Allow me a moment of your time if you will, to sing praise
to a fine establishment known as The Proper Brewing Company in a wonderful town
in Pennsylvania known as Quakertown.
We had a night in Quakertown simply because we could not
find a spot in DC, and it was within striking distance, but ho, was fortune in
our favor. Quakertown may not have known we were coming, but Quakertown still
prepared the way. If you are in the DC area and looking for something quant and
lovely and wonderful in Pennsylvania, may I recommend to you this town.
The most cursory of google searches revealed an
establishment in the middle of ‘downtown’ that not only brewed their own beer,
but also cooked their own food. They also sold beer to go, and after time spent
traipsing through New England, where each state has a different policies in
regards to alcohol and when/where/how it could be sold, I was quite eager to go
somewhere where I could sample the wares before taking some home.
We arrived to find a converted dining area that surely once
held more tables in the before times.. The brewing equipment to the left made
me homesick for my neighborhood in North Austin, though the painfully awkward
hostess was not a good sign. The poor thing was trying, and did indeed fetch us
a highchair, which was needed, but her hands were shaking so badly while she
laid out our silverware (piece, by painstaking piece rather than handing out a
bundle wrapped in a napkin) that she dropped a fork on the floor and nearly had
a nervous breakdown right there. “The kids don’t need forks, right?” She
managed in a hoarse whisper.
“Actually yes, forks would be great,” I tried to sound
cheery. I’m sure it came across as patronizing.
She vanished, reemerged a moment later with a fork, and
vanished again.
Fortunately our server was much more sure of herself. “She’s
new,” was all she said with a cheery smile, and asked us what we were drinking.
I ordered the Mac Daddy Summer Shandy for us to split, and then asked our
server to decipher the menu, which was all named after people.
I ordered a flight of four beers, and each was more
delicious than the last.
The next was Quinny’s Irish Red, reds being my wife’s
favorite variety. This was a good one, with a rich reddish amber color, and a
good, easy drinking profile. It was the first to go, and the beer that we
ordered two 25 oz cans of to take with us.
Next was a pumpkin ale that was probably the best
non-homebrewed pumpkin beer I’ve ever had: Gracie Lou’s Witches Brew. The
fantastic thing about it was that it tasted like a pumpkin cookie. The pumpkin
was good and full, but there was also this biscuity flavor that just set it
off. I still think about that biscuitiness. It made me think of the grain room
from my homebrewing days but was also similar to a piecrust. It was the
perfect malty bridge to a pumpkin beer because it was familiar to both baked
goods and to beers. Paired with assertive pumpkin flavor it was… enlightening.
My favorite was the darkest on the table, a Prop-er Cherry Stout
a dark milk stout with chocolate cherry coffee and cocoa nibs that was divinity
in a glass. Cherry. Chocolate. Roasting fireplace. Oak. With a mouthfeel like
satin and more flavors than those. This one was something else. Something
special. If I were to come across a wizard on my travels through the woods, or
perhaps a satyr, this is the beer I would offer him. Just a sip of this was
lovely, I cannot imagine drinking the 25 oz can that I purchased alone. It sits
in my fridge, even now, taunting me to find gentlemen worthy of drinking such a
finely crafted elixir. (I say men because when Raquel sipped it she said
“WOOOO! That’s something!” And took no more sips).
We also ordered an appetizer of pumpkin hummus, while my
darling wife badgered her about the menu. (Actually, she wasn’t; so bad this
time. At a sports bar in Manhattan (hey, sometimes you just need a place with
fries) she was so indecisive that she was grunting at the server, poor thing).
The server told as that the seasonal menu was quite good, and that she liked
their Reuben. I wanted the sandwich—this place seemed like the sort that might
not overdo it on the meat, and actually stack it up with veggies—but the kids
demanded a burger, so we acquiesced and ordered them the shenanigan version,
plus butternut ravioli.
The pumpkin hummus arrived first and came served handsomely,
surrounded by carrot and celery sticks, pita chips frosted with the slightest
amount of cinnamon and sugar, pickled cauliflower, and apple slices. The
pumpkin flavor was subtle, adding an earthy sweetness more than anything, but
coupled with the wide variety of dippable bites, it was deemed good by the
children, and excellent for the adults. Not bad at all.
