120 a beer adventure
From
MICHAEL LOO@1:123/140 to
DANIEL on Saturday, October 19, 2019 14:14:36
My mouse died, so Lilli wanted to take me to Wal-Mart, to which I
demurred, so we agreed to take a little trip to San Marcos, where
I recalled a big Fry's, which according to the Website was supposed
to have a whole infestation of the things, plus I wanted to check
out Port, the brewers of the beers sold at Pizza Port and of the Lost
Abbey line, which I was less interested in, as they are all Belgians.
Fry's's parking lot was basically empty, with a few cars that by
their antiquity and condition looked to be employeemobiles, and
when we walked in our footsteps echoed in the cavernous space, and
there was one customer in sight, being argued at by one of the
staff. The shelves were bare, and, in fact, there was not an
ordinary mouse in sight - the whole aisle was empty, with dozens
of labels where merchandise may once have been. There were a few
in the gaming department, running from $40 to 100, a bit rich for
my budget. Lilli ended up getting a battery pack for her phone, on
sale for half price, but my mission went unaccomplished. A few
creepy oddities. Near where the mice should have been, there were
hundreds of some off-brand full-size 104-key USB wired keyboards
offered for $5, with no other merchandise in sight; and in contrast,
the mazy path leading to the checkout was stuffed with snack items
and energy drinks. The cafe in the middle of the store was deserted,
and the play area, well, I'm sure the last kids who had played there
are grown up by now. It was exceedingly strange and made me kind of
sick, not a good condition for going beer tasting, but one does have
to make the occasional sacrifice, and we were now only a couple
miles from the brewery, which was easy enough to find, despite the
Internet reports claiming a food truck made it invisible (big food
truck!).
Turns out there is a big BBQ food truck right in front of the place,
which is signed Lost Abbey. Turns out also that I was hungry, and
Big Dev seemed to fill the bill. I ordered a tri-tip sandwich and
a rib plate; after a short consultation with Lilli, we got beans
rather than potato salad or mac'n'cheese, and paid (getting the
credit card machine to work took the counter man a good five
minutes); then we settled in at the bar with some beer tastes.
We (or rather I, as Lilli doesn't like beer) started with four:
Dawn Patrol English mild - easy drinking, relatively low hopped even
for an English mild. Low carbonation. Some malty brown flavor but on
the whole unmemorable. Quenching and good with food.
Santa's Little Helper imperial stout is brewed with chocolate and
coffee and tastes it. The girl helping me said it was her favorite.
It clocks in at about 10%, so the taster was almost a full beer's
worth of alcohol. Picked up the smokiness of the BBQ nicely.
Old Viscosity strong ale also runs close to that level but is quite
smooth; only the hoppiness prevented me from chugging it right down.
Wipeout IPA is floral and fruity with a bit of malt but less than
the girl had claimed. It was terrible with food.
Soon my name was heard from the speaker out at the truck, so I sent
Lilli to fetch the food. Would that I hadn't, as the idea was
better than the reality. The tri-tip, done beyond well, was
actually kind of tasty and not too dry. The ribs, though, were
beyond their first youth, with that weird taste that old pork gets
that says it should have been sausaged a while ago. This was made
up for by a lot, read lot, of salt and heavy smoke. The meat did
fall off the bone as advertised (I was hoping it wouldn't).
Dev's famous saue was grainy and spunky, lots of pepper, drippings
from the smoked meat, and SALT. The beans were half mashed with
half whole ones mixed in, also lots of smoky flavor and SALT. I
was hoping to escape consequences, but later I had to take an
extra Lasix and spend a white night as a result.
I needed more liquid and chugged a glass of water and went back
for a couple more samples.
Mongo DIPA didn't have the piney oomph I was expecting, but I
wouldn't have wanted to do a whole big pour of this nonetheless.
High Tide fresh-hopped IPA was pretty likeable, with pleasant
tropical flavors and a relatively easy drinker.
As I wanted to do the echo and had been having a heck of a time
with this touchpad, we stopped in at Office Depot, where I got an
overpriced and, as it turns out, very cheaply made Logitech mouse,
far more pathetic than the one it replaces, only it sort of works.
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