Sippin’ in the south: My louisville beercation part 3
Today’s itinerary is filled with beer spots galore. It promises to be a marathon and not a sprint. I wake up with a touch of Bocce Elbow from the previous night’s outdoor games and big gulp curls. Yet, I am not deterred because we are meeting in the lobby to head to brunch and get a good base for a day of fun.
Eggs over frankfort-A great place to brunch
When I hear the word brunch, my knees automatically start to hurt. I realize that my quips about tripping over a phone cord that starts in the kitchen and stretches all the way to the end of the driveway will fall flat. In short, I am too old for brunch as it exists in the year of our lord 2024. Growing up in the 80s, brunch meant breakfast food and lunch food consumed after 11. It did not mean mimosas, cocktails, and avocado toast that costs 18.00 plus tax, tip, and a suspicious 7% organic oxygen fee, tacked on to the bill in print way too small for me to see without my reading glasses. Brunch is one of the many things that make me feel old.
I don’t know if it a Southern thing, but Eggs Over Frankfort is about the least pretentious brunch experience I have ever had. In fact, it is so delicious that I wind up visiting again later in the trip. Eggs Over Frankfort is amidst a collective of wonderful mom and pop hardware stores, book shops, and places to eat and drink on Frankfort Avenue. If you travel to Louisville, you cannot miss this great stretch of quaint commerce.
I’ll take a booster seat, please
We are now rocking a party of 12 and were it not for Brian and Amy getting there early to snag a table, we might still be waiting to be seated in the cozy dining space at Eggs Over Frankfort. I get the end of the table spot, in a chair that I am pretty sure was built with the height of a hobbit in mind. I’m tempted to ask if they have any booster seats that come in husky sizes so I don’t clonk my forehead on the edge of the table. The coffee is bottomless, the server is kind, and Michelle keeps me laughing the whole entire time.
I order a breakfast bowl consisting of 2 fried eggs over easy, mac and cheese, breakfast potatoes,and sausage. Every bite is sensational. The mix of textures from the crunch of the potatoes to the softness of the mac & cheese are satisfying. The sausage, which is made in house, is seasoned perfectly. The eggs are cooked to perfection. The coffee is delicious. Of course, the real star of the experience is the company. We are laughing and enjoying the connections that are being strengthened with each bite and laugh. As our group is finishing up and grabbing checks, we start to talk about the first stop. We also want to do a little exploring before we uncork the bottle of fun for the day.
Carmichael’s Bookstore
I notice that there is an independent little book shop right down the street and I make a beeline for it. I really miss the days of going to B. Dalton Bookstores in the West Saint Paul Signal Hills Mall. There is something about the smell of a bookstore that is so comforting and nostalgic to me. I have been writing so many letters to the head honchos at Calvin Klein to create a perfume that smells like a bookstore to help nerdy book lovers find romance and other like-minded readers at the same time. So far, no responses.
I walk into Carmichael’s bookstore and the array of books, smells, and other bookstore accouterments greet me warmly. As I am walking around, the floors creak familiarly under the weight of my satisfied soul as I peruse the different sections of the store. I am drawn to an entire shelf devoted to books on Bourbon. It is an exciting feeling that pops into my head knowing that I have some exciting distillery tours planned for the second half of my trip. When you become fascinated with something in life, the energy you get from learning more about it is like a drug. I am so enamored with the prospect of learning more about Bourbon that I have to buy a book about it. I make my purchase and see others in the group doing the same thing. We finish up at Carmichael’s and continue to wander down the street. This is such a cute part of town.
The time has come to order up some Lyfts and head to our first brewery of the day. Luckily, Brian and Amy offer a spot in their family vehicle that has plenty of room and snacks in the backseat. We arrive at Atrium Brewing and pretty much have the run of the place. The all-black square building shoots up like a 4 by 4 column on the corner of the street. The inside is nice and has a variety of different types of seating. There is a stage with a fake greenery that is perfect or live music and making TikToks.
