Back in November we took a drive out to Texas hill country in search of some hiking. We’ve been missing the mountains a lot lately and were hoping to find something to quell that desire a bit. Hill country is quintessential Texas in our opinion – the terrain is rocky and arid scattered with scrubby trees. We chose Pedernales Falls State Park not only for its proximity to Austin (~1 hour drive) but for its proximity to Jester King Brewery (priorities).

We noticed that to get to any real, single track hiking trails you have to go about an hour west of the city in any direction. Luckily we had a beautiful, clear day so the drive was very enjoyable. Since it was Veteran’s Day weekend the fees were waived, but beware they charge a $6 entry fee per person! We chose to do the Juniper Ridge trail after talking with the park ranger, because it was less crowded and had greater tree coverage.

We set out to do an 8 mile loop starting at the Madrone Trail, hooking up with Juniper Ridge, and finishing back on Madrone. Our initial plan was to run the whole thing; we ended up running the first 5.5-6 miles and walking the last 2. The terrain started out pretty easy, but quickly got very technical with all the rocks and tree roots. Snickers had a blast being off leash and running between us. We only passed a couple of people at the beginning of our hike and one bike along the way (how they were biking through all those rocks was a miracle to us!), and we thoroughly enjoyed having the trail to ourselves.

Cooling off on the Juniper Ridge Trail

Sweaty family selfie

After a sweaty run, we made it back to the car and headed to Jester King for some delicious brews. It’s located on a working ranch so the grounds are expansive and ideal for hanging out on a sunny afternoon. Bonus: they have kid-free areas!

I have been looking forward to this pairing all year long!  It combines my love of Stouts with the love of pies.  You may have guessed it… November was Oatmeal Stout and Pumpkin Pie! Mmmm.

Those of you who have been lucky enough to have a beer or two with me know I love my stouts.  Imperial Stouts!  Anything particularly with a ABU of 10% plus and aged in a bourbon barrel.  I believe oatmeal stouts actually run on the more drinkable side, usually a lower alcohol content and very sweet and smooth due to the lactose (right??).  This was a great pairing for the Thanksgiving Day pie and fresh whipped cream.

Since we are in Austin, TX at the waning months of the year, I have had quite a few local and regional stouts.  In fact, just across the street is a local beer bar called Craft Pride which only serves Texas beers, and they have a great selection.  That said, I had already chosen a beer back in Minneapolis for this occasion, so we went ahead with Braubeer MooJoos from Lucan, MN.

Beth made the pumpkin pie and we had it along with everything else from scratch for our Thanksgiving Day feast!  Here is the recipe:

• Filling (Beth here – if making two pies, use a 29 oz can of pumpkin and 5 eggs, double everything else in the recipe):
  • 1 x 15 oz can of pumpkin (unflavored)
  • 1/4 t nutmeg
  • 1 t cinnamon
  • 1/4 t cloves (0r 3 whole cloves ground)
  • 1/2 C sugar
  • 1/2 C packed brown sugar
  • 1 C milk
  • 3 eggs
• Pie crust was made from scratch (Beth here – or use your favorite pre-made crust, Pillsbury was always a favorite in my house):
  • 1 1/4 C all purpose flour
  • 1/2 C butter, chilled and diced (works great if frozen and grated on a cheese grater as well)
  • 1/4 t salt
  • 1/4 C ice water
• Whipped cream (Beth here – I don’t actually measure when making whipped cream I just go by sight, but these are standard measurements):
  • 1 c Heavy cream
  • 1 T powdered sugar (confectioners sugar)
  • 1 t vanilla

Mix the filling, set it aside.

For the crust:

Make the crust by combining the flour and salt. Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add in water 1T at a time until mixture forms a ball. Do not over mix and don’t add too much water; this causes the butter to melt and aids in gluten formation that leads to a less flaky crust. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and let chill in fridge for a few hours. When ready, roll it out and place it in a pie tin, any ol’ disposable tin will do.

Pour filling into crust and bake at 375 degrees until knife comes out clean (~60 minutes).

For the whipped cream:

In a large bowl, whip cream on high until soft peaks form (~2-3 minutes). Add vanilla and confectioners sugar and continue beating on medium until stiff peaks form. Make sure not to over-beat or cream will become butter!

When the pie is cool, top with whipped cream and serve!

Cheers!

This one is a bit out of order, but wanted to share the delicious-ness.  September was West Coast Lager and Beer Can Chicken.

We had heard of beer can chicken; however, I never knew how to make it.  We did some research as to how exactly this method operates, but (spoiler alert) after we had collected the data we ended up butterflying the whole bird and grilling in directly on the rack.  Some points on why it is disappointing clear we had to go our route:

• First, the beer can in the chicken plays no gastronomic role at all!  That is, the beer can only exists to help hold up the chicken.  There are a few sites that will tell you the [open] beer is supposed to evaporate into the chicken to make it more juicy, but my whole grilled chicken always comes out juicy, so I don’t see why this is a problem in the first place.
• If the beer can is supposed to structurally support the chicken while cooking, the physical setup still baffles me.  I don’t think that top-heavy foul would support well even with a big beer can crammed in its cavity.  I imagine one would have to create a suspension system to keep the bird up.  So, even if it could be balanced, the practicality here makes it pretty hard to make the point.
• The chicken won’t cook properly on a grill if it sits on top of a beer can- the top part of that bird is so far from the rack/heat source that the bottom would be extra crispy while the top of that breast would be extra rare.  This method might work in an oven where the heat is evenly distributed, but I fail to see it working on the grill.

