Kea

Crafty, thieving, little buggers.  Alpine parrots and the coolest birds I've ever met.  Yeah, met.  They were full of personality.

    

Yeah, yeah, we climbed some mountain in New Zealand.  ALPINE PARROTS!  There are parrots that live on mountain tops in New Zealand!  And steal your things.

Look at that face.  He's telling you to step away from your pack.  Aren't I a lovely bird, yes, photograph me, pay no attention to the Kea sneaking up behind you.  

Seriously, I can't remember the mountains name.  It had some name like "Mount Lovely-View" or 

"Mount Fair-Weather." "Mount Holy &%@ Alpine Parrots, HEY! Give me back my hiking pole!"

Seriously, out-smarted by a bird.  Yes, yes photograph me, and all of a sudden, sh*t, it has wings, it's going for your pack!  They didn't take anything from us.  Successfully.  But one guy had his camera bag stolen.  If you go hiking in the southern alps: watch your stuff.  There are thieves with wings.

Sorry, this is a lazy post.  The point is the Kea Photos.  Neat birds.  Not much more to say, easy summit in Arthurs Pass, South Island.  I could have spent hours on top photographing the Kea, but we had a waterfall to hike to next.

Don't stop moving

This is a story that could have ended much differently but for coming prepared and dressing properly.  And dumb luck.  Only 20 something miles.  Five peaks, wintertime, mostly bushwhack.  10% chance of 1/4" of rain.  No biggie.

We'd driven through the night and staged two cars, with about a 2 hour drive between them, for a through hike.  

We both fell in a river within the first hour.  I fell first.  It seemed to have a thick enough layer of ice to walk across the top, but it did not.  Helicoptered out like a cat and between the snow pants and gaiters actually managed not to get wet.  He tried another approach, walking uphill to a narrower section and jumping.  Landed face first in the river.  Kinda wish I'd had the camera ready.  We were both fine and carried on.  The rain started around noon, and was relentless.  1/4" my ass.  I'll need to buy some new rain gear because it did nothing to keep the water out.  But we had layers of synthetics and as long as we were in motion, were fine.  It was harder to walk in the sludge with rain beating down on our faces, but we carried on.  By the time we were at the base of the final peak, which could have been avoided, we decided to go for it anyway.  We summited, and were fine.   We kept moving.  It was cold out, but beneath our layer of synthetics we were sweating.

The adventure started when we got back to the car.

Rain turned to snow.  Fast falling snow.  Luckily we were in his car with 4 wheel drive, or I'm not sure we'd have made it.  Stupidly, our dry change of clothes were in my car.

By the time we were in the car and in motion, there were at least 6 inches of snow on the dirt road, and building.  It was hard to see where the edges of the road were, but I'm pretty sure that I would not have driven off of it.  Unfortunately, I was not the one driving.  Flash of panic.  Now we've been sitting for 20 minutes.  In our drenched clothing.  With the heat on full blast.  We're going to die.  How far along was the last house?  Pretty far, I think.  It's -10 degrees out there.  How much gas do we have?  We'd be better of naked.  What were we thinking leaving our clothes in the other car?  Obviously we weren't.  Ok, we have to do something.  

I don't know why the first thing we tried was having the girl push.   But that's the way it usually was.  He'd get us into a mess and it'd be my responsibility to save the day.  Perched on a tree above a rushing river, pushing his kayak out from under it with my feet because he thought he could jump it.  Yeah.  So we were getting nowhere with him steering and me pushing.  The edge of the road was a ditch filled with muddy water.  I don't even know how deep, but this is a small car without much clearance.  4 wheel drive but low to the ground.  I started collecting sticks.  Getting colder and more and more worried.  Forcing sticks under the tires.  Why am I the one outside?  Put them behind the wheels, behind!  Maybe we can reverse out the way we came in.  Get out here and help!  I convinced him he was stronger and we switched places.  He pushed from the front and I reversed out.  Tires spinning and ohmygod friction!  I'm moving, ohmygod we're out ! We're on the road!  Get back in here!  

I stayed in the drivers seat.  Took it slowly and carefully, down the very center of the dirt road.  The sun was up before we made it to pavement, but we made it to pavement.

Pleased

That was easier than expected.  Original content 100% on blogspot!  For the more than year long battle that drupal was, in only a few hours I have the new site looking pretty much how I'd like.  Very pleased.  All I wanted was something simple.  I'm a nerd at work.  At home, sometimes I just want things to work out of the box.  Thanks google.  Yay freedom.

I still have paper books of brewery notes, and stories from the past few years in my head, but new posts from here on are actually new :)

Captain Lawrence Brewing Company

Type: Brewery

Location: 99 Castleton Street

Pleasantville, NY 10570

United States

Phone: (914)741-BEER

Website: http://www.captainlawrencebrewing.com/

Tours: Friday 4-7, Saturday 12-6

Cost: It's free, make sure to tip the bartenders!

Visit Date: 12/03/2011

Beers:    Drew's Brew

              Family Meal

              Pale Ale

              Double IPA

              Espresso Stout

Nearby:  North County Rail Trail

Notes:  It'd been a couple of years since we stopped at Captain Lawrence. My parent's used to live in the North Bronx, so odds are when we crossed the Hudson we were heading straight there.  When we wanted a weekend adventure, we headed farther away, or otherwise avoided the toll.  I recently got a newer better bike and so we've been seeking out rail-trails more.  On this day we did ~40 miles round trip on North County Rail trail, conveniently finishing up an hour before tours ended.

We were pleased to discover not much has changed.  Great tour, you walk into the bar area, and samples are being handed out, then you are free to enter the brewery and peek around.  There are several "tours" throughout the day, where the group is walked around and the brewing process described.  We missed the actual tour this time, but enjoyed the opportunity to look around and sample some brews.

In no time, my sore quadriceps were loose again.  The stout was my favorite brew but they were all pretty solid.  We hoped to bring home a keg of the Stout, since they're close enough to return it when we're done, but it turns out you need to reserve online beforehand.  They didn't have any kegs of it in stock.  Major bummer, but I guess it means we'll have to be back.

I took a photo of some empty kegs, that's about as good as I could do.

Keegan Ales

Type: Brewery with Bar

Location: 20 Saint James St

Kingston, NY 12401-4534

United States

Phone: (845) 331-2739

Website: http://www.keeganales.com/

Cost: $10 six packs

Visit Date: 01/29/2011, 05/07/2007

Beers:       Mother's Milk

                  Hurricane Kitty

Nearby: The Catskills

Notes: This time around we just stopped in to pick something up to bring back to our hotel room. We were broken, wet, and hungry from a long snowshoe in the catskills.  So much has changed about this place in the past couple of years. 

The last time we were here was in May of 2007, we stopped in while in the Catskills Camping at the North South Lake campground on George's birthday weekend.   I don't remember if we drove down Saturday Night to pick up beer or if we stopped in on our way home Sunday, but it was the most depressing sight I have ever seen.  I hope it was the Sunday scene.  We walked in to a mostly empty bar.  There was a guitarist in one corner, and a woman swaying back and forth.  There was a guy slumped over the bar and a friendly bar tender chatting with a customer who looked to be a good friend.  It seemed like the saddest place in the saddest city in New York.  The bar tender was nice however, and gave us a generous free sample of each of the 3 beers they had on tap (the third, Old Capital, I don't list above because I don't remember much about it).  We picked up a growler of Mother's Milk and left. Mother's Milk was a delicious creamy stout with added (unfermentable) Lactose to give milky flavors.  A real winner, but I don't think we could bear to sit in the bar here.

Judging by this trip, Kingston has been flourishing in the economy that's hurting the rest of the country.  Or maybe people are just drinking more.  Either way Keegan's was packed with a much hipper crowd than before.  Business seemed to be booming this Saturday evening. We picked up a Six Pack of the Hurricane Kitty IPA and the Mother's Milk to bring back to the hotel and recover with.  The atmosphere isn't the only thing that's changed about Keegans. The recipe for Mother's Milk has changed, it's a lot smokier now, and not as Milky.  It's still decent but I wouldn't go out of my way for it like I would have before.  