Atrium Brewing
The Atrium Brewing beer menu consists of a bevy of beer styles that I like. However, I see 8 lagers on tap and immediately become overjoyed. I go for a flight of crispy beers since this is my first stop of the day. I won’t bore you with the details of the beers other than to say that each one is brewed well and drinks perfectly crisp. It is time to signal the mouse running on the wheel in my liver to take off the governor and I am off to the races.
Roasting on the roof
After everyone arrives from brunch, we decide to adjourn to the rooftop bar. We climb the creaky set of stairs up the rooftop bar that is painted all black under a fairly substantial canopy. One thing to note, if you every want to experience hot yoga, but don’t want to go to a gym, the rooftop at Atrium at the end of July will suffice. Sweet mother of pearl, no sooner are my thighs seared to the wood and sweat is pouring out of me like an overzealous middle schooler getting the sex talk from their parents at a Pizza Hut. While I love the outdoors, being hotboxed by mother nature is not conducive to drinking beer. So, we decide to head downstairs to the bar seating on the patio. This is easily 50 degrees cooler and in the shade. The beers keep going down and it is hard to imagine wanting to leave this oasis of lagered goodness.
Storytime at Atrium Brewing
Rick, ever the entertainer, decides that it is time to open up his mystery book from Carmichael’s Bookstore. They have books wrapped in brown paper for a nominal amount of money and you don’t know what you are going to get. Rick, in addition to being Canadian, is a wacky thrill-seeker when it comes to the written word. Just like a kid on Christmas morning, Rick begins feverishly opening the brown paper wrapping that conceals his mystery book. Rick has the ability, thanks to his pure and kind life disposition, to make anything fun. He is a fantastic person who welcomes anyone into the fold, whether they are Canadian or not. Being in the space of a human like Rick is good for the soul. As you can see in the video above, Rick has a way about him that endears himself to everyone.
What the Heck is a Mliko Pour?
After several pours of more lagers, I am finally up to doing a Mliko Pour (pronounced milk-o). What is a Mliko Pour you ask? Well, it is a glass of beer foam that is meant to be consumed all at once, like a shot. According to Pilsner Urquell, this has been a thing for a long time. I decide that this will be a perfect opportunity to do a TikTok on the stage at Atrium while basking in the neon lighted brewery logo and fake foliage. It is kind of refreshing and unlike chugging an entire beer, is not nearly as taxing on your stomach.
Well, the Mliko pour is very much as advertised. The creamy foam is super-charged with the aromatics of the hops in the Czech Pilsner, and I throughly enjoyed it. Atrium Brewing is a must-visit in Louisville. The beers are incredibly good and the atmosphere is welcoming. Lagers are back and this is a great place to enjoy them.
Mile Wide Brewing Company
I have a fond memory from a beer share that happened during the 2018 Beer Now Conference. Tomasz Kopyra, a blogger/vlogger from Poland, was sharing some beers from home. He had a few beers that were in the neighborhood of 3% ABV. Then, he pulls one out of the cooler that was 9% and said, in a thick accent, “Now, we are elevating.”
As we pile out of the Welzbacher chariot of fun, we are ready for launch. Just like that evening in the Loudon Country Virginia hotel room, when Tomasz busted out the bottle of 9% Polish rocket fuel and it changed the trajectory of our evening, Mile Wide Brewing would continue to elevate our fun levels on this steamy Louisville Saturday. We walk in and the place is huge. They have food, and a sprawling taproom with overstuffed leather couches, plenty of bar seats, and a myriad of other tables situated around the space. There are plenty of televisions and a room dedicated to pinball machines. They even have a Weird Al Yankovic Harvey the Wonder Hamster pinball machine!
After all the lagers at Atrium, I think that the pace of consumption will moderate a bit at Mile Wide Brewing. I start off with a can of Cathedral, their Kölsch-style beer. I figure it might be a good idea to enjoy a low ABV beer given that this is only our second beer stop of the day. Only half of our group is here. Some of the others elected to venture on from Atrium by foot and are taking their sweet time.
