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From the category archives:

Food & Drink Festivals

Sarasota Beer Festival: Beer Is Good!

by admin on August 30, 2010

This past Saturday I attended the 1st Annual Sarasota Beer Festival. Let me tell you R.O.T.R. readers, I was so excited I damn near stormed the entrance of Robards Arena “William Wallace” style. Nothing does my heart better than good beer and LOTS of it! That being said…do you want the good news or the bad news?

Bad news first it is! This place was one hot mess when I showed up. There was one line over here. There was one line over there. Not one sign was up letting you know where to get tickets,where to go if you had tickets… Most people in line started getting real frustrated (pissed!). When I finally got in I was almost immediately met by my good friend, Don Juan Gian Luca. The first words out of the Don’s mouth was, “This place sucks!”. There were no instructions on where things were, beer and food vendors were all kind of jumbled together. Without a good map or layout of a venue ,  it doesn’t allow the patron to form a good plan of attack. It was like teasing a bunch of caged rabid Peruvian spider monkeys and then letting them out of the cage. Let the ultra violence begin!

Now the good news. They were presenting some fantastic beer! Here are my top five in no particular order.

1. Amadeus

2. Phin and Matt’s Extraordinary Ale

3.  Jomo Lager

4. Wacko Summer Seasonal

5. Stockholm Premium Lager

All of these beers are fantastic! We’ll get a little deeper into flavor profiles and what breweries they are all represented by in some upcoming posts. I was also impressed by some of the food being passed out. I had never eaten a beer battered hot dog before, who knew?!  I now realize this ridiculous treasure is something I won’t be able to live without for the rest of my life. Those dogs were courtesy of my good friends at The Old Salty Dog.

All in all I had a great time. The beer was good, there was plenty of it. Once everyone got settled there was a great vibe in the air. Even Don Jun Gian Luca ended up having a good time.  This was more evident later on in the night when his smedium shirt came off and was being twirled over his head. The Don and my good friend, Tom Cruise, love the smedium size shirts. They purchase these at Gap Kids. That way they can get some shopping done and hit on all the hot moms!

Don Juan Gian Luca and his girlfriend...

Next year, if you get the chance swing by the 2nd Annual Sarasota Beer Festival. I’m sure they’ll have all the kinks worked out. The food was good, the beer selection was great and the people are real down to earth. Make sure you put it on your 2011 calender and as always… you’ll toast me later!

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The Epcot Food and Wine Festival: Getting Your Drink On With The Mouse

by admin on August 23, 2010

About this time every year I start to get very excited. My family notices the extra spring in my step and there is a twinkle in my eye rivaling the one Tom Cruise gets when he gets new lifts for his big boy shoes (Tom Cruise short joke #3…ehh thank you very much).

The Epcot Food and Wine Festival is one month away… hallelujah…holy mouse!!! This will be my families 4th year going and I am ret-to-go! My wife first introduced me to the festival and I gotta be honest, I thought it was going to be LAME. “Seriously, a wine festival at Disney World is not my idea of a good time.”, I said. My wife assured me it was fantastic and wasn’t at all what I was expecting it to be. Now I have to be honest, I had never been to Epcot, so I had no basis for my bias. All the years playing in punk bands made me very  anti-corporate and tend to make you feel a lot cooler than you really are. I’m here to tell you eager readers  the Epcot Food and Wine festival ROCKS YOUR LAME BUTT!

Every country has a sampling of wine and food specific to the region. The cheese booth is really cool because you can go grab yourself a nice wine and pair it with a good cheese ( It’s clearly brie time baby! ). Now I know you beer fans are like, “what about us?”, brew guys and gals you are totally covered. They have beer tents that can cater to your every need. You want a beer from India? Done. Some suds from Norway? Drink up. Now, the common practice is to drink your way through every country. You buy a bracelet drink card, power it up with however much you would like to spend and set out to drink yourself around the world. That being said, nobody likes a drunk guy in pair of Mickey ears puking next to his kid. Don’t be that guy! Take a couple days and really take it all in.

There are some amazing restaurants in Epcot, in fact, I’ve yet to go to one that wasn’t good. There is nothing better than taking the day and really soaking up the culture around you and then ending up at the Biergarten in Germany, downing 1 litre of the Deutschland’s finest ale and tearing into some schnitzel and kraut. Its damn near heaven!

Obviously it’s at Epcot, so it is kid-friendly and you can also catch some pretty good deals with Disney on-site hotel rooms. The best thing about staying on Disney property is you don’t have to drive anywhere. So if you get the chance, put the Epcot Food and Wine festival on your “to-do list” this fall. You’ll be thanking me later.

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