Next up was the butternut ravioli. Now, perhaps this dish
had an outsized advantage because Raquel often makes a butternut and sage (plus
lots of butter) pasta sauce that I am quite fond of. I feel I must offer that disclaimer
because I cannot understate how delicious this ravioli was. The filling was
perfectly smooth and subtly sweet, the noodles, were, well noodles, which are
always pretty much fine and good in my book. And the sauce was rich and thick
and smelled of sage. They were just big enough that popping an entire one in my
mouth felt decadent, yet not so big that taking such a gluttonous approach did
not invoke chastisement from my wife. A wonderful, perfect pasta dish, from
someone who does not particularly love pasta. If you are in Quakertown this
fall, get it.
Next was the Shennanigans burger, which we were sharing. I
cut it half, gave two thirds of one half to my eldest son, one third to my
second born (because he doesn’t like meat as much as his older brother, not
because I value the health and wellbeing of my proper heir more than I value
the spare). This left a quarter of the burger each for my wife and I.
I eyed the quarter of burger, sizing it up. It was a bit
decadent, to be sure, with bacon, and American cheese on top of sirloin beef,
though it was the mixed greens and thousand island dressing that had drawn my
wife and I to it (the bacon was unnecessary in her opinion, and an added
delight in mine). We added tomatoes, asked for pickles on the side, two
additions I recommend.
I deemed this quarter of a burger to be small enough to just
barely fit inside my mouth, and promptly stuffed it all up in there.
I was greeted with a symphony of flavor. The juice from the
beef, dressing, and tomatoes hit first, then my teeth crushed through the
greens, bread and meat, adding texture to this tantalizing burger juice. My jaw
spasmed orgasmicly as I chomped and chewed, mixing burger, bread, greens and
sauce into a perfect harmony of flavor. It was juicy, and salty, and just a bit
sweet from the thousand island and tomatoes. It was decadent, but there were
also vegetables, and I loved it.
I looked around the table, ready to shamelessly steal
someone else’s, but no one had failed to notice the sheer deliciousness of this
burger, save Xander, who had left an iceberg shaped chunk of meat on his plate,
which I let get cold and him to start to play with before I devoured it.
As if all this was not enough, we then ordered desert.
A tip I gleaned from the internet
was to ask if restaurants make their deserts in house. Not that the server
would necessarily be honest but ours had already told us that she wanted to
come with us on our adventure with her six-year-old (Leo and I were both ready
to load her and her kid up, Raquel cautioned against it) so I was guessing that
she’d shoot straight.
Her eyes sparkled when she
answered. “Why yes, we do.” She then rattled off four fantastic sounding
deserts. Two caught my ear, but Raquel heard cheesecake, and that’s what we
did.
That’s right.
Kettle corn.
Caramel.
Cheesecake.
Now, Perhaps I have said this too
many times in this article about too many things, but cheesecake (like pasta,
and burgers versus sandwiches) is not my favorite. I’m a chocolate guy, through
and through. Can’t beat a slice of good chocolate raspberry cake in my book,
except maybe with a brownie with nuts. I don’t really like ice-cream either.
It’s good, but, like cheesecake, I feel like I can feel every single calorie
sliding down my throat, a sensation I never get with cake, or less dairy rich
deserts.
But let me tell you, this
cheesecake was worth every kcal.
It was perfect, light, flaky under
the fork, with a rich graham cracker and butter crust, but it was the toppings
that elevated it. The caramel was salty and sweet and a lovely counterpoint to
the cheesecake, but it was the popcorn that stole the show.
Being a father has made me love
kettle corn. Why, the next day, in Quakertown, I would happily buy a bag of it
for my children and consume at least half of it, so again, I might be biased.
But there was just something
spectacular about the crunch of popcorn, the just cooked slightly bitter taste
of it, on top of cheesecake and drizzled with caramel sauce. I think any of the
three parts of that desert—the cheesecake, the caramel, or the kettle
corn—would have done well on their own in a tasting test challenged by other
versions of themselves, but together, when they could also combine textures and
flavors and various levels of sweet and salty plus that roastiness that’s in
both popcorn and caramel?
It was perfection.
The kids thought it was weird, but
Raquel was nodding as she ate and I was enraptured.
What a meal. What a town.
Book your plane tickets now. The
seasonal menu won’t be there forever, and it is worth the miles.
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