My Birthday Dinner

On Friday night, my wife and I headed to The Cooper’s Tavern here in Madison for dinner. As far as my favorite restaurant in the area, it’s a toss up between Cooper’s and The Grumpy Troll out in Mt. Horeb. Cooper’s Tavern is a small little place just off of the square that has an English/Irish style pub type atmosphere. There are about two dozen beers on tap with many more in bottles (many of them European). As far as beers on Friday night, I went close to home and far away. For my first beer I had rye beer for a local upstart brewery in town called House of Brews. My second beer is one I almost always get at Cooper’s – Old Speckled Hen. You won’t find it on tap at too many establishments, but it has always been on tap at Cooper’s when I’ve been. I love Old Speckled Hen because to my taste buds it is the perfect creamy English ale.

The food at Cooper’s holds up to the great beers as well. On Friday night, we had an order of Beer Cheese Pretzels for an appetizer. You’ll find soft pretzels with a cheese dip at many places around Wisconsin and especially here in Madison, but this was perfect. Instead of the traditional twist pretzel design, these were just squat breadsticks. That simple shape made them easier to dunk in the cheese sauce. The pretzels were steaming hot and perfectly salty. Their outside had that nice toughness with the inside being nice and soft. That soft interior worked perfectly to soak up the cheese sauce which was made a bit thin, probably on purpose to do just as I mentioned.

For my main course, I had the Brisket sandwich. It’s something that I had thought about ordering many times before, but just always went with something else. This now might become my “usual” at Cooper’s. The sandwich is done on a large ciabatta roll and contains beef brisket and caramelized onions as the main stars. However, the supporting role in the sandwich comes from bacon aioli. That’s right – bacon aioli. It just rounded out this sandwich perfectly. With only four components, it’s one of those simple dishes that are just plain outstanding. My wife probably got tired of me talking about the sandwich. The ciabatta was the perfect bread to carry the sandwich, the brisket was tender and juicy, the caramelized onions were well done (not tough and stringy), and the bacon aioli, well that just finished things off.

We decided to splurge and split a dessert. I’m always one for a good bread pudding so we ordered the butternut squash bread pudding from their dessert list. Of course it was just as good as the brisket sandwich and the pretzels, but the brisket stands out so much that I can’t remember the details of the bread pudding.

If you find yourself in Madison, I wholeheartedly recommend going to The Coopers Tavern. Have a pint, watch a soccer or rugby match on the television, have a nice meal, or just marvel at their ceiling fans that are powered by a pulley system. Yes, the last one sounds odd, but go there and you won’t go the night without mentioning them…especially if you’ve had a few pints too many.

Oh Where, Oh Where Have My Growlers Gone?

After much searching in the apartment and in the garage, we cannot locate our growlers from The Grumpy Troll or Shipwrecked. From what we can remember we have two growlers from the former and at least one from the latter. We have opened up boxes, upended closets, and searched in every nook and cranny possible. If we lent these growlers to anyone, or if anyone knows where they may be, let us know.

An unused growler is a very sad thing. I’m finding out an unused and lost growler is even worse.

My Goodness My Guinness...Stew!

This weekend I’ve been feeling particularly Irish. Now my wife and I enjoy most everything from the Celtic isle, so it’s not unusual (even though I’m 98% German and only 2% Irish – if even that.) Yesterday however, I was even talking around the house with an Irish accent. There was no one to stop me with my wife out of town. This whole weekend I also listened to Irish music. Only one time did I play something different, and that one time was bluegrass so I didn’t go too far off. It was mostly the Dubliners or the High Kings, but I did watch a documentary last night about The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem.

Continuing that Irish theme, I thought it a good idea to make Guinness stew. I searched a few recipes online and settled on this one. I did add some parsnips to the recipe and only used four potatoes instead six. However, the russets that I got at the grocery store could have qualified as being extra large. I still only put in two pounds of stew meat; however I ended up browning three. The grocery store for some reason only sold stew meat, or slabs of chuck for that matter, in 1 ½ pound packages. So I have some extra browned meat chunks in the fridge I guess for when I get peckish. The last change I made was to omit the water and cornstarch. It seemed to make a nice thick broth without it. The stew was hearty and dense enough.

The other change I made was starting it earlier in the day. With the big breakfast I made and the clean up afterword, I didn’t get the crock pot going and anything stewing until 1:30. Because of that, I went with the 6 hours on high method on the recipe. However, the parsnips were not quite done so it still needed maybe an hour longer (note, also cut the parsnips smaller).

Still, I was quite surprised at how incredibly good it was. The recipe didn’t call for any herbs (like bay leaf, rosemary, or sage) or even and salt or pepper. Without thwas so good, maybe even one of the best stews I’ve ever had. For a side, I picked up some beer bread at the grocery store and just refreshed it in the oven beforehand. Of course, I also had a nice pint of Guinness as well.

To end this post and end with the Irish theme, I thought I would share this video of a live performance of The High Kings doing their version of “The Parting Glass.” I may be a bit of a dork, but this video always gives me goose bumps and makes my eyes watery. To all my friends that I’ve shared a drink with, or to all those that I have yet to, this one goes out to you:

http://www.thehighkings.com/video/video-the-parting-glass/

Brandy You're A Fine Girl

Instead of limoncello, I decided to try a different infused libation this year. I found a recipe for Fruit & Nut Brandy that looked enticing, especially as a nice sipping liqueur for the cooler fall and winter months.

The initial preparation was much easier than the limoncello. Chop some almonds, chop some walnuts, and halve some dates. Then drop all of those into a sealed glass container along with some cranberries and pour a liter of brandy over top. The next steps are the hard part. For two weeks everything needs to blend together in a cool dark place (I just put it in an out of the way spot in the refrigerator.) Every day I just need to give it a shake. After those two weeks is up, the brandy then needs to rest for three more weeks to get the flavors to blend and age together.

Of course after putting all the ingredients in the jar together, I just want to have some now. Luckily I bought some nice bourbon to sip to get me through any cold fall days before November 6^th.

Here it looks like I'm about to make a fruit smoothie...with very different ingredients.

The wait begins.