By Iron Chef Leftovers

Usually when I am on vacation, I like to sample any local beverage I can get, whether it is beer, wine or spirits. Generally, when you go to an area not known for the particular drink you are tasting, it usually ends in disappointment.

Recently, Mrs. Iron Chef and I took off to the Great White North (well actually it was Alaska, not Canada) for a vacation. We found ourselves in a dinky little tourist town called Skagway. Skagway’s claims to fame are that it was a starting point for prospectors during the Yukon Gold Rush and it is the town farthest south on the southeastern coast of Alaska that you can reach by car (everything further south is only accessible by boat or plane). Skagway also has a brewery, conveniently enough named Skagway Brewing. There was a nice little write up in NW Brewing News recently about Skagway Brewing and how they can’t meet demand and their beers are only available at the brewery (the article is on page 25).

Skagway Brewing is located at the very end of the main strip in Skagway, a few minute walk from the docks. The bar is small and crowded, there aren’t many options in Skagway, but the pub has a lot of wood and feels like a brewpub rather than a tourist trap. They have a decent pub food menu and a small tap list – 5 beers brewed in the brewery, a couple of Alaskan Brewing Taps, PBR and a draught Root Beer. The 5 home brewed beers were Spruce Tip Blonde, Prospector Pale, Chilikoot Trail IPA, Boom Town Brown and Blue Top Porter.

All of their beers were good; a couple were exceptional. I liked the Pale, Brown and IPA – the IPA being surprisingly hoppy and full bodied. The Pale and the Brown were both drinkable and I would not turn down a pint of either if someone put one in front of me. The two standouts were the Blonde and the Porter. I was absolutely in love with the Porter and drank that the entire time I was there. It was a cool cloudy day and the Porter provided the right amount of malty smoothness with a hint of chocolate that came with each sip but did not linger, even after 4 pints of the stuff. The beer lacks the heaviness of a stout and I felt like I could keep drinking it all day without getting a feeling of being full. The Blue Top Porter was easily one of the 5 best porters I have ever consumed.

The Blonde would be my second choice of beers from Skagway. The NW Brewing Article quotes the brewer that the Spruce Tip outsells their other beer 5 to 1 when it is available. I am always skeptical about beers that have strange ingredients – they can go from interesting to cloying in a hurry. Spruce Tip Blonde is not one of those. When you first smell this beer, you get a light aroma of being in the forest on a nice summer day – not a smell of a pine scented air freshener, despite 300 pounds of hand-picked spruce tips being included in the batch. Tasting the beer provided a second level of enjoyment – I didn’t taste pine at all, but subtle fruity (almost raspberry) hit on the front of the palate which gave way to a crisp and refreshing sensation from the beer itself. You could definitely taste what was a very nice blonde on the back of the palate.

Sadly, since we were 4 days from returning home and the beer is only available on tap, growlers were not an option, otherwise we would have come home with the world’s biggest 6 pack. If Skagway ever gets the ability to expand and can distribute their beers to a wider audience, try them; otherwise you will need to make the almost 1,100 mile trip by boat (or 2,000+ mile trip by car) to Skagway to sample the beers. Heck, I would probably make the trip again just to drink the Porter that I am sitting here thinking about longingly.

By Iron Chef Leftovers

Stop 3 – Anacortes Brewing/Rock Fish Grill in Anacortes

A hop, skip and a jump down winding Chuckanut Drive (and after an emergency bathroom break), lies Anacortes, Washington – a sleepy little waterside community known for Whale Watching, its ferry terminal, the Tesoro refinery and Anacortes Brewing, possibly the best top to bottom brewery in the state of Washington. Rock Fish Grill is the restaurant attached to Anacortes Brewing and they serve up some tasty food as well as all of Anacortes’s beers and are located right in the heart of downtown Anacortes on Commercial Street.

The Beer – OK, so this is going to be a slightly biased review. I REALLY like pretty much anything that Anacortes makes and they have a pretty extensive lineup of beers – they were pouring somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 beers when we were there, with styles ranging from Maibock to IPA to Belgians. I am a big supporter of Anacortes IPA – I consider this to be the best IPA in the Northwest and quite possibly the world. Their IPA is a tremendously balanced beer with just the right amounts of hoppiness, bitterness and flora aromas. Strangely enough, I did not actually order the IPA (although that is what came home with me in the growler). I indulged in my second favorite beer in the Anacortes lineup – their seasonal Mai Oh Maibock. The Maibock is the kind of beer I look for on a warm summer day – malty and refreshing with a bit of hops on the back of the palate. The one beer they had on tap, which I had not tried before, was the Bourbon Barrel Aged Blonde (say that one three times fast). I am really not at fan of barrel-aged beers – they tend to be overly oaked and remind me of chewing on wood. It is the same reason why I tend not to like oaked chardonnay; all you taste is wood. The Blonde was surprisingly well done. Don’t get me wrong, there is no mistaking that this beer ended up in a Bourbon barrel, but it didn’t whack you over the head with that flavor and you could surprisingly taste the beer (Blonde isn’t exactly a heavy style), making it more than just a one dimensional beverage. With a alcohol level approaching 9%, you probably wouldn’t want more than one, but you are not exactly going to chug it either. Alas, Anacortes’s beers are available on tap only and don’t make appearances in Seattle in any great quantity (you will usually find a handful of places with it on tap), so I would recommend taking home as many as you can before you leave. Overall, I would give their beers 5 Sebastidae out of 5. Heck, the only thing keeping the beer from being 6 Rock Fish out of 5 is that you can only get it on tap, and most of the beers are only available in Anacortes.

The Atmosphere – Rock Fish is a big space, plenty of tables and a large outdoor space (although not large enough to accommodate 8 people on a beautiful sunny Saturday). It feels like a brewpub – inside has plenty of wood, a nice, long bar, the current selections hanging on panels over the bar. Having been to Rockfish several time to eat, I tend to think of it more as a restaurant, and it is a comfortable and homey place to have a meal o go with your beers. Outside there are 2 outdoor areas, one on the side of the building with a few tables and the other in the back. One of these days I am going to have to go back just to have beers and judge it from that perspective, but until then, Rock Fish gets 4 Trophospheres out of 5.

Dog Friendliness – This is a tough one to judge since we couldn’t be seated as a group outside. I am not sure what the Rock Fish policy on dogs is on the back patio, but you can have them on the side patio, which will allow you to indulge in your beer with Spot by your side. The drawback here is I believe the side patio does not have any waiter service, so you have to get your own beers. Rock Fish scores and incomplete 3.5 belly rubs out of 5 due to lack of information on their policy (and I didn’t think to ask).