Quebec Run

Yesterday I went with Adam and his friend Dave on a trip to Quebec Run Wild Area for some mountain biking. Quebec Run is about 1.5 hours away in Forbes State Forest near the West Virginny border (dahn err 'round Uniontahn n'at). We were driving down I-79 near Waynesburg when all of a sudden Adam's car started to sputter and choke and run out of gas. We were cresting a hill, so we were lucky that we made it over the hill and were able to coast on the shoulder for about 3 or 4 miles down the other side. We got within a quarter mile of an exit ramp before coming to a stop due to a hill. There was a bridge between us and the ramp, and there was no shoulder on the bridge, so we were forced to get out and find another way to the gas station. Luckily we had our bikes so Dave and Adam rode to the gas station, bought a 2-gallon jug for $12, filled it up, and soon enough we were on our way.

We filled the tank up the rest of the way and stopped at Sheetz for some pre-ride food. The $1.99 6" turkey sub is a fine deal, and I finished it off with a bag of yummy honey BBQ chips and a new drink I found: Canada Dry sparkling green tea ginger ale. It boasts 500mg of antioxidants, but also has 60g of sugar. Even though my dentist would cringe, I figured it was worth a shot just this once. It wasn't really that good though, and I think the Canada Dry ginger ale Halls cough drops I had in Utah were a much better Canada Dry spin off.

The riding was spectacular - some of the best (if not the best) in the state of PA. There was a good mix of fast and flowy rolling bench cut, short steep climbs, long adrenaline-filled descents, and tricky rock gardens. It is a very remote but beautiful area, and would be great for backpacking with its many creekside campsites. The trail was kind of wet due to the scattered thunderstorms, but we stayed fairly dry except for getting muddy. The ride we did was a 13-mile loop and probably took us about 3.5 hours (lots of stopping). Due to the gas adventure, that didn't put us on the road until 7:30pm, a bit later than we expected. We stopped at a place Dave knew of in New Stanton called Toad's Logger House. When he first told us the name, Adam and I both thought "Lager" house, but they still had plenty of Yuengling Lager on tap. It was an interesting place, definitely typical of a backwoods bar you'd find in western PA, but the food was good. I got a "Toad burger", with cheese and a nice crispy sourdough bun.

We made it back around 10 or 11 I think, and we were all too tired and sore to do much of anything else. Another epic adventure had ended, but I can't wait for our trip to Asheville, NC next weekend...

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Thursday, February 14 I got a call from Justin at 5pm asking if I wanted to join him and Jordyn and Brent on a road trip to Minneapolis for the weekend to attend Frostbike. My initial reaction was, “no way”, but after thinking about it, I realized I had no set plans for the weekend, and I figured could take a vacation day Friday. I decided I was in. They were planning to drive from State College and pick me up in Pittsburgh at 1:30am Friday morning, and if we drove straight through, it would put us in Minneapolis just in time for the Salsa Cycles happy hour starting at 4pm. Sure enough, we were off at 1:30am, with Jordyn taking the first shift of driving. I woke up at 4:30am as we pulled into a service area on the Ohio Turnpike. As I went in to get coffee from the Burger King stand, I noticed the soda dispenser had a sign with suggested “drink recipes”.

I thought this was pretty cool, especially with graphics to help you understand the concept, but where is the “Suicide”? Back in grade school, when we went to the pool in the summer, we thought we were badass for asking for a Suicide at the concession stand. I thought this was a universal term, but for those of you don’t know, a suicide is a mix of every soda in the fountain machine. They were really good, but at some point in high school, I pretty much forgot about this drink altogether. I’m glad that Burger King is encouraging some creativity when it comes to pouring soda, but I really think they should bring back the Suicide putting it on their “recipe menu”.

Before going any further, I guess I should explain what Frostbike is. It is an annual trade show hosted by QBP – Quality Bicycle Products –one of the biggest bicycle components/parts/accessory distributors in the country. They are based in Minneapolis, hence the location and name of the show. It is an opportunity for bicycle dealers (shops) to meet with vendors and tour the QBP facilities.

