Sub Ubi

A friend and colleague from Olin is starting her epic drive from Boston to Seattle soon, and will be stopping here in NE Ohio for a break. Having not lived here for some time, I needed to find a place that we could have some tasty treats before sending her on her way. So, I did a Google search for “restaurants strongsville ohio.”

This turned up a list of restaurants on some page or another; I naturally clicked on The Brew Kettle, simply because I couldn’t believe that there was a brew pub in Strongsville. It just didn’t jive with my view of the place. I mean, Strongsville is overrun by chains and suburban sprawl, not tasty brewpubs, right?

The Brew Kettle’s decor. Clean, and with a clear theme.

Wrong. Christian, Carrie, and I went there on Friday to check it out. (Dr. Jacobsen is visiting for the month while we do some Transterpreter hacking; more on that in a later post.) We drove over, and the outside of the restaurant is nothing special; it’s in a little strip with a bakery outlet and a dentist’s office. Inside, the decor was clean. The beer list on a large chalkboard was reasonably impressive, but we started by requesting a taster of their own brews.

The food was great. Christian and I split the “Backyard Sampler,” which gave us a 1/4 rack of ribs, some BBQ wings, and some pulled pork. Everything showed signs of having been prepared fresh, and prepared well. The pulled pork, for example, was nicely done, with their own seasonings; likewise, the wings were real chicken wings, and the sauce used in all cases was their own. The fries were good, too.

The thing that makes the Brew Kettle special, though, is that they will let you brew your own beer. Currently, they’re booked until March 2009, but we got very lucky. I inquired if they might have any cancellations, and they said “no”. However, a half-hour later, someone stopped by our table and said that they have an opening right now if we’re still interested in brewing. Apparently, they were already 30 minutes into a brewing slot, weren’t able to get anyone off the top of their cancellation list.

So, we said yes!

Christian adding the flavor hops half-way through the brewing process.

The brewing process took around 2.5 hours; we opted to produce an IPA, as we’re reasonably fond of hoppy beers around here. The recipe we were given had us using American Cascade hops for each stage in our brewing process; we were excited to be using whole-leaf hops as opposed to some compressed, pelletized form. (Not that we know the difference, but they were fun to work with.) In the future, we’ll have to do some research and experimentation. My primary goal will likely be to strive to recreate the glory that is a good pint of Incubus. Or Skrimshander. Or, really, anything Tonie brews at Hopdeamon Brewery, but sadly does not export.

The Brew Kettle takes care of fermenting, and in two weeks, we get to come back for bottling and labeling. As it turns out, we get to design our own label! Naturally, it will involve the Transterpreter, somehow.

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