IPA Road Trip
This past Wednesday and Thursday, I took my family on a little brewery road trip in search of New York State IPA's, that are not available in the Westchester beer market, for next Wednesday's New York State IPA Fest. Our final destination was Lake George, NY and we made stops in Chatham (Chatham Brewing Co.), Troy (Brown's Brewing Co.), and Glens Falls (Davidson Bros. Brewing Co. & Cooper's Cave Ale Co.). We picked up an IPA from each brewery and also an Imperial IPA from Chatham Brewing.
Our first stop was Troy, where we had an excellent lunch at Brown's Brewing and when we went downstairs to pick up our keg, my 4 year old son, Henry, toured his first brewhouse: "Wow! What is this place?" Our next stop was Cooper's Cave Ales in Glens Falls, were we met up with Patty Bethel. At Cooper's Cave they not only produce beer, they crank out ice cream, a laundry list of soda pop and operate a restaurant. After packing up our keg of Irate Pat's IPA, we headed to Lake George to check into the Tahoe ($52 a night on Hotwire!), which is right on the lake. After a quick dip in the pool we headed back to Glens Falls to meet up with Rick Davidson at Davidson Bros. Brewing to pick up beer and have dinner. Rick runs a great place with a welcoming atmosphere. The service and the food were outstanding - not to mention the beer. We even talked Rick into coming down to Peekskill for our NYS IPA Fest! Rick set us up with a couple of growlers (red ale and brown ale) and we headed back to the hotel to put the kids to sleep. Then my wife and I sipped Davidson Bros beers on our lake front balcony. Bliss.
The next morning we started heading back south and stopped off to see brewmaster Matt Perry at Chatham Brewing Co. We had kegs of IPA and Imperial IPA waiting for us. Matt (a home brewer turned brewmaster) is cranking out some great beer on a 3.5 barrel system and he's brewing at capacity. According to Matt, there may be an expansion in the near future.
The above IPAs and 13 others - all from the Empire State - will be tapped next Wednesday (Sept. 15th) at 6pm. So mark your calanders and stop by the Birdsall House to celebrate local beer and local food.