Sorry for the late posting today, I blame Mike from www.MikeLovesBeer.com and Chung from the Coffee District for a night of great craft beer. Before I get into who will be guest blogging with me this week, I personally would like to congratulate Mike from MikeLovesBeer.com on his 2nd Anniversary of his Beer Blog. Good times buddy!

Ok, so this week I had the honor to sample some VERY fine beers with a “legend” of sorts from RateBeer.com, HopScotch. It was a pleasure to sit and learn more about beer than I knew existed with him. HopScotch is another prime example of why the Craft Beer Community is so good, it consists of amazing people.

Here is some background info on HopScotch.

HopScotch; “Eric”
Location: Vero Beach, Florida
Hometown: Harpers Ferry, West Virginia

Got into craft beer in his last semester of college at West Virginia University (1992) when a brewpub known as The One Onion (subsequently the West Virginia Brewing Company; currently the Morgantown Brewing Company) opened two blocks from his apartment offering $1.00 pints every weekday between 3 PM and 7 PM. His go-to beer in college was Rolling Rock as it was cheap in that part of the country. After graduation and a substantial increase in income while working on Capitol Hill, Samuel Adams Boston Ale hit the supermarket shelves and he was a quick convert to the Boston Beer Company. As beer stores started popping up all over the D.C./Baltimore area, he set out to try every new craft brew and import he could get his hands on. Started taking notes in 2002 and joined ratebeer.com that very same year. Since then, he has rated 5,899 beers… oops, make that 5,904 now… and travels and trades extensively in order to try as many American, Danish, Canadian, Dutch, Italian and Swedish craft beers as humany possible. His three favorite beers are Alesmith Wee Heavy Scotch Ale, Three Floyds Dark Lord Bourbon Barrel Aged Vanilla Bean Imperial Stout and Cigar City Hunahpu’s Bourbon Barrel Aged Imperial Stout.

Stay tuned for some crazy good beers this week!

Cheers!

Tryst
4 E. Atlantic Ave., Delray Beach
561-921-0201
trystdelray.com

Well, Friday night after my day trip to Orlando, I’ll cover the details of that next weekend. The Cerveza Chica and I ended up hitting up what we were told was a local favorite for food and craft beer. Tryst, in downtown Delray Beach.
Tryst is a nice little restaurant that has a very good craft beer selection. We were told to go and check it out during happy hour as their drinks are all 2-4-1, and they have 50% off select menu items. Due to work I typcally can not make it out to a place for Happy Hour, so Friday, since I was off work, was a prime chance for us to check out the place.
The establishment is defiantly “trendy”, seemed like a young professional crowd. It was cozy inside though, very welcoming. We ordered the following food; Cheese Platter, Mussels, Some Kind of Sweet & Sour Shrimp, and Chicken Pad-Thai. The food was good but the portions were relatively small, but for 50% off I won’t complain. The best thing out of everything was the cheese plate, it was divine.
As for the beer….Tryst has a limited rotating tap selection that is very good considering most places only carry Non-craft on tap. They carry Dogfish Seasonals, Stone, Victory, and more on tap. Pretty diverse selection of beer. Their bottle list was VERY impressive. They even had the insanely hard to find Hunahpu’s from Cigar City in bottle. This is surprising since there were such a limited amount of bottles brought south, and since it was a limited released beer.
The service was good, and not rushed. The waiter did want to make sure that we were educated about the drinks we were purchasing, and offered free samples of other beers/wines that were up-sales.  Which was really nice even though we both knew exactly what we wanted.
Overall it was a very good experience, although I don’t think I would go back off Happy Hour and eat. The food was very good but not worth the non-happy hour price.  Parking was also a bit of a challenge as it is with any where on Atlantic Ave.
Worth checking out!

Dark Lord 2010
Three Floyds Brewing Co.
Munster, IN
15.00% ABV

C. Black
H. Clear on the corners
N. Boozie (Rum and Bourbon), Sweetness, and a hint of Espresso

KirkDiggler;
A: Smells of booze, but don’t know what kind. I got Notes of Rum and bourbon, sweetness, and finally warms to espresso.
A: Pours black w/ chocolate colored head. Quickly dissipates, leaves no lacing.
F: Sweet and fruity up front w/ slight umami and soy sauce notes. I believe that cantaloupe was also used to describe at this point. If it wasn’t cantaloupe, it was some kind of melon on the back end.
M: Oily and slick, goes down smooth w/ a slight alcohol burn. Finishes boozy
O: I’m now a believer that the hype is real. #DLD2011, here I come!! Definitely buy enough to drink through the ages. 25 year Dark Lord? Yes!!
Score: 4.625

The Ferm; Well the only other time I have had Dark Lord was at the release party for Hunahpu’s. I was pretty intoxicated but was able to remember how good I thought it was. Well 2010 stood up to the hype, slapped the hype, then defecated all over it. This is a perfect Russian Imperial Stout, that is anything but hype. Everyone that sampled this bottle with me was amazed by the complexity of the beer, just as I was. The mouth feel was oily and creamy on the tongue. The flavors progressively changed with warmth, though one flavor of Cantaloupe stuck with me for a bit. Simply put; Darklord is Complex as HELL!!!
Score: 4.99

Overall: 4.8075

Cigar City – Hunahpu’s
Cigar City Brewing
Tampa, FL
11.00% ABV

C. Hard to see clarity when the beer is Black
H. Dark Black
N. Coffee, Cinnamon, Chocolate, hints of Vanilla

Dos; Oh yes, we’ve been waiting a longgg time for this one. Technically we had it in January at the Jupiter Beer Fest, but having it at the actual brewery is WAY better. A nice dark beer with a brown head. Very aromatic with some great hints of cinnamon; smooth yet very thick. Definitely not as thick as fat chicks….or Ten Fidy, but this is definitely a 1 glass type of beer. So good all you need is one of these to be pretty satisfied. I feel that way occasionally with certain ladies. The last one being the girl from that restroom at the Mexican restaurant that when I woke up in the morning….I had no clue who she was! Whoops.
Score: 4.689

Ferm; Alright this is why we came to Tampa. While I have had this beer before at craft festivals I have never actually reviewed it. Love the nose of this beer, it has such strong scent of coffee and cinnamon. It is hard to compare that odor, but it makes me happy. After first sip you can taste the cinnamon, coffee, and a hint of brown sugar and vanilla. Pretty complex and matures well while reaching room temperature. I would say slightly chilled is a great temperature for this 11% ABV beer. It is very smooth and easy to drink. Not an extremely thick Imperial stout. Wow…I’m really happy that I came to Tampa and am able to pick up some bottles of this beer. I personally think it is going to become AMAZING after a few years in the cellar.
Score: 4.747

Overall: 4.718