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Top 12 (OK, 13) Beers of the Year, 2020
The tale of 2020 can be told through the beers we drank along the way–and they give us a specific sense of where we were a year ago, and how much they helped us retain both a kind of normalcy as well as keeping us connected with the hospitality industry, which took it on the…
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Cushwa Brewing Company, Williamsport
While preparing for the latest marathon–another story to be sure, during covid times–I passed by Cushwa Brewing Company in Williamsport, Maryland, on my way back and forth to the Potomac River and the C&O Canal Tow Path that snakes alongside it. While their taproom remained partially closed through the spring, they opened up in the…
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Tröegs Brewery, Hershey
The aromas of chocolate filled the air, but we were there for the beer. My husband, as a Brit, takes Hershey’s chocolate as an affront to his senses, but we both remarked upon how well the company has apparently invested in the town as we drove through it on our way to find the Tröegs…
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Antietam Brewery, Hagerstown
Well, it took us long enough to make it to our first local taproom–but I’d sampled the Hager-Weiss Hefeweissen from Antietam Brewery in Hagerstown, Maryland, in six-pack form in December, so I knew we had a winner on our doorstep. The brewery used to be in town, but grew beyond its meagre space a couple…
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Moving In
It’s a feature well known that when you move into a new place, for every box you carry in and unpack, you drink a beer. Okay, maybe that was true in my college days–or was that just the price extracted by my erstwhile friends for hauling around my stuff? The stuff has multiplied, and we…
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Northern Neck Burgers
It’s the afternoon of the Saturday before the time change, and it’s a calm, cool day, with a bright sun that warms us only a little bit as we sit at a picnic table outside NN Burger in Tappahannock. The pups are leashed up and watching the boys play cornhole. You can tell it’s all…
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Gone Fishin’
Sometimes you need a break…a real Saturday morning evoking your childhood–complete with a bowl of Lucky Charms, sleeping in, and watching cartoons. Okay, so I didn’t do any of those things last Saturday, but I did walk over to the neighbor’s dock, where my love was tying a swivel to the line on a second…
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Toast to a B-17
An incredibly tragic accident last week took a legendary airplane, her crew, and her passengers into a fiery landing up in Connecticut. Though I didn’t know the pilots of the Boeing B-17 Nine-O-Nine, many of my friends did–and we all felt their loss as keenly as a collective heartbreak. Historic aircraft fly on the wings…
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Make-A-Wish
We’re always up for a charitable way to mix philanthropy and beer (or wine), so when my friend Lori put it out there that she planned to hike 28.something crazy miles to raise funds for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, we asked, “Great. Where’s the beer?” She answered, “Down in Greensboro, you silly kids.” Actually, she and…
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King Bao & Brews
Actually, the title of the story is purposefully misleading: I did not drink any beer at King Bao on East Colonial in Orlando last week–mostly because they don’t serve any alcohol. That should in no way stop you from enjoying the pillowy folded pancakes of joy the next time you’re in the neighborhood. Try any…