It also looks like something has changed about the ownership or investorship since they've dropped the "and Sons" from their name and their bottles (they only had growlers previously) say Saratoga Springs, NY.  I doubt they ship the beer up in a truck to bottle, if I had to guess I'd say they are contracting through Olde Saratoga nowadays.   They did and do have a brewery onsite, so if they're like other breweries they probably send their recipes up and get bottles in return and make everything else onsite.  Next time I'll have to get a growler and see if it's the new recipe or the old recipe.  The differences may be in who is brewing it or where the hops and grains are sourced (and I can hold out hope that delicious stout of years past is still brewed somewhere).  If it's getting shipped down has it been pasteurized?  This could also change the flavor.  

I'm glad they're doing well, and that it wasn't such a depressing sight this time around (we struggled to find parking) but disappointed that the beer has changed.  We'll see if a growler is any better next time around.  If not, well, we'll see if there's another next time.  It's likely, only because of convenience, we plan on heading up to the Catskills a lot more this winter.

Cricket Hill Brewery

Type: Brewery

Location: 24 Kulick Road

Fairfield, NJ 07004

United States

Phone: (973) 276-9415

Website:  www.crickethillbrewery.com

Tours:  Friday 5-7

Cost:  $2 for four beers, note that you cannot buy extra beer tickets as more than 4 samples per visitor would be a violation of New Jersey state law.

Visit Date:  Every Friday :)

Beers:  East Coast Lager

               Hopnotic IPA

               American Ale

               Colonel Blides Cask Ale (Alt Style)

               Jersey Summer Belgian Style (Summer Seasonal)

               Fall Festivus (Fall Seasonal)

               Paymasters Porter (Winter Seasonal)

               Maibock (Spring Seasonal) 

Notes:  I'll start by saying that Cricket Hill is my local brewery, I volunteer helping run the bottling line and during the Friday tours often help out carding visitors.  I would feel it were a conflict of interest to post any sort of a review of Cricket Hill were it not for the fact that I only learned of Cricket Hill when my boyfriend found them in his GPS.  My admiration and respect for Rick, the owner and Dave, the brewer developed through the brewery, and while I consider them friends now, I did not know them prior to dropping into their fine establishment.

All that being said, Cricket Hill is a great brewery.  Every friday, from 5-7 the brewery fills with visitors and Rick gives a passionate speech (check youtube!).  Pretzels and chips are given away.

My personal favorite is the Paymasters Porter.  I cry every year when they stop brewing it (are you reading this Rick?) They made a Dark Lager once that was pretty good, but I
haven't seen it again.  Dave does a very good job consistently brewing very clean, easy drinking beers.  Don't expect any quadruple IPAs, because Rick is looking to be a gateway beer for bad beer drinkers.  All of the brews are good session beers and prime examples of their styles.

Tuckerman Brewing Company

Type: Brewery

Location: 64 Hobbs Street

Conway, NH

United States

Phone: (603) 447-5400

Website: http://www.tuckermanbrewing.com

Tours: 3pm Saturdays

Cost: Free

Visit Date: 01/15/2011

Beers:       Pale Ale 

                    Headwall Alt

                    6288 Stout

Notes: FINALLY!  We made it to a tour!  The first time, our GPS took us to their old location.  They'd moved but the software hadn't been updated (and we update maps pretty regularly) confused, we left.  The second time, they were closed.   Third times a charm, I guess. 

We got lucky.  Or unlucky as the case may be but this was a good consolation prize.  We attempted a winter ascent up Mount Washington along one of the lesser used routes, Nelson Crag, not so successful.  Nobody'd been up since the last snowfall, so we were breaking trail.  Soft power up to our knees, factor in the boulders with 6 foot snowdrifts and the 60 degree slopes with ice underneath, and after switching snowshoes for crampons and back to snowshoes, and sliding down twice as far as we'd just climbed up too many times to count, we concluded our attempts were futile.   Our last half mile took two hours (after a relatively easy first few) and we decided were we to make it to the top, we'd never make it down by sunset, not at that pace; so we turned back, and were back at pinkham notch by 2:30.  We asked the nice guy at the desk if he knew how to get to the Brewery, since we couldn't remember where the right location was, and he was kind enough to call for us, he said the machine said the tour was at 3, and we bolted out of there as fast as we could!

We got there a tad late but hopped on for the rest of the tour and then went upstairs for some tasting.  Good tour, very good beer, we bought a case of the yummy alt to bring home, highly recommended.  Too bad the only tour of the week is at 3pm: a time when, if I'm in New Hampshire, I'm usually still on a mountain

Bar Harbor Brewing Company

Type: Brewery

Location: 8 Mount Desert Street

Bar Harbor, ME 04609

United States

Phone: (207) 288-4592

See map: Google Maps

Website: http://www.barharborbrewing.com

Tours: Daily Tastings 

Cost: Free 

Visit Date: 07/18/2010

Beers:     Harbor Lighthouse Ale

                  True Blue (Blueberry Wheat)

                  Thunder Hole Ale (Brown Ale)

                  Cadillac Mountain Stout

Nearby: Acadia National Park

Notes: Not what it once was, but great once again.  The Brewery opened up in 1990, down route 3 in Otter Creek, run by a nice couple out of their home.  The husband, Todd, worked tirelessly in the family basement to brew this fine beer, and his wife Susie gave tours and ran the gift shop out of a small cabin on their property.  It was a small but fantastic operation. 

We visit nearby Acadia National Park at least once a year and if we can't get to the brewery, seek the beer out in stores (the Cadillac Mountain Stout is among the finest stouts I have had).  One year, a couple of years back, we discovered that they had relocated downtown and had a very disappointing visit to the brewery.   The beer just wasn't the same and the proprietor was very grumpy.  Still we thought, good for them, a new building is probably an indication that they are doing well (but what happened to the beer?!). 

We came back again this year, found a vast improvement, and learned the story.  It seems Todd and Susie had sold the business to someone from Florida, the beer was being contract brewed through Gearys in Portland at the time of our prior visit.  The new owners ran the business into the ground and it was sold to Atlantic Brewing Company, the rival business just down the road.   I must say, I'm glad ABC restored the beers.  They are almost as good as they were.  I seem to recall a Peach beer that's not made anymore (unless it's seasonal?) and the sodas have been discontinued.  There are still sodas, but they are the Atlantic Brewing Company's brand (which they always made) I guess they didn't see a market for two lines of soda (unless the soda recipes were not sold with the brewery?) which is a shame b/c I did like them better.  But this isn't about soda, it's about beer, and I'm happy I can get my Cadillac Mountain Stout again.  I hope that Todd and Susie are doing well in their new endeavors.

Spier

Type: Vineyard

Location: R310 Baden Powell Rd

Stellenbosch 7603

South Africa

Phone: 021-809-1100

Website: www.spier.co.za/

Notes: While I'd pass on most of the beer in South Africa (Castle Stout was ok, but if you're in SA look for Namibian beer), the wine was phenomenal.  I found several really good Pinotages for around $4USD, so I was excited to visit a vineyard.

Regretfully, the best thing about Spier was it's location.

Before you get upset, maybe they make world class wines, maybe all the other wines I loved were "bad" to a more educated palate.  I don't know wine.  I just know what I like, and I was disappointed by Spier's wines.  Here's a sad George.  He was disappointed too.

Spier was a great spot for tourists, however.  Historical old buildings, shops with all sorts of items for sale, a restaurant with a large picnic area, and bird and cheetah sanctuaries (separate of course).  With our entrance to the bird sanctuary, we got to enter a cage with Owls and hold them, and suggest names for the sweetest little baby owl.  With big black eyes, he just begged to be pet.

They had a show with some birds of prey that George and I opted out of.  The rest of our group wanted to see the show, but we had a feeling there wouldn't be time to explore after the show.  We were right, they wanted lunch.  

When we finally got to the vineyard, the wine was disappointing.  Defintely not up to the standard that we were coming to expect from South African wines.  After the vineyard, the rest of our group went to visit family, and we were dropped in Stellenbosch central for some exploration.  This was probably the most enjoyable part of the day.  We walked around photographing old buildings, had lunch, and found out that post offices in South Africa are closed for about a week around Christmas.  We ended up mailing our post cards home from New Jersey.  Oh well.

