Travels in the near abroad, part 1

A couple of weekends ago I got roped into a trip to Concord Mills Mall by The Mrs. As we meandered around, and I began to loose interest, my attention turned to the important things in life. This, as is always the case, meant lunch. I decided to completely dismiss all of the chain crap in the general vicinity right off the bat. This lead me to my phone, and the Urbanspoon App. With a couple of tweaks, and a few rolls of the dials, I landed on Emma's Carolina Cuisine and Spirits in downtown Concord. I have only visited downtown Concord a couple of times before and had never really had the chance to explore. So when The Mrs. was finally done shopping I explained my plan. With no resistance we headed toward Emma's. We got into town and parked, then made our way up to the restaurant making notes of what to check out when we were done. Number one on the list was what we thought was a Cuban Bakery, more on that in a second. We found our way to the restaurant and had a seat. The decor has a bit of a local "Fridays" feel with chotchkies and local newspaper clippings on the walls. The servers are all southern women who talk to everyone as if they were a regular and, judging from the conversations, most were. I had a fairly good fried pork sandwich with sweet potato fries. While The Mrs. went for the Ruben also accompanied with sweet potato fries. The fries were great. I inquired about the spirits in the name and was pointed to the bar hiding in another corner of the restaurant. I was sad that, that was all it was, but not near as sad as I was when I saw the bar while paying our tab. It's not very often you see a bar with nothing displayed, in what I will admit was a nice little bar, but Aristocrat products and a bottle of Tia Maria. It was a little disconcerting.

The first stop after Emmas was the Cuban bakery, which turned out to be a full fledged restaurant; Havana Carolina. Damn the luck. It is a cute little place with a few tables and all the feel of anything you would find back home. Most amazingly was the inclusion of a Mamey smoothie on the menu. We ordered one and then saw Cuban bread to go and topped it all off a couple of croquettes for the road. How could we resist?

Last stop in Concord was Lil' Roberts Place, a bar with a beer store in the front window. It was not earth shattering but a nice selection for a little place. I picked up a bottle of Mad Rivers barleywine and a Duck Rabbit wee heavy.

I'm not sure how often we will be making the trip to Concord but it made for a nice day and if we do make it back, there will definitely be a stop at Havana Carolina.

Catching Up

So I have been so slack in posting and a lot of that has to do with being so busy. A quick sum up of the last two weeks or so is in order.

Easter weekend -

My In-laws were in town and we hit most of their favorite places like Crepe Cellar and Solstice. On Friday we decided to take a trip to Asheville. The ladies wanted to check out a yarn producer in the area and I wanted to eat, so, win win. The yarn place was a bust so we headed into the city and decided to try Laughing Seed, a place I have heard much about and was really excited to try. We had puppies with us which meant we had to wait for one of four puppy friendly tables. It was a bit of a wait but It was beautiful out and as i found out totally worth it. We started with the pakoras. They were delightfully light and crunchy with a great full flavor. To drink I started an IV drip of the IPA from Green Man, a local brewery.Hey, I wasn't driving. For lunch I had the Mercury Not Rising, which is an herb seasoned seitan patty on a bun with veggies and dill pickle mayo. It was delicious, but the fries made the meal, Jalapeño-onion fries to be exact, but don't eat the pepper pieces, ouch. For dessert we shared a slice of coconut cream pie that was near perfection.

Thursday - April 8th

Grateful Growers has been hosting a series of pork cooking classes and we really wanted to go to all of them but were only available for last weeks. It was on pate and terrines. And, since we had no ideas about either, we were really excited. It was held at Friendship Trays a local charity that runs a food delivery service to the needy who can't get out as well as a cooking school and caterer. When we arrived there was an array of meat spreads and bread. Everything was amazing. There was a classic pate from Julia Child, a country terrine as well as a pate devised by one of our teachers Reg. Then we were split into two groups and got our hands dirty. Our first lesson was on preparing the classic Pate and Regs Pate, and then we switched and learned from Cassie the country pate. It was a lot of fun and we got to take some home with us, which is even better. And, while I will not be eating pate all the time, I would be willing to try one for our next party.

