Oktoberfestmenu!

Feast your festing eyes upon this, your Oktoberfest Menu! This is our menu for the 26th, 27th AND 28th of Oktober. No burgers, no fries-- it's Oktoberfest, eat your sausage!

Special Oktoberfestbier

Paulaner Oktoberfest – Paulaner Brauerei, Munich, Germany, 6.0% abv
Amber in color with a rich creamy head, and a smooth, lightly hopped flavor......4.00 (Draft)

Erdinger Oktoberfest Weizen – Erdinger Weissbräu, Erding, Germany, 5.7% abv
This bottle-conditioned German Hefeweizen has the crisp and somewhat citrus character of a wheat beer, but with some of the malty characteristics of a Märzen..................4.00 12oz bottle

Hacker-Pschorr Oktoberfest Märzen – Paulaner Brauerei, Munich, Germany, 5.8% abv
Bavarian barley slow roasted, caramelized to a rich, red amber color combined with the purest spring waters from the Alps, exclusive yeast and the finest Hallertau hops..........4.00 12oz bottle

Hofbräu München – Taatliches Hofbräuhaus München, Munich, Germany, 4.9% abv
This pale German lager is what a refreshing lager beer all about. Smooth, light, and crisp
without sacrificing flavor .......................4.50 16.9oz (special 500ml) bottles

EKU 28 – Kulmbacher Brauerei, Kulmbach, Germany, 11% abv
This world-famous beer has the character and richness to stand in for fine sherry or port. Just the right degree of sweetness - never cloying; wonderfully aromatic and warming..................................6.50 12oz bottle

Oktoberfest Stein
Take home your very own 1 Liter traditional dimpled Oktoberfest Stein, with Hofbräu München's logo in color on the front!
....................................................12.00
....................................................15.00 with a full liter of Paulaner Oktoberfest (sorry, no substitutions)
.....................................................7.00 Paulaner Oktoberfest refills (sorry, no substitutions)
(Note that your stein may be refilled with two draft pints from any draft, and may be reused throughout Oktoberfest!)

Beer Specials

Bavarian Bottle Tour
Try each of three different Oktoberfestbiers for a special low price!
(Includes one of each bottle above except EKU 28)....................10.50
.............22.00 (with stein)
.............25.00 (with stein full of Paulaner Oktoberfest)

OKTOBERFEST FOOD MENU!

Starters

Soft Pretzel... 3-
Our homemade chewy, soft pretzel served warm with Inglehoffer stone ground mustard

Koeningsberger Klops with Mustard Sauce... 6-
Savory German meatballs served with mustard sauce for dipping

German Potato Pancakes... 5-
Two pan fried potato pancakes served with a sour cream, green onion, and horseradish sauce

House Greens... 7-
The freshest, best organic greens we can find. Your choice of house made ranch, blue cheese, malt vinegrette, or oil and vinegar (add bohemian burger patty for 4-)

Entrees

Sausage Platter... 11-
A grilled Bavarian Brat and a Polish Kielbasa served with Inglehoffer mustard, German red cabbage, and our homemade soft pretzel.

Wiener Schnitzel... 11-
A pork cutlet breaded and pan fried, served with German red cabbage and warm potato salad.

Koeningsberger Klops & Spaetzle... 9-
Savory German meatballs in a creamy caraway sauce served over homemade spaetzle. We even bought a spaetzle maker, so we can create these delicious German dumplings!

Sides

German Red Cabbage... 3-
Made with cranberry juice and cinnamon, this is a classic German side dish that you'll love!

Spaetzle... 3.50
Traditional German egg noodle dumplings served with a creamy caraway sauce.

German Potato Salad... 3-
You can't have Oktoberfest without the potato salad! Served warm and made with vinegar, bacon, parsley, and seasonings.

Sauteed seasonal vegetables... 3-
A mix of fresh vegetables sauteed with butter, garlic, and extra virgin olive oil.

Sweets

Apfelstrudel... 6-
Just like Großmutter used to make! A flaky, tender pastry filled with apple goodness

German Chocolate Cake... 6-
Decadent and delicious... yum

Oktoberfest! and Monday night football!

Oktoberfest is coming to Barley and Hops Tavern! The rumors are true - live music, a special (authentic) Oktoberfest menu, special Oktoberfest beer, and other special specialness for THREE days.

September 26th, 27th, and 28th during normal business hours. That means Sunday, all day long starting at noon. Because we open for lunch at noon on Sunday.

