Cats, Breakfast and Popovers

Our Maine vacation was plagued with grey skies, rain clouds, and freezing cold temperatures. While it was a nice hot 80 something degrees down here in Albany, were were covered up in at least three layers to keep warm in the 55 degree tundra of Bar Harbor.  I suppose it was a trade-off for how well we had been eating. Besides lobster, we needed food with sustenance to keep us going through the days and nothing was better than a hot comforting brunch. Lucky for us, Bar Harbor has a couple of two great brunch staples. 

Maine Luau Lobster Pound & BBQ Pit

If there's one thing we've learned from this Maine vacation, is to take chances. One thing about going to Bar Harbor the weekend before Memorial Day Weekend is that most places aren't open yet! Plus while it was 80 degrees in Albany, it was about 55 degrees and rainy all week in Maine. We were pretty disappointed to see so many places still boarded up, including the winery and lobster pound that was next to our cottage. Bummer. At least we got a good rate out of our stay and places weren't clogged with tourists! By the time dinner time rolled around, we were determined to get our fill of more lobsters. An ad in our handy dandy cottage visitors guide led us astray to a restaurant that wasn't open for the season yet. Clearly this was becoming trend on our Maine trip (i.e. Duckfat to Eventide experience), because on a whim we decided to visit a lobster pound that was Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives worthy. Talk about not judging a book by its cover...

Breweries of Maine

I've been meaning to get around to this for a while, and hopefully once I get out of my current job and into something with somewhat human hours I can start writing relatively regularly again (just 2 more weeks).

Now, to be fair, before I met R my idea of a great dinner was putting frozen shrimp in a pot of ramen.  I was really proud of myself for that one, so inventive.  She's the one who taught me how to taste, who showed me what real cooking can be, and how much fun it can be.  I never grilled before I met her, now it's my favorite thing to listen to John Sterling call a Yankees game in the back, grill flaming away, beer in hand.  I use the beer to time my grilling, if you were wondering.

All that said, I really feel like R captured our culinary experiences in Maine beautifully, and I'm hoping she's planning another post to describe the lobster pound we basically maxed our credit cards at 3 days in a row (hint).  I don't feel there's a ton I can add about the food, so I'm going to talk about the beer instead.

Being a fan of craft brewing, I love living in the northeast.  R kind of humors me when we go on vacation, we always look up and visit at least one brewery near wherever we're staying even though she doesn't really drink.  Win-win for me, since at tastings I get to drink hers too if I like it.  Here, in order of visit, are the breweries in Maine we've visited and my thoughts on their brews: