Twitter Year in Review 2013

Twitter remains my favorite social network. I came across this fun service, Vizify, last week that created some visuals to recap 2013. The first is a little movie. Unfortunately, you can't embed it but you can view it by clicking on the tweet below or by clicking here.

Just made a movie of my #2013memories on Twitter: https://t.co/bTScQrP3PF What's yours look like? #Vizify
— Amy Z (@amy_z) January 6, 2014

The other fun creation is my top tweets from 2013. Again, this is a screenshot, so it's not interactive, but you can click here or below the image to visit the actual page on the web. There you can view the original tweets and also follow links included in them. I think they are all fairly self-explanatory except for the one from Nov 30 - that was my reaction to the Auburn touchdown at the end of the Iron Bowl. 

https://twitter.com/amy_z/timelines/420166366545465344

What were your favorite moments on twitter in 2013? 

Publix Cooking Class

Saturday, we enjoyed an evening at the cooking school at our local Publix grocery store, featuring Cigar City Brewing Company from Tampa. It was a demonstration class, with the staff chefs showing us how to prepare each course and the guys from the brewery telling us about the beers used in each of the recipes and the beers paired with each course.

A view of the classroom. It's on the second floor of the store; the stairs are right inside the entrance closest to the pharmacy. Note the televisions mounted up close to the ceiling - the camera zooms in on the action so you can see exactly what the chef is doing from your seat. 

The view from our table. We were seated with two lovely women who work together.

First course: Beer Battered Conch Salad with Guava Grove Vinaigrette

(made with the Guava Grove Farmhouse Ale)

paired with Florida Cracker Belgian White (which will be available soon in cans!)

The salad was delicious, the vinaigrette light and refreshing. It was fun to see how to prepare and cook conch too. (Conch is a shellfish from the Bahamas.)

Second course: Spicy Andouille Gumbo Pizza

(made with Jai Alai India Pale Ale in the sauce and in the crust)

paired with Jai Alai as well.

This pizza was unexpectedly delicious: the crust light and crisp, the sauce and sausage flavorful and the beer the perfect counterpoint to all the spiciness. See recipe at bottom. 

Third course: Braised Beef Short Ribs (made and paired with Ligero Black Lager) served over Parsnip Puree. 

Another great course though this one was a little rich for me as the ribs were rubbed with espresso powder and cocoa before cooking and the parsnip/potato was chock full of butter and heavy cream. Tasty nonetheless. 

Fourth course: Flourless Chocolate Cake with Caramel Maduro Sauce and Chocolate Ganache, made with and paired with Maduro Brown Ale.

Super rich and super delish. It was fun to see another way of making caramel too. 

One of the best parts of the evening (besides eating all this great food) was learning more about the brewery, what they have planned, and their commitment to sharing a bit of Florida and Tampa history by putting fun facts on their packaging (also see their website here for more on the history of brewing in Florida).

Class took just under three hours. Tickets were $45 apiece. Plans are underway to host a brewery once a month this fall; sounds good to us! Our new friends at our table have been to other classes and enjoyed them -  wine pairing classes in particular got high marks as did the hands on sessions. The schedule is here. 

As promised here are the recipes for Gumbo Pizza:

Enjoy!

Our Visit to Southern Tier Brewing Company

While we were in Ohio, we drove up to Lakewood, New York, with my brother and sister-in-law to visit Southern Tier Brewing Company. It was an easy drive, about an hour and a half; the southern tier of their name refers to the part of New York state that borders Pennsylvania.We're lucky to get a lot of their beers here in Tallahassee and have developed quite an affection for them over the last few years.

Great glasses, right?

It was a perfect day to enjoy their beautiful outdoor patio - 81 and partly cloudy.

We liked the design of the patio cover with the rustic elements, clear panels and replica bottle cap.

One of the new beers we tried that I enjoyed was their Raspberry Wheat - 

not too sweet, not too strong; a lovely summer beer.

delicious pulled pork sandwich

There was even entertainment.

This is a popular place - by the time we left around 9pm, the parking lot was packed, with cars lining the driveway all the way around the brewery and out to the street. Some folks rode their bikes over and all ages represented. There is lots of lawn space around the patio; people brought blankets and spread them out to enjoy the singer-songwriters and great environment. It's definitely worth the trip.

