Expeditions Volume 2 of 2

September 22^nd, 2018 – [3 Floyds], Burn ‘Em Brewing, Journeyman Distillery, and The Brewery Lodge.

Exactly five years after four guys from La Porte County wandered in to Blue Chip Casino with five kegs of Burn ‘Em home brew and a vision, four friends from the local TPG chapter (plus their Kankakee affiliate Miles) sat down for some bachelor weekend beer.

Raising Michigan City tulip glasses of ripe rhine floral recipes we ruminated regrets, and offered reflection. I was the final inductee in to the Toof Pix and that was back in 1998.

This Northwest Indiana bachelor event was also a twenty-year Toof Pix award ceremony.

Journeyman Distillery in Three Oaks, Michigan, is located in the former Featherbone factory. The odd early 1900s craft of stripping quills from turkey feathers to utilize the bone structure for corsets, and “buggy” whips. The owner of Featherbone being a staunch prohibitionist. I don’t know about you, but I enjoy all of the strange, twisting irony.

Transparent vessels of Perfect Storm, Journeyman’s play on the Dark & Stormy with rum, lime and ginger beer, and Blueberry Old Fashions festooned the table in a chess match of glassware shuffling about in revered awe.

Sipping liquid glamour we scrolled back the memories of defeating the 8 Ball Posse and the Insane White Boys in a single night’s swoop – one, singular hit with the help of Boss and Aaron Comprehend.

We ended the night off Exit 40 in a forty acre wooded lot in Michigan City, Indiana. Streams and wildlife surrounding us, just off the winery trails of Harbor County and Southwest Michigan, our stay was The Brewery Lodge. Hand hewn timber and fireplaces. A grand piano in warm 1930s rustic outback.

We got back so late from Journeyman that the beer and wine bars at the lodge were closed for the night. But there was a backup plan and a back up terrace under twinkling elliptical galaxies.

Hovering like a s’mores goblin over the fire pit, a bottle with silver metallic wax twinkled in knowing excess. We snatched it from the air. Crickets and fireflies wrestled in flurries as we sawed, decapitating the platinum wax from the opaque decanter.

The beer in question was a 2018 3Floyds Marshmallow Handjee – a bourbon barrel aged Dark Lord rested on vanilla beans.

It poured black with a finger of foam, khaki tan. Used motor oil legs oozed the glass walls as the aromas of brown sugar, burnt marshmallow and light roast coffee presented a palate in front of some late oak barrel character. The liquid velvet in our glasses of magic cloying stout accented the night’s laughs.

In lavish bourbon and toasty wood, a desert beer to honor and close out the final bachelorhood chapter of Toofpix founder, Alex T. Grape.