Next stop of note was Milwaukee around 10:30 on a sunny Friday morning, with the temperature in the single digits. We called Jimbo to get recommendations for food, since this was his stomping grounds, and he recommended Abu’s Jerusalem. Unfortunately, Abu’s doesn’t open until 11:30am. We wandered around, found a cool bike shop called Crank Daddy’s, and then stumbled into Koppa’s Polish grocery/deli. This place was awesome: a superb selection of local/micro/import beers, a deli counter with a plethora of prepared food options, and a “lounge” with old school Atari and about 20-30 games. Most of their sandwiches were named after planets in the solar system; I ordered a Pluto, which was ham, lettuce, red onion, Swiss cheese, and Polish mustard on marble rye bread. Honestly, it was one of the best sandwiches I've ever had - and cheap! For about 4 bucks, they wrapped the sandwich with a pickle and an individually-wrapped Swedish Fish and Extra Sour Cry Babies gumball.

Onward towards the Twin Cities. We arrived at the Sheraton in Bloomington at 4:30 for the Salsa Cycles happy hour. The place was packed, and we were each given three Salsa clothing tags as our tickets for booze. Jordyn agreed to DD for the night, so he gave his extras to Brent and me. After a couple margaritas, I tried what seemed like the Yuengling of the upper Midwest: Leinenkugel Red Lager. It was the best beer they had to offer, which isn’t saying much, but I can’t complain since it was free after all.

After happy hour ended at 6pm, we got invited to a banquet dinner downtown, sponsored by Saris. We started off in a big white tent adjacent to the building, where they had finger food (snacks!) and an open bar featuring Summit Brewing Co.’s Extra Pale Ale, brewed in nearby St. Paul. It was nothing spectacular, but very drinkable and much better than any of the macros (Coors, Miller, Bud, etc.).

Dinner was nice; we had salad, bread, choice of entrée (I chose the squash ravioli… it was delicious), and fruit pie for dessert. We watched a few speeches given by people from Saris and the lovely Melanie McQuaid, all while Brent and I pounded down as many free beers as we could. Afterwards, we apparently tried to go to a party at One On One, but Jordyn couldn’t find parking and I was passed out in the backseat, so we headed to our lodging destination instead. We spent both nights at Justin & Alyssa’s friend Fiona’s house, only a couple miles from downtown.

Saturday morning we arrived at Frostbike bright and early, and helped ourselves to free donuts, coffee, and juice for breakfast. We browsed the vendor booths and the other three guys attended some dealer seminars while I took a tour of the building. Snack-wise, the coolest thing I found was the new energy and recovery drinks from Clif: a hot apple cider energy drink and a hot chocolate recovery drink. They had samples of the hot chocolate and it was really good. It makes perfect sense for folks like us who try to ride through the cold and snowy winters.

After a full day at the show, we came back to Fiona’s and met up with a few of her friends to ride downtown for dinner. We went to Pizza Luce for some tasty black bean/artichoke/green pepper pizza and pitchers of beer. Next we headed a few blocks over to One On One, where they were having another party. This "studio" is a bike shop, art gallery, and coffee shop all in one. Tons and tons of old (and new old stock) parts and bikes filled the basement, resembling a Freeze Thaw on steroids - if you can imagine such a place. Upstairs, they had a few kegs of Summit behind the

coffee bar and Steve Hed was showing off his fancy carbon fiber toys. The owner – Gene Oberpriller, a former pro racer – had a lot of crazy bikes on display, but the coolest was probably his Hutch/Hanebrink HPV. Eventually, people migrated out back on the loading dock, where there were stacks of mini-bikes, goofy bikes, and old cruisers. We started jumping them off the snow banks, but soon enough we were riding around in a derby, crashing into each other and dodging the drunk bar crowds walking through the alley. A Canadian in high heels who happened to be walking through the alley even joined in on the fun.

Sunday morning we stumbled into Frostbike around 10am, went to a couple seminars, filled up with lunch, and left around 2:30pm to get a head start back home. Turns out that was a good idea, because we hit a nasty snowstorm in Wisconsin that slowed us down a bit. We saw at least two dozen cars flipped over or stuck on the side of the road on our way through that state. I figured with all the snow they get, people up there would be used to driving in crappy weather. Nope.

We tried to stop in Madison at another place Jimbo recommended – Monty’s Blue Plate Diner – but they were also closed (making him 0 for 2 on this trip). Instead we went to IHOP and loaded up on breakfast at 8pm. The snow had ended by the time we hit Illinois, and the rest of the drive was rather uneventful. Seriously, what can you say about driving through Indiana and Ohio? We arrived in Pittsburgh at 8am Monday morning, just in time for me to shower and get to work by 8:45 - only 15 minutes late. A small price to pay for what was probably one of the best weekends ever...

see more photos here

I'm back... for real this time.