ALSO

WE ARE NOW OPEN ON MONDAYS (closed Tues). That means that Barley and Hops tavern is the place to be for Monday night football. During the game select drafts and bottles for 2.50! Also, organic wing specials, garlic fry specials, quesadilla specials, and more!

mmm... quesadillas.

Kitty kitty blog time....

It's often necessary to preface a cat-related activity with "kitty kitty". Our kittens, Porter the Cat, and Hops Pierka Bolmer, are often subjected to the following:

"kitty kitty dinner time"
"kitty kitty bath time"
"kitty kitty outside time"
"kitty kitty advanced integral calculus time"

In much the same way, wines, and to a far lesser extent, fancy beers, are prefaced with completely incomprehensible balderdash. This serves, in theory, to tell a story about what sort of grape or grain made your beverage possible, which fancy hill it grew on, and whether or not it was made by magical ponies under rainbows. In the way that DiVinci doesn't preface his works with the chemical composition of the paint, but allows the onlookers to simply take it in and enjoy, the art of tasting has, at times, become obfuscated in the science. It's awesome and neato-rad-alicious to be able to wax coherently with other aficionados about whether it's caramel or toffee coming through on that last note, whether this estate is better at producing this grape because of this amount of relative humidity - but.... BUT! Beer ... (and wine) ... are about enjoyment. Is it... GOOD? Is it... YUMMY? Is it crafted with love by people who DO know the science AND the art? The overall experience of a beer shouldn't be lost by delving too deeply into the intricacies. This doesn't mean that there is no time nor place for the endless adjectives, appellations, and comparisons, but by all means: enjoy your beverage for what it's meant to be - an overall experience without the constant need to dissect. Even my cat understands. Simply have kitty kitty beer time.

Which brings me to rollercoasters.

A funny thing happened during a busy night. I turned 31. It snuck up on me because I was so busy owning a tavern and all, that I didn't have a chance to cry in the fetal position like I did on my 30th. It just so happens, that my in-laws were down for the event. Now let me tell you something about my mother-in-law. She's coo-coo for cocoa puffs, but without the for cocoa puffs. She's nuts, rather like me, but in a more New Jersey sort of way. A typical moment was Sigrid (said mo' in law) talking about how odd it was that Nikki (my chef) MISS-pronounces "herbs", because she says the 'h' (note that Nikki has an English accent, where such pronunciation is proper). All the while, in her very thick NJ accent, miss-pronouncing nearly every word BESIDES herbs. I love her dearly. I really wish the whole in-law fam lived here. They were so helpful the 2 weeks they were down, it was like having a real kitchen crew! As a small restaurant owner, I'm familiar only with being woefully understaffed and always within a centimeter of complete and total exhaustion.

So for my birthday, they took me to 6 flags Vallejo, which is pretty much like 6 flags anywhere, except it's a converted marine world, and has giraffes. Giraffes aren't marine animals (except for the water giraffes of Delaware) but this park is a zoo with rollercoasters - we saw killer whales, and manatees, and manta rays, and porpoises, and I saw a bee. Because of my wife's and mother-in-law's condition- not being able to withstand the extreme awesomeness of loopy-doopy coasters, Maria, my little sister-in-law and I went on every ride at the park. And then they all ate funnel cake, which I don't really like, because it's basically donuts, but less good.

Next, we headed back via Novato, home of Moylan's. Moylan's is yet another of north bay's many world-class breweries, along with Russian River, Moonlight, Bear Republic, etc... Moylan's'...s? Moylanses'' ? Moy... their... restaurant is really neato. It's open-beamed and beautiful, except for the acoustic tile false ceiling, which is lame, but the beer is great. I enjoy their barleywine, and their red (which I now carry in 22oz bottles).

The next day, at work, there was a whole thing with wearing a fuzzy apron and singing happy birthday to me and embarrassment on a very busy day. I'll leave that at that.

In other news, I had a visit by none other than ratebeer.com's owner. I'm not sure what happened, but Firefox is telling me not to visit the site due to potential malware attacks at the moment, but rest assured, I'm sure he'll get it up in order. He reviewed my place very nicely, but missed a lot of great beer which I actually DO carry, much to the contrary of his report (I DO have lambic, multiple Bear Republic offerings, a Russian River handle, rares, and non-Chimay trappist). So come on back for a pint!

NEW POST

Coming soon. I haven't forgotten about my blog, I've been slammed planning Oktoberfest (!) Huge post tomorrow. Also, if you like the football, we're now open Mondays for the football. Which I think is something to do with sports and feet.