Lists

I like keeping lists.  Its my way of attempting to organize my life.  Of course, those lists are usually haphazard and ill-kept.  But I still do it.  Technology has helped to centralize these lists, and my Blackberry (best phone ever) holds many of my digital lists.  The problem is, I rarely update the lists once made.  So as an exercise in fun-ness and organizing-ization-ness, here is a random list, distilled from my Blackberry and my own mind.

• Prohibition Taproom – This (post) is what prompted this list.  It opened recently, and I added it to my “to-try” list, and realized that I hadn’t updated it in awhile
• The Tiedhouse – This Saturday The Brew Lounge crew is running there (not to be confused with the Fishtown Beer runners, as I made the mistake of doing before) from the General Lafayette Inn.  It reminded me that I want to get there soon.  And I would love to bike there on Saturday, but Lois will be on tour and I’ll be dadding all day.  Maybe I’ll bring the trailer, hmm…
• Chicks Cafe – Another place I’ve been meaning to get to
• Southwark Restaurant – Rye Whisky anyone?  Did I mention my “to try” list?
• Apothecary – I think I must have
• Kung Fu Necktie – I get the sense that I should either go here more often and put my flag in the ground before it becomes the new cool spot, or just concede it to cooler people than I.  Either way, it needs a new name.  And a website.
• Memphis Taproom – Heard of this place before?
• Germantown – Maybe moving there in the not too distant future?
• Earth Bread and Brewery– Not too far from Germantown…
• Stilton Cheese and Barleywine – Tis the season
• Autumn – Have you seen a tree lately?
• Bottom Brackets – I need to check mine out before my next ride, please remind me.
• Tria – I forgot about this place, I used to go to all their beer classes
• Money – Oh yea, I don’t have any, so most of this list is pointless.
• The Internet – I’m on an upward swing in my dysfunctional relationship with the internet, I signed up for Blip.fm, Twitter, and Facebook recently.
• Real life – If you want to discuss, enjoy, attempt, consume, or visit any of the above, let me know.  I’d love to get out more often.

Figs

I don’t have much in the way of beer and bike news.  At least nothing that you can’t find out from other, better sources.  I do, however, have a fun food bit.

My neighbor has a fig tree (somewhere secret) and brought me over a big bag of fresh figs.  Coincidentally, on the same day that Josh talked about a fig parable at Circle’s meeting.  I decided to try to make fig preserves with them.  This decision was based solely on the thought that it would go great with what is in all likelihood my most favorite food combo of all time: Barleywine and Stilton Cheese.  The season for this is rapidly approaching, and I’ve been getting more and more excited about consuming some Old Horizontal or Blithering Idiot with some Market Borough Stilton.  This is probably also brought about from reading Garret Oliver’s “The Brewmaster’s Table” as much as the weather changing.  I seriously love it though.  Just the thought is turning me into Pavlov’s dog.

But there will be more on that as the weather gets colder, I’m sure.  On Monday night, I threw together some ingredients, loosely based on some recipes from Epicurious.com.  There isn’t much to say about the making of it, other than it tastes great, and lots amazingly just like Fig Newton filling.  Before they turned brown though, they were a brilliant mess of red and green.  If you have never had fresh figs, I would suggest giving them a try.  They are only slightly sweet, and make a great pairing for many cheeses.