March Madness

I actually couldn't care less about college basketball - and I hate cliche headlines - but with the whirlwind month I've had, I felt this one was appropriate (and besides, I love the alliteration: it makes me smile). So here we are at the end of one crazy month, in which I believe the lion went ahead and ate the lamb this time around, because I haven't seen mild temperatures. The lamb started to come out around St. Patrick's Day, then the lion just devoured it and it's been frigid ever since.

Yes, the french fries are IN the
sandwiches at Premanti Brothers! 

The beginning of the month started out promising with a spontaneous trip to Pittsburgh with a dear friend of mine.  We stayed on the Southside, and walked almost the entire city throughout the first day. It was rainy, but we didn't mind. We stopped for lunch at the famous Premanti Brothers and had ourselves two honkin' huge sandwiches and cheesy fries. They were a sight to behold, and quite honestly, an accomplishment to consume. We of course made friends with the cooks (mainly because it took us nearly three hours to eat these sandwiches, so we had time to chat), and they told us to go to Carson City Saloon that night. We took their suggestion, and spent most of the evening there, drinking $2 mixed drinks and $1 drafts. The "best" part about this bar? They only had two beers on draft: Yuengling and Natural Lite. Despite the fact that they were both equally cheap, people were still ordering Natty. I thought the Apocalypse had come. (For those of you who don't know what Natty Lite is, it's the beer we ordered in college because we couldn't afford anything else, and it tastes like skunky water. As opposed to Yuengling, which is a masterpiece of brewing excellency.)

Pittsburgh was a fun mini-trip, and I'd certainly go again. The next couple weeks consisted of build-up to St. Patrick's Day, which I spent up in Lakewood with some great friends while my husband was out of town on business. I attended a pre-St. Patrick's Day party with him the weekend before, so we got our green-beer fix together then. But on the actual day, my friends and I went to a place called Deagan's in Lakewood, and it was positively perfect. They had delicious food, so we got a myriad of appetizers for the table, including pommes frites, bacon wrapped sea scallops, Peking duck confit mac and cheese, and sesame crusted calamari - yeah, it wasn't your typical bar food! We ate, drank Irish beer, and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railway "Ales on Rails"
beer-tasting train ride. What a great concept!! 

The month culminated with a funky fun twist in our food and beer adventures. My brother-in-law had given my husband and me tickets to "Ales on Rails" for Christmas. Now, I always write on here about the great Cuyahoga Valley National Park, but this is something different and interesting that they offer: a beer tasting train ride through the park on their famous, rusty, old train (the rust and ripped seats definitely add to the character of the 1940s train - I wouldn't upgrade it either!) My mother-in-law and father-in-law joined us, along with my husband's aunt and uncle, and we had two strait hours of bottomless ales and stouts paired with snacks while we rode the train through the CVal Park. Really, it was too much fun. I got yelled at by the conductor for not drinking enough (my kind of train), the electricity shut off about halfway through the trip, and by the end of the ride, the group had plenty of beer-induced "quotes of the night." I believe at one point my father-in-law referred to the city lights out the window as "fairy lights," and our uncle fondly remarked at the end of the trip, with a cheesy grin on his face and a shrug of his shoulders, "We liiiiike Mike." (Mike was our beer distributor who was telling us all about our tasters. We did like him.)  I won't tell you what our aunt said, but let's just say the entire train was dead silent when she was describing the head on the beer!

Next month, we're heading to Opening Day for the Tribe (April 1), Washington D.C. long weekend (April 15-17), and probably another few trips here and there! I can't wait!

Until then, enjoy the wee bit o' winter we have left, and don't judge my beer consumption.