Southern Tier Brewing Company
2072 Stoneman Circle
Lakewood, NY 14750
http://southerntierbrewing.com/

Pints for Paws

We are looking forward to supporting the Animal Shelter Foundation and our local home brewers on Saturday at Pints for Paws. From the website:

Join us again, this year, and drink the finest and freshest handcrafted beer in Florida. Experience the taste of home brewed craft beer and talk with local home brewers. All proceeds go to the Animal Shelter Foundation (ASF), a charity that supports the homeless animals in the care of the Tallahassee Animal Service Center. Please visit www.tallyasf.org for more information. 
A donation of $10 includes tickets for six craft beer samples. Additional donations include additional tasting tickets: $1 each or twelve for $10. Each sampling is approximately 3-4 ounces of craft beer.

Pints for Paws sponsored by North Florida Brewers League (NFBL)
Saturday, June 2nd, 2012 4-8pm
Market Square on Timberlane Road
http://pintsforpaws.org/

Pumpkin Beer Tasting

Hubs and I had a blinded taste test of 7 pumpkin themed beers available here in Tallahassee. Here's a quick synopsis of the winners and losers.

In order to make our tasting as blind as possible, I poured the beers into the glasses and wrote a number on each square of paper in front of them. I kept a record of which beer each number corresponded to. Hubs (who was in the other room for the pouring) then reorganized all the glasses, keeping each number with its glass. Then he turned each number over and wrote a letter on the back (in case I remembered which one was number 1, 2, etc.). We took notes on each beer based on the letter and then used our list of numbers to translate back to which beer was which after the tasting.

Pumking from Southern Tier Brewing Company was the favorite by far!

photo source

It takes like pumpkin pie. Yum.

Others we enjoyed included the Hoppin Frog Brewery's Frog's Hollow Double Pumpkin Ale (very good, low hop, can taste cinnamon; nice aroma, full-bodied); and Dogfish Punkin Ale (which I thought had a similar taste to Great Lakes Brewing Company's iconic Christmas Ale).

We thought these were decent: Weyerbacher Imperial Pumpkin Ale (not as good a mouth feel as the others, also heavily spiced); Terrapin Pumpkin Fest (nice flavor, on the strong side, heavy on cloves; slightly creamy, just a little too hoppy).

We weren't impressed with Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale or Tommyknocker Small Patch Pumpkin Harvest Ale (we described them as ok and boring).

Recapping My Favorite Seasonal Beers

My favorite holiday beer by far is Great Lakes Brewing Company's Christmas Ale (picture below is from Thanksgiving 2009) but for the rest of the list, my suggestions include only beers available to buy locally in Tallahassee. 

One word: YUM

The good news is there were lots of seasonal beers available in town for us to try and enjoy. I'm presenting them like a visual countdown - all were good but here they are all from my sure-I'd-drink-it-agains to my most favorite. Left to right: Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale, Sweet Water Festive Ale, Hoppin' Frog Frosted Frog Christmas Ale, Rouge Yellow Snow IPA, Rogue Santa's Private Reserve

Harpoon Winter Warmer I like the design of the packaging and the beer's not bad either!

Weyerbacher Old Heathen - for Solstice!

Southern Tier Old Man Winter - a winner with me, both in the bottle and on tap.

Anchor Christmas Ale - fabulous! It was exciting to be able to purchase this locally this year (thank you Liquor Loft!). It's brewed a little differently every year and 2010 was definitely exceptional. 

Getting Ready for Halloween 2

A few more photos of our Halloween goodies, mostly inside the house this time. First, by popular demand, here are Sassy A and Sassy B.

I know it looks like Sassy A is in the yard, but really she's hanging out at Grandma's house so T'll have something to inflate when we visit.

Sassy B is in the house, at home, but all the light up pumpkins are outside.

We have fun new Halloween night-lights.

Love how the cats eyes light up green.

Even the inside of the beer fridge is decorated for Halloween. I love this brew from Southern Tier: Imperial Pumking. It takes like pumpkin pie.