My friend Kristine Nickel is a woman of many accomplishments. Among them is an expertise for all things culinary. She has maintained a freelance writing career since the early 1980s, wrote a wire-distributed weekly column for the Chicago Tribune for 7 years, and has covered food, wine, and travel for publications such as Sarasota Herald-Tribune, [...]
Anne & I spent Memorial Day weekend in the Big Apple, visiting my family and taking in the sights. The weather was perfect, and the city was buzzing even with a lot of people out of town. It was also a great time to bar hop and mingle with the locals & tourists. New York’s [...]
Mahaffey’s is a great bar owned by proprietor Wayne Mahaffey in the Canton section of Baltimore. It has a great neighborhood feel, and you can’t beat the Monday night special. That’s right, 3 10oz microbrews for $4, along with $1 sliders, either beef or chicken! You can eat and drink like a king for about [...]
Marzens tend to be traditional Fall beers, but I had the chance to try a different take on this beer style at Crum’s Bar and Grill recently. Cigar City Marzen Spring Lager (Cigar City Brewing; Tampa, FL; Marzen; ABV: 5.5) is also known as Cigar City Oktoberfest Marzen when it’s released during the autumn months. [...]
You can add Crum’s Bar and Grill to a growing list of exceptional brewpubs in the Tampa Bay area. Located in downtown St. Petersburg, and owned by Chris Crum and Lanette Miller, Crum’s Bar and Grill offers craft beer, food, and live music in a hip casual setting. Speaking of which, there’s 52 selections of [...]
The last time I was at the Cigar City Brewing Tasting Room in Tampa, I learned something new. Did you know that bats pollinate blue agave plants, which provide the ingredient found in tequila? So it’s fitting that I tried a double cream ale, named for the bat, that’s aged in tequila barrels. Cigar City [...]