These are my thoughts, so take them with a grain of salt.

To prep the chicken, I butterflied it by taking a large chef’s knife and cutting along the backbone.  I also cut the skin that holds the thighs and legs, since I want the heat more evenly spread.  The whole then essentially lays flat.  I season the skin with salt, pepper, paprika, very little cayenne pepper, and maybe some rosemary.  I make sure the grill is hot and throw on the bird, cavity side-down.  I always start chicken with the skin-side up, so it get mostly cooked then halfway through I put skin side down for not quite the rest of the half.  This gets it cooked well all the way through and the skin has time to crisp but avoids burning it.  The whole chicken will take about 20-25 min to cook on the grill.

We served it up with a simple meat and potatoes meal – a microwaved sweet potato and some red leaf lettuce with a bit of balsamic vinegar + olive oil topped with cheddar.

Now the beer:  We cooked this at the apartment in Minneapolis, so I had a hard time finding “West Coast” lagers from which to pull.  I ended up using a Lakefront Brewery, Inc. Oktoberfest Lager, which is based in Milwaukee, WI.  For the truest West Coast notion, I went as far west as we can go- Kona Brewing Co Longboard Lager, which also reminded us of the warm vacation just back in Jan at Hawaii.

Three weeks down, five to go. [How we’re just over a month away from returning to Louisville is beyond me.] We’ve been in Texas for just shy of a month now and we are thoroughly enjoying it. We’re staying in an apartment on Rainey Street right in the heart of downtown. While the apartment building is more “frat house” than we’re used, the location couldn’t be more ideal – we’ve got food trucks and restaurants galore within a block of our apartment, we’re right on Lady Bird Lake (aka the Colorado River), and are a quick 1-2 mile walk from East Austin and South Congress.

The weather has been nothing short of amazing. While the rest of the country has been getting their first snows of the year, we’ve been soaking up the sun and 80 degree days. Working from home certainly has its perks when you can take a meeting in a bathing suit at the rooftop pool! Matt was able to work remotely these last few weeks (sadly he’s back on the road now, in Chicago, no less), which has been great.

The city is so colorful due in no small part to all the street art adorning walls everywhere. Another thing we really love is the abundance of food trucks; Austin might even give Portland a run for its money with how many there are. It’s nice to have no shortage of food options around every turn. We’ve eaten our fair share of TexMex and barbecue washed down with margaritas and beer; there are plenty of breweries and we’re slowly making the rounds. We’ve done lots of “urban hiking” to explore the city, went trail running in Hill Country, and to visit some of Matt’s relatives near Dallas. There’s still so much more to do, see, and eat and we’re going to squeeze in as much as we can in our last month here!

After being months behind on our food and beer calendar, we finally caught up right before we left Minneapolis. October’s beer and food pairing was a bock and pretzel. We’ve enjoyed the more snack type pairings this year over last year’s heavier meals, and we can’t turn down a carb.

For the beer, we went with the tried and true Shiner Bock – hearkening to our impending move to the Lonestar State. The beer is lightly hopped and finishes smooth. A perfect complement to the salty pretzels. We simply chose a highly rated pretzel recipe from Allrecipes.com, and it’s listed below if you’d like to give it a try. The pretzels are best right out of the oven; they will keep for a while but definitely lose that “fresh baked” deliciousness after a day or two.

Cheers!

Pretzels

Most of you (does anyone still read these?) probably thought we only blogged about beer and hiking, but Minnesota has had us changing our tune. Instead of blogging about those two things we’ve blogged about…nothing. We’ve seriously neglected this poor blog and it’s become our own red headed stepchild.

Nevertheless, we’re here to tell you a little about Minnehaha Falls. A couple of weeks ago we decided to get out of our pj’s before noon and walk around Minnehaha Falls to Lake Hiawatha. It was a sunny, crisp fall day – perfect to be out exploring. We got to the falls along with apparently everyone else in Minneapolis. Having seen our fair share of waterfalls this year in Hawai’i and Oregon we weren’t overly impressed, so we spent most of our time walking the Grand Rounds. The leaves were changing and we just enjoyed our time leisurely walking along Minnehaha Creek and letting Snickers play in the water.

One really cool thing about Minneapolis is that 95% of residences are within a 10 minute walk or 1/2 mile of a park, so pretty much everywhere you turn there’s another park. And the best part is it’s not just a playground on some grass, it’s actual lakes and wooded areas. The Grand Rounds is a 50 mile parkway system around the city of Minneapolis that encompasses natural features of the area: creeks, lakes, woodlands, wetlands, etc. And it has quickly become one of our favorite features of the city.

Snickers at Lake Hiawatha

It was a great way to spend a (cold) fall afternoon!