12 Jan 2012 edit while migrating: Yeah, sometimes not going 200mph is frustrating.  Especially when flying halfway around the world.  But George is a damn drama queen.  There are a many experiences that I regret allowing this to affect.  That expression in the photo above?  Mopey manipulation that I got way too accustomed to.  Add that to the list of things I'll never put up with again.

Orlando Brewing

Type: Brewery with Bar

Location: 1301 Atlanta Avenue

Orlando, FL 32806

United States

Phone: (407) 872-1117

Website: http://www.orlandobrewing.com

Cost: 9 Samples for $9

Visit Date: 11/4/2007

Beers:   Winter Dark

                Blonde Ale

                Pale Ale

                Olde Pelican

                European PIlz

                Red Ale

                Brown Ale

                Monk in the Trunk Amber Ale

                Black Water Dry Porter

Notes:  I was in Orlando for a Conference, I stayed in a Disney Hotel, but no trips to Disney this time.  We came by a couple of times, we really enjoyed this brewery.  The daytime visit was much cheerier, a night the place was a little dark and somewhat depressing.  Nice, clean decorations, I appreciated the effort put into the tables with grains and hops sealed in resin.  The beers were all pretty solid, and organic.

The Porter was very good, full flavored and malty but with a clean finish, a good beer to offer people who "don't like dark beers" to show them their biases are wrong.  The Amber was my favorite offering, rich and malty.  My notes say, second only to Bar Harbor, so you know it must have been good.  The Pilsener was also excellent.  No complaints on any of the beers, if we're ever in the area again, we'll definitely be stopping in.

Blue Mountain Brewery and Hop Farm

Type: Brewpub

Location: 9519 Critzers Shop Road

Afton, VA 22920

United States

Phone: (540) 456-8020

Website: www.bluemountainbrewery.com

Cost: Reasonably priced food and beer menu

Visit Date: 07/04/2010

Beers:            Blue Mountain Lager

                         Blido de Blanche (Belgian White)

                         RockFish Wheat

                         uberPils

                         Full Nelson

                         Nitro Ale (Imperial Porter)

Nearby: Shenandoah National Park

Notes:  All of the beers were pretty solid.  The Blido de Blanche stood out with their unique take on the style mashing at a higher temperature than usual and using half Belgian Wit Yeast and half Champagne yeast.  Recently, I've grown tired of Belgian style beers, but this one was quite good.  The Porter was outstanding as well.

The food was a real treat here.  I shared a pizza with my boyfriend--It was incredible.  Not a traditional pizza, it was freshly prepared with all sorts of vegetables and served on a wooden board, definitely worth trying! 

I enjoyed the artwork that lined the walls, all by local artists and available for sale.  It's nice to see businesses supporting local artists.

Pecan Grill and Brewery

Type: Brewpub

Location: 500 South Telshor

Las Cruces, NM 88011

United States

Phone: (575) 521-1099

After my first trip to Las Cruces, I had concluded that New Mexico is a food desert.  Nothing to eat here.  Even if there were palatable food, everything in town closes at 9, which was often about when we were driving back to town from work.  Mostly I ate carrot sticks for lunch and beer in my room for dinner.  I got home after my two weeks and good 5 course meals every night for my two weeks home.  Food!  Glorious food!  Before coming back, I went to Patel Brothers and bought a ton of prepackaged food.  Dammit, I was eating when I went back!  

Then we went to Pecan Grill.

Then we went back to Pecan Grill.

It's not cheap, especially for Las Cruces, but good god the food is delicious. 

There were plenty of options for everyone, including me, the Vegetarian sent to the land of Steak.  The stuffed squash was my favorite.  Dude.  So good.  The Portabella, the mushroom appetizer, everything I tried, I loved.  Though the mushroom appetizer was very cheesy, I don't want to know how many calories were in that!

The beer was pretty good too, though, not made onsite, their microbrewery is nearby.  They had twelve beers on tap, and two options for sampler trays, lights and darks.  Naturally, I got both.  I'm usually a dark beer fan, but overall the lights were much more impressive than the darks.  Nice, clean crisp, with strong malty, or hoppy tones.  The darks, overall, were kinda meh.  My coworkers liked the Pecan Ale.  It was too sweet for me, a taste was alright but I couldn't drink an entire pint of it.  I'm not a fan of sweet in my beer.  The green chili ale was a surprise.  I wasn't expecting to love it, but it was absolutely perfect.  Strong green chili nose, but not overwhelmingly spicy, on top of a nice solid golden base.  It could not have been better.  This was by far my favorite beer they had.

