San Fran Fest at Victoria Gastro Pub

This Monday, Victoria Gastro Pub is having a "San Fran Fest" featuring beers from San Francisco and parts nearby. The list as of Sunday evening is as follows:

1)21st Amendment Brew Free or Die IPA
2)21st Ammendment Hell or High Watermelon Wheat
3)21st Ammendment Back in Black IPA
4)21st Ammendment Bitter American
5)He'Brew Messiah Bol
6)He'Brew Rejewvenator 2009
7)He'Brew Rejewvenator 2010
8)He'Brew Origin Pomegranate Ale
9)He'Brew Bitter Lenny's RIPA
10)Moylan's Hopsickle Imperial IPA
11)Lagunitas IPA
12)Lagunitas Pale
13)Lagunitas Lucky 13
14)Lagunitas Little Sumpin Sumpin
15)Schmaltz Human Blockhead
16)Schmaltz Sword Swallower
17)Schmaltz Lager
18)Schmaltz Freaktoberfest

San Francisco -- hill tops, steep drops, organic crops and fresh hops, CHEERS!!!

Victoria Gastro Pub American Craft Beer Week Events

Victoria Gastro Pub in Columbia is having a huge selection of beers for American Craft Beer Week, broken up nicely into fun themes. You can find the full taplist (.pdf) available at their website with some very interesting offerings.

Here are the themed days:

Monday: "The Dog Fight On Draft" featuring Dogfish Head and Flying Dog taking up all 24 taps plus two firkins

Tuesday: "To Live and Die in P.A." featuring Troegs, Victory, Lancaster, Stoudts and Weyerbacher

Wednesday: "California Dreamin" featuring Sierra Nevada, Stone, Lagunitas, Anchor, 21st Ammendment, Anderson Valley, The Bruery and North Coast

Thursday: "Sleep is Useless, Welcome to New York!" featuring Ommegang, Southern Tier, Brooklyn, Saranac and Southampton

Friday: "Root for the Home Team!" with Pratt Street Ale House/Olivers, Heavy Seas, Brewers Alley, Flying Dog, Evolution and Stillwater's Stateside Saison on cask

Saturday: "Ahhhh fuh Pete's Sake This Bah Has Some Wicked Good Beaaa!" with Harpoon, Smuttynose, Allagash, Otter Creek and Wolaver's

Sunday: "Welcome to the Mile High Club" with Oskar Blues, Great Divide, Avery and Boulder.

Howard County Pub Crawl

Looks AMAZING and since hitting Howard County's four elite beer bars as your own driver is not advisable try this option to check out some really cool beer bars in one swoop. The proprietors and bartenders at all four spots are great people.

Click on the image for more details but essentially, sign up at T-Bonz for the trip with other beer lovers ($50/head) and have them provide a ride to four of the great beer bars in Howard County -- T-Bonz, Frisco Grille, Victoria Gastro Pub and The Judges Bench.

You'll be able to hang out at the various establishments and sample (5 oz) four beers at each stop (more if you wish, on your dime) and then be escorted back to T-Bonz for some delicious grub.

That goes off Saturday May 22nd as part of the annual American Craft Beer Week.

Coincidentally, Saturday is also "New England" day at Victoria Gastro Pub with selections from Harpoon (MA), Smuttynose (NH), Allagash (ME), Otter Creek (VT) and Wolavers (VT). That's some good stuff to try while on the bus trip!

Pratt Street Ale House Invades Victoria Gastro Pub

Be sure to stop by Columbia's Victoria Gastro Pub (conveniently located immediately off Rt. 100 on Snowden River Parkway) for a neat Pratt Street Ale House event.

Victoria will be pouring eight (!) PSAH taps including Hot Monkey Love (first batch!), Cherry Blossom Ale and 3 Spires Ale.

Brewmaster Stephen Jones should be on hand at some point in the evening, as well as souvenir pint glasses.

Flying Dog Victoria Gastro Pub Event

Speaking of Flying Dog, they'll be at Victoria Gastro Pub tonight (Monday) from 5 PM onward with a huge selection of beers plus rep Matt Crow and special guest brewer Matt Brophy.

On tap:

Doggie Style Pale Ale (firkin)
Gonzo Imperial Stout (nitro)
Kerberos Tripel (retired!)
Road Dog Porter
Garde Dog (end of the season)
Double Dog Double Pale Ale
Old Scratch Amber
Raging Bitch

Stoudts At Victoria Gastro Pub

Stoudts Brewing will be making an appearance at Columbia's Victoria Gastro Pub Monday. Stoudts family member Eddie Stoudt will be on hand, and he'll have five taps and a firkin with him. The last time he was at Victoria they featured an unusual firkin of Fat Dog oatmeal stout aged with cherries and chocolate.