April 9-11

And finally, a weekend of drinking and driving. To celebrate the impending birth of Mr. Chelsea's first child, a few of the men folk decided we needed to take a visit east, to the coast and all beer related sites in between. So we woke up early and headed to the coast on a splendid Friday morning. Our original plan had been to visit Mother Earth in Kinston and Duck Rabbit in Farmville. Both of which were unavailable due to a brewers conference in Chicago. So we quickly changed plans and headed toward Fayetteville and a brewpub called Huske Hardware House. I had just read an article on them and was eager to check it out. We arrived a little early for lunch, and opening for that matter, so we strolled around downtown Fayetteville dispelling our preconceived notions of a town usually referred to as Fayett-nam. Once inside we quickly weighed our options and I headed for the Rusty Nail Pale Ale and a Cuban Burger. While we made polite conversation with our waitress, we asked if we could get a tour and yes, yes we could. Shortly after the Brewmaster stopped by the table and we had a great discussion. When we finished our fine but lackluster meal we got the nickel tour of a very clean and organized brewing area. Then again, it is surrounded by glass, so it has to be clean.

I suppose at this point I should say this was also a working trip for a friend of ours who is trying to start a hop farm called the Cone and Bine Hop Farm. And to round out the gang was Mr. Painter who is one of Mr. Chelsea's oldest friends and an all around good guy. He served as our moral center for the trip, and with Mr. Hop along, boy did we need it.

Our next stop was a quick one at Duck Rabbit, just to see it. I wish we hadn't done that. I love their beer and their facility did not make me want to drink it. I'm sure it's fine inside but I didn't need to see that. On to Washington, and the beer and wine slash book store, where I not only got beer but a lovely bottle of Fererria Tawny Port, to pick up some Mother Earth for the evening, when we arrived in Kill Devil Hills; Which we did without incident. As soon as we arrived it was time for dinner at Outer Banks Brewing Station. I started with a Lemongrass wit that was spectacular and, I have since learned, got a silver at the world beer cup. Unfortunately it was all down hill from there. The food was ok, we had some wings and various burgers and sandwiches. My second was their Abbey which was middling and to finish the night we each got their Ice beer. We were quite excited to try this since none of us had tried an ice beer before, although, I was a little leery that it only came in at 11%. It was ok but lacked real definition, nothing stood out about it. So, back to the room, grab some beer, and watch stars on the beach.

Saturday I woke up feeling fine. Which was kind of a surprise. Unfiltered beer and I don't usually play well together. We started the day at the Grits cafe with a giant breakfast and moved on to the Wright Bothers memorial to kill time until we could get back to drinking. It was cool enough, and the scale of the thing definitely gave me pause. When we were finished we loaded back into the van and headed for Weeping Radish.

Weeping Radish is a brewery, butcher and seasonal cafe run by a German couple who specialize in German beer and sausage. Unfortunately, the cafe part was closed for the season. Mr. painter was not amused, he was promised food. However, there was beer and, after some small talk, plates of food started trickling out. We each started with a flight of all of their beers, six in all at the moment. The group consensus was that the Schwarzbier was one of the finest beers we had had. Thus we settled in for a near constant flow of beer. This flow was only halted occasionally for samples of Pretzel, fresh apple sausage, and Sweet potato liverwurst, as well as a gander at the brewing facility and numerous potty breaks. After about three hours we decided to finally pay our tab and move on. On our way out the door we added cases of bottled beer and countless sausage to out tabs and threw them in the cooler. On the way back to the hotel room we made a quick stop at Chips, the local beer and wine purveyor, to stock up. Here I found another bottle of port. this time the rare Dows Crusted Port.

Dinner that night involved a 2 mile walk and a fine meal of no real consequence.

Sunday we headed home with one last stop on the agenda. We made our way to Raleigh to check out Natty Greene's, another brew pub. This is their second location. The original is in Greensboro. This stop served double duty, since we met Mr. Painters brother there. As far as I'm concerned, outside of the adventure of it, we didn't need to go anywhere else. The beer was superb and the food was excellent. I had a Belgian dubbel that was very crisp and a stout that was smokey and thick. But, since I was driving the last leg I had to quit there. I will be back.

Luckily, we made it home in one piece and full of memories to keep for our lifetimes.