The ladies finally reunited after a long month away for a brown bag tasting.
It was the first night of the week-long Ladyface Alehouse third anniversary celebration! In addition to sips from the eight shrouded bottles, I grabbed a taster of their anniversary beer…
As well as a limited edition third anniversary glass, filled with Derailleur from the cask.
Happiness in a very large glass.
Janelle’s beautiful 6 month old, Avery, joined us again. She’s already devouring books. This is a smart little one.
Dinner was the duck confit salad with bacon (minus the egg. I stupidly forgot to request it so Lise let me take a picture of hers).
Surprisingly I got the majority of these right! They ranged from Coors Original to Green Flash Rayon Vert to Rogue’s Hazelnut Brown.
Sadly now, I’m suffering from the flu. I can’t seem to go for more than a month without getting some kind of illness. I think it may be time to start cheffing the healthy stuffs and finally giving my self a chance to heal (as well as creating more foodie material for the blog!). For now, I can look at pictures from my past week and reminisce on how happy it was and how it felt to be able to enjoy delicious food while I sip ginger ale and tea and nibble on flavorless wheat thins.
Seared ahi tuna with pickled watermelon radish in a sesame oil and butternut squash with pumpkin seeds and raisins in a dijon dressing from Lemonade – now in Westlake Village! So happy to have one of these close by!!!
And I already introduced you on my Twitter – this is Jezebel aka Wheezy, my lovely new Prius C! 53mpg city and 44mpg highway. I’ve owned her for a week and already put on 540 miles. That’s how this job rolls.
I’m off to sip some Nyquil and slowly fade into oblivion. Playing hooky from work tomorrey since I’ve got a 101.5 degree fever. Yay.
I’m now the Craft Beer and Menu Pairing Specialist. That means you’ll be seeing gratuitous photos of deliciousness I consume and pair with even more delicious craft beer, events I’m lucky enough to be able to attend, as well as beer-food recipes I’m hoping to start making once the craziness subsides. I celebrated in the best way I know how – 
Charlie has been with me for over five years!
She kept me safe when two big scary guys 
I purchased her brand new shoes to make her feel a little more beautiful after the scars… Anyone want to buy her? She’s looking for a loving home within the LA area!
It snowed on Christmas Eve! I set a beer outside to let it chill and when I came back out, it was covered in a good half inch of this beautiful white stuff!
Bare feet in the snow on Christmas morning. I don’t recommend it.
Delicate crystals atop the table.
I snapped a few pictures before rushing inside to escape the 3 degree weather. The rest of the day was spent roasting in front of the fireplace.
My Christmas gift from my bro and his wife! He made this himself the night before. Quite awesome, if I do say so myself!
It also came with this – unfortunately I didn’t have enough time to brew out there with all of the brewery tours we had lined up, but I’m creating a recipe at this moment for my next visit!
IPA tastings. I am head over heels in love with Myrcenary and Mountain Standard by 
My favorite nephew got to spend the day with us. Nothing like having the whole family there for Christmas!
A beautiful beer list! I’ve only had one or two of Avery’s brews before, but as much as I wanted to try them all, the altitude was still making me a cheap date (read: tipsy after a taster), so I stuck with a taster of Out of Bounds Stout and…
MEPHISTOPHELES’. 16.2%ABV. I couldn’t NOT try that!
Out of Bounds on the left, Mephistopheles’ on the right. The Mephistopheles’ was full of rich bourbon flavors, thick roasted coffee, spicy dried fruits and bitter dark chocolate powder. We may or may not have taken a 12oz bottle home. And by may or may not, I obviously mean we did.
Jon Cross was kind enough to give us a tour of their 40bbl system. Avery is prepping to move up to a 120bbl system over in Gunbarrel in the upcoming year!
Perhaps they’ll allow diving in the new, gigantic mash tun. We visited two other breweries after, neither with beer worth talking about, and the next day we went to one of my old favorites.
Oh, 
After an hour exploring the place, we headed over to 
It was a much longer tour than the last time I took it – over three years ago. They’ve built many expansions since and turned a half hour tour into ninety wonderful minutes!
Brewhouse 1.
Not too much heavy lifting going on here except on the brain.
We moved upstairs and drooled over the tanks, checking out each progression from mashing all the way to the rolling boil they had going on. You couldn’t smell anything inside, but the air outside smelled lusciously of hop resin being released from the grips of its pellets.
The barrel aging room was next. Epic. I don’t know how many oak foeders they had in there, but I could’ve wandered for hours and been content.
We got many, MANY samples throughout the tour, but this was my favorite. I hated La Folie the first time I tried it three years ago on the same tour, but now it’s pure adoration. Sours have won me over.
The next part of the tour took us outside past the gigantic bright tanks and into a relatively new building where the bottling and canning line are.
Capturing the deliciousness happens in here!
The brewery is covered in random art. I’d love to see this chandelier lit up at night!
8.5bbl system. They measure everything here in hectoliters. I spent a lot of the tour on my phone doing conversions from hectoliters to barrels. I’m cool like that.
Quite a colorful pilot room.
This system has one of the best views of the brewery. Look at all the pretty foeders!
Poor neglected Sputnik was empty. There were four fermentors that were full of experimentals. I spotted a stout, a dark set for release in fall of 2013, a light set also releasing in 2013 and a collaboration. I can’t get into any more detail than that – don’t want to give away the secrets!
Fire! I shot this thing once and said no more. Not a fan of fire in my face and a kick that almost makes me drop the gun on top of my head.
Aaand an assault rifle rental from my bro. Kinda like a BB gun with laser sights.
A belated Happy New Year to you all!