we were nearly finished with our drinks we were welcomed to get a brief tour of the facility. It was pretty cool, especially with the familiar C.A.S.K canning system. (Brewery Review coming soon). We settled up (Thanks Vivant for the discount!). By now, I was pretty buzzed and exhausted, but Eamon demanded we go to the Green Well, across the street. We ordered a sampler (which I don't remember of what) and closed the place out, By then it was around 12:00pm and we biked back to his house.
Saturday (6/23/12):
Today was Founder's fest. We figured most beer lovers would be there and the other local breweries would be empty. Right we were. I woke up around 7:30 and downed some tea. Since I brought my running shoes, I wanted to hit some roads for a quick run. We mapped out a 5 mile loop. Eamon runs a lot (70+ mpw), and he's in good shape, except he runs at 8-9 min/mile. Even for not running in a while (foot injury) I don't think I could do that. So we planned on clicking off some 7's, which, while still taxing, were manageable. Did that 5 in 34 minutes, nothing special, but Eamon said that was a pr. Haha. Following the run we ate some beans and headed out to check out Schmohz (See the rest of my visit to Schmohz).
We left and stopped to recover a bit at Eamons house. The next stop was the Hideout Brewery, which we planned on biking to because it was a bit more bike friendly to get there than Schmohz. Nevertheless to my surprise, the hills were a bitch! but the reward was worth it. (see the rest of my visit to the Hideout)
After leaving the Hideout, we headed a different route back, intended to be along the river. Prior to that however, we stopped at a small grocery store that boasted a very large beer selection. I found a bottle of Bear Republic's (my favorite brewery) 27th Anniversary Ale. I also bought some organic spinach and basil seeds and a bag of local tortilla chips to curb the plummeting blood sugar hunger from all the beer.
We headed a bit further down the road and stopped at Graden's Crossing, another beer bar that has an enormous selection (including Hatter on Cask) and locally sourced food. We split a 12 Oz tall can of Resin by Blue Point Brewing Company in New York.
Following that stop we biked all the way back to the B.O.B and Pyramid Scheme to check for Eamon's keys (he had lost them the night before, only to realize they were gone this morning), so back tracking commenced. No luck there. We then made a quick stop at Meanwhile, where Eamon said a couple friends were them. I wanted to check out the Eastown street fest so we split ways an I headed back to Harmony. To my dismay, the street fest was over, but it gave me an opportunity to try Harmony's pizza, which looked exquisite. Minutes later Eamon, Matt and Dave arrived and we sat at a booth for some pints. Eamon's dad arrived and told us to head down to a sports bar down the street where all the older folk were drinking. We did, and stayed there for a couple hours. I thought it was in my best interest to drink water after the long day, and it definitely payed off in the morning. After that, we headed back to Eamon's house and I was passed out by 10pm.
The next morning was chill. Woke up. Downed some tea. watched Dogs 101 and was on the road by 11:45.
The ride home was arduous and long, but I made it back an hour and 45 minutes later (took me 80 minutes to get to GR from Holland).
Well, that was my weekend in Grand Rapids. Thanks to Eamon and his parents for housing me and to all the breweries that made the experience worth our while. Stay tuned for next weekend.
Cheers!