According to my notes the firkin this time will be their America Pale Ale. The new Karnival Kolsch will be on tap (a sure sign Summer is on its way) and again, according to notes, the Old Abominable barleywine should be on tap.

Festivities begin at 5 PM.

Victoria Gastro Pub Miscellaneous Pics

1 & 2)Tonight's (Wed 3/4) complete beer menu ahead of the Allagash Beer Dinner

3)Barman Alex's (empty) bottle of the extremely rare The Bruery Black Tuesday

4)Alex showing how much he loves that beer

5)Oh and he also picked up a Russian River Brewing Co. Pliny The Elder for his own uses. Seriously Alex, drink that! Its only fresh for so long.

6)Looks like the Dunkin' Donuts across the way is finally open ...

Victoria Gastro Pub Behind The Scenes I

MANY thanks to Victoria's excellent bar manager Alex in giving me a view into the world behind the bar at Victoria Gastro Pub.

1) Its a mess of kegs and lines sometimes, such is life with a 24 tap system

2) Self explanatory

3)Pressure and lines and beer, oh my

4)Some of the bottled offerings

Victoria Gastro Pub Behind The Scenes II

1)Barman Alex proudly displaying a new arrival: Brewdog's Tokyo

2)Bottles, kegs and barmen

3)The arsenal

4)The good stuff

Victoria Gastro Pub Behind The Scenes III

1)The tote board!

2)Lookie lookie what do we have here?

Picture Dump

1)I think that was some kind of IPA at Frisco Grille

2/3)Cool foaming head with bubbles of a pint of Flying Dog Raging Bitch at Victoria Gastro Pub ... addicting.

4/5)Lighting was dark but listings of two Brew Dog special bottles aged in unique whiskey casks from the Victoria Gastro Pub bottle menu.

Sierra Nevada Night at Victoria Gastro Pub

This Monday is Sierra Nevada night at Victoria Gastro Pub.

They will be pouring the much-hyped Life & Limb and Limb & Life (they have about two sixtels of each), plus:

Glissade (a golden bock)
Harvest Wet Hop
Anniversary

All on tap, starting at around 5 PM.

Stoudts Night at Victoria Gastro Pub

Today (Monday) starting at 5 PM is Stoudts night at Victoria Gastro Pub. They'll have several Stoudts beers on plus a rep and one of the Stoudt family members on hand.

Of special note is a unique firkin being poured: the Fat Dog oatmeal stout aged with cherries and chocolate

Also:

Scarlet Lady ESB
Abbey tripel
Pils
Gold Lager

PS ... keep up to date with Victoria beer and dining news at their brand new Twitter account.

Ommegang Chocolate Indulgence at Victoria Gastro Pub

Victoria Gastro Pub, Monday

Tonight, Allagash Ommegang (d'oh!) beer is the theme at Beer Club night at Victoria Gastro Pub (no membership needed).

They'll have Hennepin, Abbey Ale, Chocolate Indulgence and something else I'm forgetting, on tap.

The fun starts just about any minute now (5 PM). Cheers.

Howard County Beer Roundup

-- Scan to the bottom to find Frisco Grille's calendar of events for this month. Featured pint nights include Pratt Street Ale House/Oliver Breweries on Wednesday the 13th (perhaps even a visit from brewmaster Stephen Jones!), He'Brew on the 20th and Dogfish Head on the 27th.

One change: this Wednesday (the 6th) will be a Flying Dog pint night, starting at 7 PM per usual (more exciting details in an upcoming post). Also, Firkin Thursdays as usual, starting at 4 PM.

This Thursday's firkin will be the always excellent Flying Dog's Doggie Style Classic Pale Ale.

And, if you haven't already, bookmark and regularly visit Frisco Grille's handy beer page, which lists up to the minute what is available on tap as well as their bottled beer list and what's "on deck" to be added to the taps whenever.

-- On January 31st T-Bonz in Ellicott City is hosting a 'Pints and Pancakes' breakfast from 10 to 2. The $5 entry fee nets you a free pancake breakfast which will also featured breakfast style beers and drinks. I have it on good authority a very special one-off beer from a local brewery will be one of the *breakfast* themed beers featured. Also, music from the Grilled Lincolns.

Side note on T-Bonz, I only discovered they were a beer place by stopping by for the food. Lo and behold its actually a legit craft beer bar as well, with around 10 taps and an interesting collection of bottles and seasonal themed offerings. Nobody talks about them but seriously they're probably the best (craft beer) thing going in Howard County after the Holy Trinity that is Frisco Grille/The Judges Bench/Victoria Gastro Pub.

