VISION FOR CRAFT BEER

There's a great reason to pick up the UT today. Inside the Night&Day section you'll find a very nice write up about the Blind Lady by Peter Rowe.

"My best friend's middle school was run by Irish nuns, a no-nonsense bunch with unforgiving standards. Once B.F. had the gall to question her grade on a history test: 99.
“Sister Bede, what did I get wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Why isn't this 100 percent?”
The nun tut-tutted, then lowered the theological boom: “Only Jayzus is pairfect.”
Keep that in mind if you visit Blind Lady Ale House...." read more

We couldn't have said it better. We're an order-at-the-counter, scout-out-a-table and hang-out kind of a place.

SO MUCH MORE LIFE

So here is the short version: Little Zara Soleil Brazel and her parents are familiar faces at Mystic Mocha, one of our favorite coffee shops in town. We heard Zara was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia in February from the good folks at Mystic and just felt crushed for her and her family.

Childhood Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) is a type of cancer in which the bone marrow makes a large number of abnormal blood cells. Zara will spend the next six months undergoing chemo at Radys Children's Hospital in San Diego. As you can imagine this puts not only an unbelievable strain on the body and soul but Zara's family will spend day and night at the hospital to be by her side, putting a very real financial burden on her strong, seriously courageous and loving family.

We wanted to help out, so we are having a Zara Fun(d) Day this Sunday, March 22. We open at 11:30 and go till Midnight and we will give 15% of money made to Zara's family, in addition to the tips for the day/night. Come by and have a pint or a pizza, or both.

To read more about Zara and check in on her progress, go to the website the family has set up at http://www.zarabrazel.com. You can donate there to the cause as well. Thanks, all. Hope to see you Sunday.

Fridays at 2pm: It's a Spring Thing

Mc Chouffe up there is saluting the bounty because the first day of Spring is this Friday, March 20th. We've decided in honor of Spring to open our doors a little early on Friday afternoons, at 2:00. Food won't start till 5, but you can hang out, have a pint or three and kick off your weekend with a good local beer. Last time I checked we had (among MANY others) a Russian River IPA, a Saison from DuPont, Old Rasputin (served with chocolate!) and more on tap.

BLACK TUESDAY

We ain't Irish, but we love beer.
So on March 17th we are opening at 2:00 so that you may start your drinking early (food will be on after 5) and we have a lot of local stouts tapped or on deck to be tapped, including a few from Ballast, the Old Rasputin from North Coast, Hangar 24's Porter, Lost Abbey's Serpent, Alpine's Captain and Pizza Port's Truck Stout. Oh and from now on the imperial stouts will be served with a small square of dark chocolate (until we run out!)

And of course the Ould Sod's pint o' Guinness is just a block away (and Rosie's next door will be doin' it green-style as well.) It's a nice street to spend St. Patty's Day on.

GLASSES, BEERS & FOOD

GLASS ARE IN:

The big news this week is that we (finally) got our real glassware in.
Long ago, before we opened, we ordered these beautiful half liter glasses so that we could serve you a larger glass of beer -- with a pour line -- and still have room for a nice head. They have finally arrived and will be replacing the non-stemware glasses that we currently use for the the 37cl serving size.

Some key points to take pleasure in:

• These are intentionally over-sized to 63 centiliters (0.63L, which is 21.5 oz), so that we can serve a true half-liter (0.5L, or 16.91ounces) of beer, and still have room for some foam on top. So yes, that means you will be getting a beautiful 0.13L of foam on top of your beer--all the while not getting short-poured any beer.

• The shape is great for function. It's big enough to allow your nose into fit into the glass, so you experience the beer more completely. Also because the upper edge tapers in (a bit like a coffin-shape), you can swirl the beer around while the taper helps form a nice foam on top without spilling out like a standard pint glass does.

• And, wait till you see it full of beer. It's really, well... sexy!

Thanks to Dutch at North Park Trophy for the engraving.


NEW BEERS ON TAP:

Hangar 24 beers are back! These guys don't have a distributor in the area, so they drive down some kegs every now and then for us and a few friends. We have the ORANGE WHEAT, PALE ALE, and IPA set to tap during the week.

Not exactly new, but a change: the Bruery's Berliner-Weisse is now being served with a splash of St. Louis Belgian Framboise (the Raspberry Lambic ale). This better mimics the German presentation, where Raspberry (or Woodruff) syrup is added to this style of beer to soften the acidic bite. Our use of a little Framboise in place of the syrup is an excellent touch: The result is a pinkish, slightly mouth-puckering sour ale with a lot of complexity, and a touch of Raspberry Lambic flavor. Where Syrups add a lot of sweetness, Framboise adds flavor. It is fantastically refreshing, and I hope it sticks around for a while...

We added Alpine's Willy Wheat, an American Wheat beer that is clean and refreshing. A nice, easy-drinking beer from our friends in rural east county.

And, of course, the Blind Lady's first house beer-- Automatic #1 will continue to be available until the batch runs out! This is the Organic Belgian single ale, with Ginger, Coriander, and Toasted Oak that I brewed at Mission Brewery last month. Complex and Refreshing.

NEW IN BOTTLES:

Now, we don't want to carry many bottles, but this one is special: Russian River Brewing's Consecration is here! This is a Barrel-aged (6 months) sour ale with Currants added. It's really quite amazing... and also $35 a bottle. Since the supply is very limited, we are only selling it on Sundays. No really, only on Sundays.

NEW IN FOOD:

We've added an Avocado Citrus Plate this week. We got some beautiful Oro Blanco grapefruits and Blood Oranges from Crow's Past Farm in Temecula and Aaron has paired them with avocado, mint, pecans and a chili vinaigrette. It's crazy good and delicious with the Framboise or the aforementioned Berliner-Weisse.

Our current hours are:
Tuesday-Friday
5pm-Midnite

Saturday-Sunday
11:30am-Midnite

Monday
Closed

*But the kitchen closes at 10pm.

Blind Lady on Twitter

You can follow Lee's Blind Lady twittering by heading over to https://twitter.com/LeeChase and signing on. He's been twittering new beers when we tap them so if you're interested in the most recent up to the minute info on what's in house today, that'd be the ticket.