Pizzeria Uno Chicago Bar and Grill

Type: Brewpub

Location: 61 US Highway #1

Metuchen, NJ 08840

United States

Phone: (732) 548-7979

Website: http://www.unos.com/

Cost: Reasonably priced beers, $50 Beer Dinners 

Visit Date: 12/03/07 and many times after

Beers:         Bootlegger Blonde

                    Station House Red Ale

                    32 Inning Ale

                    Ike's India Pale Ale

                    Gust-N-Gale POrter

                    Seasonals:

                         ESB

                         Weizenbock

                         Scotch

Notes: Yes, this is Pizzeria Uno the chain, the Metuchen, NJ location has an onsite brewery with some of the finest session ales I have had.  All of the brews are solid and consistent if a bit predictable.   The food is Unos food, and not why I go there.

The best reason to come to Uno is the beer dinners.  Supposedly they aren't having them anymore, but they were a great night.  For $50, the chef went nuts with a multi course meal completely of his own imagining.  Each course was served with a different beer, from Unos as well as other breweries.  One month, Dave Hoffmann, my favorite brewer :) came as a guest brewery.  The Pubscout, Kurt Epps http://thepubscout.blogspot.com/ ran the night, introducing each course and running trivia contests, and Lenny always made sure, I, the lone vegetarian in the crowd was taken care of.  All in all a great time, I'm sad it's no more.

Krogh's Restaurant and Brewpub

Type: Brewpub

Location: 23 White Deer Plaza

Sparta, NJ 07871

United States

Phone: (973) 729-8428

Website: http://www.kroghs.com

Cost: A bit pricey for the location, but not unreasonable

Visit Date: 12/09/2012

Beers:     Three sister's golden wheat

               Krogh's Gold

              Alpine Glow Red Ale

              Brogden Meadow Pale Ale

              Log Cabin Nut Brown

              Old Crow Oatmeal Stout

              Celebration (Seasonal~Spicy Amber)

Nearby: Caching Through The Snow

Notes:  We come here annually for the geocaching event Caching Through the Snow.  It's a bit out of the way from where we live and play, but a worthwhile stop.  The food, for me, is decent though unremarkable, the Rarebit is a popular favorite, they made it for me once with a veggie burger, it was good, but fatty.

I'm transcribing this in 2012, and 2012 BrewTourist is predictable, the Stout or the Brown are clear winners!  Unfortunately, they are almost always out of at least two of their beers.

JJ Bitting

Type: Brewpub

Location: 33 Main Street

Woodbridge, NJ 07095

United States

See map: Google Maps

Website: http://www.njbrewpubs.com/

Cost: Reasonable

Visit Date: 12/03/2007 and many times since

Beers:         Victoria's Golden Ale

                   Raspberry Wheat Ale

                   Black Jack Stout

                   Bitting's Best Bitter

                   Avenel Amber

                   Bitting's Bad Boy

                  Hopgarden Pale Ale

                  Woodbridge Winter Warmer

                  Rat Pack Pilsener

                  Whales Imperial IPA

Notes: JJ's is the go-to place when we're in Central Jersey.  Over the past couple of years, they've gone through a few brewers, and the consistency at times was unpredictable.  From talking with people, the management doesn't seem to treat employees very well, and specials are misrepresented in advertisements, but we do keep coming back.  The food is above average for bar food, and the beers are usually pretty solid.  Their dunkelweizen caused a bit of an obsession in me for awhile.  It was actually the inspiration for my very first, all-grain homebrew.   If you're feeling like overeating, the butterfly fries, oh man.  The restaurant is in a cool old historic train building, and well decorated.

