For the past week, Anna and I were out in Colorado visiting my family. My dad had a brief respite from his deployment in the Middle East and it was really nice to visit with him. We did quite a bit of mountain biking (I'll have to post more about our bikes later), some hiking, some beer tasting, some brewery touring, and lots of visiting. We stayed in a really nice vacation home that my mom rented for the week. It had plenty of beds and bedrooms for us all to sleep in, a spectacular view, and a hot tub to soothe those sore muscles :) I'll be sure and put up some pictures of the view. I had originally planned on cooking three times while we were out there, but my mom had a lot of meals planned and faced with quickly rising expenditures (mountain biking and driving an SUV to Colorado ain't cheap!), we cut our meal plans to just one meal. Anna and I cooked a variation of Rouladen which I think went down pretty well with the crowd (my parents, my sisters, and my grandparents). I love to cook around the house, but cooking for that many people is a little stressful (I've never made twenty rolls of Rouladen before!). We brought a nice Riesling blend and what I consider one of the beers that defines doppelbock: Ayinger Celebrator. I thought even if my dad didn't enjoy the beer he would enjoy the little goat as a good luck charm. Turns out he enjoyed both the beer and the goat :) We tasted lots and lots of beers while we were there; A few were beers that I have never had: Dogfish Head 120, Stone 07.07.07 Vertical Epic, various New Belgium fare, and lots of others I'll have to expound upon in yet another post.
When we returned from Colorado, I had a nice surprise waiting for me (ok I admit, I looked at the results online and it wasn't so much of a surprise :p), two second place ribbons and a first place plaque from the Dayton Beerfest. I nearly swept the Belgian Ale category taking first with my Belgian Pale Ale and second place with my Saison. I won with relatively low scores though, so it may have just been a weak category ;) But hey, a win is a win. The other ribbon was a second place with my American Wheat. Winning these awards was a nice feeling of accomplishment and continues my streak of at least placing in every competition I've entered, but it also reminded me of my current lack of brewing. I hope in the next few weeks to really start closing in on finishing my new brewery, but first I have to close in on unpacking! Anna and I are both in agreement to really make a concerted effort to get everything unpacked in the next few days... we'll see how that goes.