Gee, doesn't this sound familiar? Again, I apologize for disappearing over the past few months. I've been pretty busy - as usual - and once I get into a rhythm of not posting, it is hard to break it. I kept looking for the "perfect" opportunity to get the blog rolling again, and it finally arrived two weeks ago when I went on a road trip to Minneapolis for a 3-day weekend. Anyway, if anyone out there is still reading this damn thing, I promise you a nice long post about my trip in the next 24 hours...

I'm back...

I apologize for not posting anything in a long time, but I must admit I've been pretty busy. Fortunately, in the meantime, I have come up with a rating system for beer, food, snacks, bars, restaurants, etc. From now on, I will try to rate things on a scale of 1 to 5 crabcakes, since a good jumbo lump Maryland crabcake is my most favorite "snack" of all.

Hopefully over the next few days I will be able to catch up on these missed posts and relive all the good eats and drinks I've experienced over the past few weeks...

24 beers in a case; 24 years old

Tuesday I celebrated my 24th birthday at Mad Mex. The best part about celebrating your birthday here is that if you're on their mailing list, they send you a coupon for a free entree valid the week before and after your birthday. Not only can you use it at Mad Mex, but at any of their sister restaurants - for any entree up to 30 bucks. Sure, I could have picked one of the fancier, pricier restaurants to get the most out of my coupon, but I'd rather go to Mad Mex and have a wide range of good beer at my disposal. Fall/Octoberfest/Pumpkin beers were plentiful, and if that's not your fancy, their tequila selection ain't bad either...

Moral of the story: go go sign up for the Big Burrito mailing list, get a free entree, and save your cash for some good beer (or tequila).

Pumpkinfest at Bocktown

Bocktown Beer & Grill featured "Pumpkinfest" for their weekly Wednesday beer tasting this past week. Up for (free) sampling were various pumpkin ales and Oktoberfest lagers. My favorite by far was the Screaming Pumpkin Spiced Ale from Michigan Brewing Co. It is pretty much pumpkin pie in a bottle: very aromatic, very rich, with a strong, spiced pumpkin flavor. My next favorite was Weyerbacher's Imperial Pumpkin Ale, which was a bit stronger, but still tasty. We also sampled Buffalo Bill's "Original" Pumpkin Ale and Dogfish Head's Punkin' Ale - both of which are good, solid beers, but not as impressive as the Screaming or Imperial. We didn't try any of the Oktoberfest beers (since we had most of them before), except for the August Schell Oktoberfest. It had a strange - almost skunky - aroma, but had a malty taste that I liked quite a bit.

With over 400 different bottled beers, a solid draft list, and some of the best food you'll find at a beer bar or pub, Bocktown has quickly become one of my favorite watering holes in Pittsburgh. Too bad it is way out in Robinson, but beggars can't be choosers...

6th Annual Pig Roast

Since 2002, some friends of mine at Penn State have held a pig roast each September. It's such an awesome event that Tyler has an entire website dedicated to it. The past four roasts have been held at the Stimely cabin, tucked away in the heart of Rothrock State Forest. This year's roast was last weekend and while the turnout was a bit lower than usual, the food, fun, and beer was on par with (if not better than) years past.

Along with the requisite pig and roaster from the PSU Meat Labs, we acquired several kegs of good beer from local breweries: 1/6 barrel of East End Big Hop Harvest Ale, 1/2 barrel of Penn Oktoberfest, 1/2 barrel of Otto's Oktoberfest, and 1/2 barrel of Otto's Red Mo. Plus a 1/2 barrel of PBR to - inevitably - wash down our Sunday morning breakfast. I think this was by far the best selection of beer I'd seen in my 4 years of attending the roast. Both Oktoberfest brews were good, but my nod goes to the Otto's, which was a bit more flavorful.

I'm not sure exactly how many people we show up for these shindigs, but judging from the amount of beer consumed, we get a pretty good-sized crowd. Another indicator is the size of the beer pong tournament, which is always a lot of fun. 2005's pong tourney was one of the biggest and best ever, as seen in this video (click on "media keg").

Oh yeah, and the pig was especially good this year. Maybe it was the Scherba & Jamie signature homemade BBQ sauce, but I thought it was some of the best pork we've had in awhile. Next year we vow to get kaiser rolls, instead of the cheap hamburger rolls, since there is always room for improvement.

Only 359 days (don't forget, it's a leap year) 'til next year's roast...