Harvest Moon Brewery/Cafe

Type:Brewpub

Location:392 George Street

New Brunswick, NJ 08901

United States

Phone: (732) 249-6666

See map: Google Maps

Website: www.harvestmoonbrewery.com

Cost: Reasonable menu

Visit Date: 12/3/2007

Beers:  British Nut Brown

            Moonlight Ale

            Hops² Double IPA

            Elmes' Mild Manner

            Belgian Blonde

            Jimmy D's Firehouse Red

            Oatmeal Stout

Notes: We were reasonably pleased with our first visit, parking is easy on the weekend because the municipal garages are free, but getting a table can be a little trickier.  They had decent food and sufficient vegetarian options, the bathroom was a little dirty.  Elmes' Mild Manner ESB was my favorite of their brews, the Oatmeal Stout was my least favorite, too sweet..

We came here a few times before having any bad experiences, but after the last time, I don't think we'll be back.  We came with a large group and spent quite a bit of money to be treated like crap.  We were still eating when it was decided we needed to leave because it was saturday night and time to turn the restaurant into a bar and remove all of the tables, so a beefy bouncer came over and started moving the table from under us and  removing chairs.  While there was still food on our plates.  I don't think the waiter had even brought the check yet.  George had the metal footing of the table jammed into his foot, and when he yelped out in pain, the bouncer began treating him like a belligerant drunk and threatening to forcibly remove him from the bar.  We were not drunk.  This was the worst bar/restaurant/brewpub experience I have ever had.  George sent an email to the owner and never received a response.  The beer was decent but not good enough to bring us back after a night like that.

12 Jan 2013 Edit while migrating:  To be 100% fair, the bouncer was a jerk, but George is a belligerent ass sober.

Artisan's Brewery and Italian Grill

Type: Brewpub

Location: 1171 Hooper Avenue

Tom's River, NJ 08753

United States

Phone: (732) 244-7566

Website:  http://www.artisanstomsriver.com

Cost: Varied Price Menu, possible to have a very cheap or very expensive meal

Visit Date: 12/18/2011

Beers:   Artisan's Light

             West Coast IPA

             Red Ale

              Various Seasonals (usually 6 beers on tap)

Nearby: The New Jersey PInelands: Double Touble SP, Lebanon SF, Wharton SF.  Island Beach State Park, Mulica River. 

Notes: We come here pretty regularly because we like to come down to South Jersey for biking, kayaking, and geocaching.  Wharton, Double Trouble and Lebanon have miles and miles of sand trails and hundreds of caches, and the Mullica is a nice scenic paddle.  After a long day in the sun, we're ready for some refreshments and a big dinner.  I must say the food here seems to have gotten a lot worse over the years.  Not the quality per se, I don't know that I'd be able to tell you that, but rather my options have dwindled over the years.  An expensive steak may be your thing, and that's fine, but the veggie options have gone from decent to "meh, should we just stop at wawa on the way?"  This last time we were there we sat in the bar, because George wanted wings which aren't served in the dining room, I had a salad and we shared a pizza, I forgot to ask for dressing on the side.  It's good we biked so much because it came drenched.  They have tasty balsamic, but very creamy.  The pizza was....odd.   I think we concluded in the end that we liked it, but it took some warming up to.  We got the salad pizza and that's pretty much what it was.  Pizza bread with a salad--a lot like the one on my plate- dumped on top.  I miss the old eggplant and mushroom pizzas.  They list eggplant and mushrooms as options for toppings to "make your own" but who knows if it'll be the same?  The mushroom pie used to have several types of mushrooms, perfectly cooked and covering the whole pie.  I doubt it would be the same.  

But the food isn't why we keep coming back to Artisan's.  Dave Hoffman is a genius.  There isn't really much else to say, the man knows what he is doing, and does it well, and I am ever so glad he went into his chosen profession.  He's a real good guy too.  He doesn't make anything that's bad.  On this last visit we had a pitcher of the Seasonal Oatmeal stout.  It should be a regular offering.  That's all I'll say.  Great, highly recommended, if you're not in the area, look for Climax Beer in a store, Dave also runs his own brewery and brews there.  He always bottled in Growlers, but had recently (finally!) gotten a 12oz bottling line. 

They do an annual Mug Club dinner that's very good, they'll have a bufftet of fresh good food, usually different from the Menu.  There was an amazing polenta one year.  Dave comes and hangs out, and the beer is all you can drink.  It usually runs around ~$30 which is a great deal.