Eventually, they would amble in and we find out that they stopped at a brewery that was on the way. I will never fault anyone for finding a place to quench ones thirst while on the road, so I fully support them stopping for more refreshment. The brewery they stopped at was Trellis Brewing, a place I would wind up visiting later on in the trip on my own. They thought the beers at Trellis were great.
Now we have the full contingent of goofballs and the beer and conversation is flowing marvelously. Between the pinball, the comfortable leather couches, and the beer, we are finding it hard to not have a good time. What I enjoy about socializing in a big group is that there are so many fun combinations of people to talk to. With Jeff and Chris, I always like to get my fill of what is happening beer-wise in Colorado. With Michelle, it is more about the sarcastic observing of locals and talking about how we like to decorate for Christmas. With Hamilton, it is a lot of baseball and beer talk. I also love to pick Charle’s brain about writing since he has been doing it so well for so long. The crux of this group is a lot of different fun types of expertise. I really find that spending time with people like that helps you grow and appreciate the many different perspectives that we all have.
I am now onto the West Coast IPA, Army Had a Half Day. This expertly-brewed beer has Amarillo, El Dorado, and Ella hops. It is bursting with brightness and balanced by bitterness. A classic example of a great West Coast IPA. We have pinballed, laughed, and attempted to drink Mile Wide Brewing out of beer. Now, it is on to the next spot. So, we order up our Uber fleet to bring is to Falls City Beer, a Louisville institution.
Falls City Beer
Sometimes a brewery that has been around for a longtime can be a great experience. For a city, having a brand that spans generations can be very special. The nostalgia of a brand can bring is no many fans of different ages. In the case of Falls City Beer, the brewery certainly has that feel. It kind of felt like some of the places we visited in Milwaukee from a historical perspective.
In the case of Falls City Beer, we are here for the Kentucky Common. Kentucky Common is a historical beer style that originated in Louisville starting after the Civil War and going all the way up to prohibition, according the BJCP website. One of the things about this beer is that it utilizes corn, which at the time was a more economical ingredient for brewers. In Minnesota, there are few places that brew a Kentucky Common beer. The beer is malty and sessionable.
It is hard to believe that Falls City Beer is only the 3rd (4th for the real intrepid walkers) beer stop of the day. We have at least 3 more scheduled stops before we call it a day. We bid farewell to the history, the Kentucky Common, and the broken Adirondack chair on the patio at Falls City Beer and head out for our next beer stop.
West Sixth Nulu
We are literally back to almost the exact place where we started the day. The Nulu or New Lousiville neighborhood is packed with food, beer, and cocktails. After visiting a lot of the places, it is no wonder that we needed an entire day just to scratch the surface of this awesome area. We get to West Sixth Nulu, a satellite location of West Sixth Brewing and the place is packed. Also, if you are doing the math about the volume of beer consumed, we are all feeling quite jolly.
Obviously, their taplist is quite lengthy, but I decide on a pretty pedestrian beer style to keep the party moving. I go with the West Sixth Cerveza, a decent Mexican Lager. This beer is about enjoying some time with my friends. Due to the fact that it is packed, some of us are standing and some of us are sitting at the bar.
Paige, Rick, and I are standing and having conversation with Jeff and Chris. We look over and Brian and Amy are sitting at the bar. Brian looks like he is definitely in vacation mode and living his best life. The food at West Sixth Nulu comes out of a kitchen called The Galley. They have some typical bar stuff. I go with a wrap and curry tater tots. It never has occurred to me to put curry powder on tater tots, but they are an absolute revelation. Since the tots are crispy and fried, I think the Pennyrile Pale Ale makes sense to pair with the food. The beers are good, and make the food really stand out.
The conversation is just great and I continue to watch Brian engage complete strangers in conversation. We realize that we have to make a bit of a jaunt to a mini-golf place that is kind of in a suburb of Louisville. I hate to leave this brewery because there is a ton of great energy here. However, this group could head to a public library in our current state and it would be be a ridiculously fun experience.
