Monday, September 1, 2008

North By Northwest

I attended this month's Appetizers with Addie at North By Northwest, a get together with The Austin American-Statesman's food writer Addie Broyles. She's fairly new to the publication, and I've already enjoyed a lot of her work, so I was excited to meet her. It turned out to be a really fun evening full of good food and talk about food. I can't wait to get more involved in the Austin food community and share what I learn with yall!

I went to NXNW once last summer and was intrigued by their beer sampler. I didn't get a chance to try it since I was there for lunch, so I made sure to give it a shot this time. There were 6 five-ounce beers, including:

  • Northern Light
  • Duckabish Amber
  • Pyjingo Pale Ale
  • Okanogan Black Ale
  • Bavarian Hefeweizen
  • Seasonal Ale

My favorite by far was the Hefeweisen. I haven't had much beer lately, so my palate for the darker beers has somewhat dimished, but the Hefe was delicious and light, and the hint of banana was relaly interesting. The Northern Light was passable, but not as flavorful as I would've hoped.

The Duckabish Amber and Pyjingo Pale Ale were less my style, but I appreciated their deeper flavor. I was surprised how much I enjoyed the black ale, as I usually don't like beers that dark. But I saved it for last and worked my way up so the flavor didn't knock me off my feet!

We accompanied the beer with a tasty appetizer of roasted garlic bulbs with goat cheese and black pepper crostinis. This was sweet and creamy, and since I didn't have a hot date afterwards, I had no qualms about having a few!

3 comments:

Jodi said...

I second the recommendation of the garlic and goat cheese crostini. YUM! The beer at NXNW was not my taste though -- in general I found it too watery and lacking in flavor. The company, however, made up for it!

Brittney said...

That is a SASS picture of you! Chad and I looked at it this weekend and from across the room he goes, "Is that you?" I was like NO, silly...that's my Bestie :)

PS - he thinks it's cool that you have a food blog and he says hi :)

Unknown said...

Those appetizers look really great and probably easy to re-create on your own. Brian thought the beer sampler was cool too :)