Anniversary Beer: Full Sail Grand Son of Spot Cask Conditioned IPA +More 

Tonight is my 14th wedding anniversary. Is it saying something that I am blogging about beer at 10PM? Maybe. But maybe I have just had such an incredible evening so far that it is perfectly fine for my wife and I to sit on the couch with our Macs in our laps and browse the web. I’m hoping the latter is true because if it is isn’t I am missing something BIG.

View from Harboside table at McKormick & Schmick's

The view from our table at Harborside

Amy and I headed down to Harborside’s McKormick & Schmick’s. The city was unbelievable and the weather was spectacular. We each had the Dungeoness Crab Stuffed Alaskan Salmon with Brie. To drink, I had a Harborside exclusive Full Sail Grand Son of Spot Cask Conditioned IPA. Perfect with the salmon an amazing evening. Just the right amount of hoppiness , a complex first sip and a crisp finish.

I mixed it up with a Fish Tail Organic Cask Conditioned IPA (kind of a theme here). The waitress seemed to give me a “he’s not going to like this” look  when I ordered it. After the first sip I knew why. It was probably a good IPA, but not after the Full Sail. Somehow it just didn’t measure up. Maybe the lack of fertilizer or genetic engineering in the hops? Whatever it was, it just seemed to fall flat. The waitress must have read my mind, or seen the same thing before, because she asked me what I thought and immediately offered to take it back and exchange it for another Grand Son. I gratefully accepted the offer.

A little New York Cheesecake with raspberry and a nice stroll on the boardwalk finished things off… well, the night is still young.