Day 287, Oct 14 / Vienna Lager

Day 287 / October 14, 2011

Vienna Lager

Devil’s Backbone Brewing Co. /  Roseland, VA

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Beware the Beer Bear

At the foot of the mountain that the Wintergreen resort sits on is the Devil’s Backbone brewery, smokehouse, brewpub and festival grounds.  The mountain lodge building holds the brewhouse and restaurant, the smokehouse is attached, and on the other side of the parking lot is the festival grounds.  On Columbus Day weekend, the festival grounds hosted hundreds of campers and music fans, with 3 days of music headlined by the Infamous Stringdusters.

The building is home to several taxidermied (is that a word?) animals, possibly caught by the owner of the place.  High above the hostess stand is the beer bear, guarding a keg of Devil’s Backbone beer.

This was our third stop on The Brew Ridge Trail, and by now, we were hungry!  Anything on the menu that says “smoked” is smoked in-house, including bacon, turkey, pork barbecue and ham.  I had a turkey and bacon sandwich on ciabatta, and it was excellent.  I had an Ale of Fergus Scottish-style ale with lunch  and it was quite good.  But the Blue Mountain Fresh Hopped Ale was Thursday’s beer of the day, so I got a growler of Devil’s Backbone Vienna Lager to go.

We cracked open the Vienna Lager at the hotel Friday afternoon, after a round of trap shooting earlier in the day.  (Rule of thumb: Shoot first, drink second.)  The Vienna Lager was a crisp, malty beer that was quite enjoyable.  It was darker than you might expect for a lager, but that is indicative of the style (in fact, Negro Modelo and Dos Equis are Vienna Lager style beers).

I’ll also give a shout out to a beer store (and small restaurant) in Charlottesville that’s as good as any I’ve come across.  Beer Run is tucked away on a side street on the east end of town.  They have about 12 beers on tap at any given time, a limited food menu (they were cooking up a seafood stew when we were there), and a tremendous selection of bottled beers from around the country and the world.  It’s a must-stop for beer fans travelling through the area.  I’ll be back in Charlottesville in November – can I pick you up anything?