That One Time at Puttshack
We pile into a Lyft and head to Puttshack. Puttshack is an indoor mini-golf with a bar. However, they completely dropped the ball and lost our reservation so we didn’t have a place to sit. We had to split the beer fellowship into two different groups. This was all fine, but kind of made it difficult to really socialize. This place makes me feel old because it’s so loud. All the exterior noise and crazy alarms going off make it sound like robots all around us are acting out every page of the Kama Sutra. That auditory stimulation of the place, the lack of ability to find a place to sit down to order food and beer, and the lack of group fun we were having earlier made it kind of a frustrating experience.
Lucky for us, this was not the last stop of the fun train. We had an ace up our sleeve. Just when frustrations were high and the blood alcohol was going down, we ordered up our rides to Sergio’s World of Beers.
Sergio’s World Beers
I like Belgian beer. However, some of the folks in our party are ready to pen love letters to some of the dusty bottles that would make 50 Shades of Gray read like a sequel to The Boxcar Children.
If you want to get a bunch of beer nerds aroused, take them to a Belgian Beer Bar. If you want to get a bunch of beer nerds aroused, giddy, and lost in a cooler, take them to Sergio’s World Beers.
The group, especially Hamilton and Kendall, have been hyping this place up the entire trip. They say it’s an experience and it is very hard to describe. It is a nondescript place from the outside. In fact, I don’t believe that there is any signage announcing to the common passerby that through the door, laying in wait, are countless bottles older than some of the names featured on the United State Declaration of Independence.
I don’t know if my description can do Sergio’s justice. All I can say is that it feels like a beer library in the middle of a corner bar combined with a church basement. As you walk in, you see a small bar with tap handles and a handful of seats. The bartender/owner seems to know everyone there except for us. We amble in, our party in various stages of wonder, euphoria, and titillation. This place has a lot of beer stimulus.
After perusing the taps, I decide on a pour of St. Bernardus Abt 12, a Belgian Quad. This incredibly complex, malty, and decadent treat is like a maze of raisins, dates, leather, dark chocolate, and warming alcohol. This beer is iconic, and typically available at any liquor store worth their salt. Having it on tap in the proper glassware is not necessarily as easy an experience to find. So, I thought this would be a great introduction to Sergio’s.
As we explore, we realize that there are so many beers here. I like Belgian beer. However, some of the folks in our party are ready to pen love letters to some of the dusty bottles that would make 50 Shades of Gray read like a sequel to The Boxcar Children. Some people get pours of beer from the taps, others were purchasing bottles from the catacomb-like coolers that seem like they go on forever. The coolers are organized by regions of the world. I’m blown away by the tremendous offerings from Cantillon, 3 Fonteinen, and Lindemans. I love fruited Lambics and there was such a plethora of options to choose from.
If I could bottle the vibes and energy of our entire group settled around one table, laughing, sharing stories, and basking in the unabashed love of beer, I would be able to lift the spirits of the entire planet. These friends are so special to me. It really hammers home the importance of community. This is one of many chosen families I have found in life. We started with beer, but we have learned so much more about each other and that is why traveling as a group is such a great time.
After finishing my St. Bernardus, I go into the cooler and pull a bottle of Lindemans Cassis. This beer is effervescent, balanced, and a favorite of mine. It is a tossup between this and the Kriek (cherry Lambic), but I want to meander a bit off of what I usually have. I also like that the bubbles in this beer moderate the sweetness from the fruit. The laughs keep coming and the eyelids around the table are slowly starting to lower. It is quite late now and I decide that a trip back to the hotel is probably the best move if I am to be a productive member of society in the morning. Some of the brave souls stayed to attempt to empty more of Sergio’s inventory into their hearts. It was the perfect end to a perfect day.
Rick, Paige, and I are heading back to the hotel to try and catch last call in the hotel bar. We realize, much to our dismay, the hotel, which bills itself as the Whiskey Row Cambria, closes their hotel bar at 10pm on a Saturday night. This is beyond confounding. We would have happily spent more money drinking through their well-curated Bourbon list, but that was not an option. Lucky for us, we find a bar not far from us that is open. So, we take the short walk to the Down One Bourbon Bar. We have our final pour of the night sitting at the open bar seats facing Main Street. What a nice way to end the night!
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