Two Weekends in New York

Couple highlights from the last two weekends here:

Pillow Fight in Union Square on March 22nd. Part of World Pillow Fight Day. My photos are posted on facebook and Picasa; Picasa also has a very special video featuring my roommate when we were in the thick of things.

The First Manhattan Cask Ale Festival at Chelsea Piers. Over 35 cask ales available for the tasting, all of them delicious. It's a very interesting venue for a bar as well, especially when you're there in the afternoon/early evening - it's right on the Hudson, so the sunlight is pouring in from the entirely glass wall on the west face of the bar. Among the beers I sampled:

- Chelsea Brewing Company's Frosty's Winter Wheat. An interesting, zesty mix of flavors in a wheat beer. Not my favorite of the festival but still tasty.

- Chelsea Brewing Company's Tsar's Revenge. A "Russian Imperial Stout," this was a very rich stout that embodies what I think of when I think of cask ale. Very earthy and smoky.

- Chelsea Brewing Company's 1000 Gyle Imperial Mild. An English barleywine, I believe this had the highest alcohol by volume of any beer at the festival, but you wouldn't know it. Very smooth, and almost sweet. They don't serve full pints of it, for a good reason.

- Otter Creek's Sea Otter. Brewed in Middlebury, VT, which is what caught my eye in the first place. Great dark, amber ale.

- Sly Fox's Ichor. Belgian barleywine. May have been my favorite brew of the festival. A quadruple with German pils. Yummmm.