Nora McGunnigle

I've been playing around with my camera and have a few cool shots that actually came out well, as well as a couple that are kinda blurry. Once I get access to (and knowledge of) some photo editing software, I'll fix up the blurrier ones. A bit of a blurry shot of all the brewers at the Irish House Emilyand Cari taking pictures of the brewers

First of all, thanks for all the positive feedback on yesterday's blog post. It was a little on the personal side, so I wasn't sure how it would be received. As I do more and more writing, I'm trying to find my "voice" or style, something that's informative, interesting, and enjoyable to read. Last night was the St. Charles cask crawl. I showed up a little later than usual at the Avenue (had a meet & greet for Nyx riding members at Finn McCool's right after work.) I headed upstairs to try the Parish Envie cask and ran into fellow drinkin' writer Todd Price from NOLA.com who was celebrating his birthday there! That was very cool to finally meet, since we'd corresponded in email and on social media a bunch but never met in person.

I just found out about a whole host of food-craft beer pairings that are happening this week at the Irish House . Chopped winner chef Matt Murphy has created a small plate to pair with a specific American craft beer for every night this week, starting tonight. All pairings are $11. Monday, May 13: Stone Ruination IPA served with an Irish cheese plate Tuesday, May 14: Ommegang Abbey Ale with fish & chips Wednesday, May 15: Harpoon IPA with truffled chicken Thursday, May 16: Green Flash West Coast IPA with baked redfish Friday, May 17: Rogue Dead Guy Ale with corned beef & cabbage Saturday, May 18: Anchor Steam with bacon & cheese croquettes Sunday, May 19: Covington Strawberry Ale with BBQ oysters Also on Thursday, May 16, the Irish House will be hosting a three course beer dinner with NOLA Brewing. It's $45 and starts at 7pm. Limited seating, call 504-595-6755 for reservations. Here's the menu:

This week was a bit of a quiet one on the beer front - getting back in the swing of things at the Day Job took it out of me when it came to matters of craft beer. Hopefully all that will balance out soon. I've got a few exciting things in the works, and I'm very much looking forward to talking with brewers, restaurateurs, and other local beer enthusiasts and writing about them! Last week, me and a few other craft beer lovers met to discuss ideas and strategies around promoting craft beer in New Orleans and Louisiana. We were warmly welcomed by Ancora , which is a Neopolitan pizza/farm-to-table Italian restaurant on Freret Street, whose management loves craft beer and curates their 6 taps carefully to bring a diverse list of excellent craft beer to their customers. The management also kindly permitted us to bring bottles of beer that cannot be purchased in Louisiana to share, which is super cool of them. Note: one idea (and I'll discuss this in a future post about our Chri...

So this past weekend marked the 3 year anniversary of the first cask conditioned ale made by NOLA Brewing being served at The Avenue Pub. According to Polly Watts, owner of the Avenue Pub, you couldn't find cask ale anywhere in Louisiana prior to that. As I am a huge fan of cask ale, NOLA Brewing, and the Avenue Pub, you can imagine that the event planned to commemorate this would be relevant to my interests. The plan was a "Cask Crawl" on St. Charles Ave- NOLA would provide casks to both the Avenue Pub and the Irish House down the street. The weather even took a break from being either steamy or stormy, and just  was mild and comfortable. So, I was looking forward to this event... until I read the description of the one at the Pub. "Peter's Perfect Phirkin"... a Hurricane Saison cask complimented by pineapple, papaya, plums, poblano peppers, peychaud bitters, and dry hopped with Perle hops. OMG, I thought it sounded hideous. I first thought that I just ...