-- The Columbia Mall's Champps will play host to a Heavy Seas Pint Night on Thursday January 7th from 5-8 PM. Has their beer menu changed lately? It was mostly the usual corporate stuff last time I was in there (a long time ago, mind you). Hmm ...

-- A branch of the Union Jacks pub group is apparently opening in Howard County (I think HowChow mentioned that a while back?), hopefully their beer list, however British, trends slightly crafty as well (Pratt Street Ale House offerings, anyone?).

-- And last but not least, Victoria Gastro Pub. Beer man Alex provided me a wealth of items to discuss yesterday so here goes:

This coming Monday (January 11th) is Ommegang night with their beer club. 'Mr. Ommegang' as Alex calls him will be in person, along with the Abbey Ale, Chocolate Indulgence, Hennepin and 3 Philosophers.

On Tuesday (January 12th) is their St. Bernardus beer dinner with a big line of St. Bernardus offerings (6,8,12) on tap including the rare (on tap) wit. Actually, the wit is on tap right now. If you're curious I'd advise scooting on down there pronto. I think Alex said they only have about two sixtels of each beer so between the dinner and general customer use those should go pretty fast.

Victoria's February beer dinner (Wednesday February 10th) will feature the Allagash brewery, featuring Fluxus '09, Interlude, Hugh Malone, Victor and the black.

Something I'm really looking forward to: an Abita themed night on Fat Tuesday, February 16th. Their chef will be cooking up crawfish (!) and several Abita beers from Louisiana will be available on tap including Andy Gator, Turbo Dog, Bock, Purple Haze and Jockamo.

Sometime towards the end of January they'll put on Unibroue's hard-to-find Trois Pistoles. This beer is released in exceedingly limited quantities to good beer bars.

Also lined up for beer dinners: Rogue in April, Trappist beers in May, Samuel Smith in June, Southern Tier in July and a Scottish beer dinner in August (think Brew Dog, Tracquair, Orkney) plus probably some opening and closing scotch from one of the Glen's.

A selection of beers "on deck" at Victoria: Dogfish Head's World Wide Stout and Fort, Jacobin Cuvee Rouge, Smuttynose Robust Porter, Avery The Czar, one sixtel each of Dogfish Head/Sierra Nevada's Life & Limb and Limb & Life, Avery's Dugana, their last three 1/2 kegs of Stone's Sublimely Self Righteous Ale, Southern Tier's Choklat, Piraat and Brewers Art's Green Peppercorn Tripel and Cerberus (!).

Pratt Street Ale House Cask Night at Victoria Gastro Pub

Late-breaking here, but Pratt Street Ale House will be providing three casks at Columbia's beautiful Victoria Gastro Pub *tonight* (Monday) (5 PM+):

Oak Aged 3 Lions, Old Habit (brown ale) and Best Bitter.

I assume affable brewmaster Steve Jones will also be on hand. I might even sneak in but heads up regardless, and kudos to Victoria for upping the ante and diving into cask beer the last month or so.

Heavy Seas Cask Night at Victoria Gastro Pub

It is on TONIGHT Monday December 28th starting at 5 PM at Victoria Gastro Pub in Columbia.

They will be featuring Heavy Seas Loose Cannon, Yule Tide and Small Craft Warning on tap PLUS two special casks:

A Below Decks (Barleywine style) aged in white oak and an Oak Aged Winter Storm.

Be sure to swing by one of the most beautiful beer bars in all of Maryland for the event!

Flying Dog K-9 Cruiser at Victoria Gastro Pub

Its biscuity when sharply cold, warms up all malty goodness. From last night's Flying Dog event at Victoria Gastro Pub. Say hi to barman Alex when there and tell him to add a Twitter account for the bar :). And if you're at a Flying Dog event in Maryland, Rep Matt is probably the man in charge, one of the absolute best beer folks out there in a field of good people.

Busy Wednesday

Couple events to consider!

1)Flying Dog pre-view party of their Raging Bitch Belgian IPA at Firestones in downtown Frederick. It goes from 6 PM onward featuring $3 pints of the Bitch and their K-9 Cruiser Winter Ale.

2)Wild Goose's Snow Goose and IPA will be featured for this week's Pint Night at Frisco Grille in Columbia. After 7 PM a purchase of the featured beers will net you a free custom glass (while supplies last).

3)Victoria Gastro Pub in Columbia is hosting The Great Belgian Beer Fest. They'll have 20 specially selected Belgian beers on tap until they kick, starting at around 5 PM.

4)This one's hot off the wires -- Clipper City owner Hugh Sisson will be at Max's from 6-7 PM signing bottles of their new excellent Winter tripel, Yule Tide.

Be sure to follow my Twitter account for items like this and much more.