SELINSGROVE, PENNSYLVANIA
Initially visited countrified Susquehanna River-bordered town situated in the heart of Penn, November ’06. Located inside a stone Victorian-styled dwelling, SELIN’S GROVE BREWING’s right side cove-like entrance may be inconspicuous, but it’s literally a back door portal to a cozy l’il neighborhood oak bar with limited seating and outstanding brews. Back dining area with hearth provides suitable country comfort and light menu offered sandwiches-wraps-salads.
Caroused sweet corn-sugared wheat-honeyed Captain Selin’s Cream Ale, biscuit-y cereal-grained malt-smoked bark-dried twig-leafed Scottish Style Ale, and unassuming diacetyl-stricken lemon-tart banana-ripened Wilder’s Hefe Weizen with lunch.
Afterwards, downed superior piney red-fruited Hop Nouveau Pale Ale, brash grapefruit-peeled lemon-embittered peach-tangy mineral-grained earthen-backed India Pale Ale, mellow maple-sapped clover-honeyed cocoa-dried pecan-figged Organic Baltic Porter, and lilting dry-hopped coffee-beaned espresso-frothed fruit-soured Shade Mountain Oatmeal Stout.
Best bet: banana Kahlua-creamed whiskey-malted orange-bruised alcohol-spiked Saint Fillin’s Barleywine.
On the way east from December ’08 West Virginia stint, revisited Selin’s Grove Brewing to try four more admirable selections at family brunch. Organic Pils had sweet-corned sugar-malted lemon-spiced frontage inducing dry bark-like hind. Molasses-sapped cola-hazelnut-sweetened black coffee-embittered White Horse Porter sealed in a sharp hop-charred blackberry-cherry fruiting. Stealth Tripel retained viscous buttery quirk, candi-sugared subtlety, peppery coriander spicing, and cotton-candied banana sweetness above tertiary rum raisin, pineapple, mango, and brandy illusions.
Best bet: Winter Solstice Dubbel, a warm honeyed cognac intimation lodging brown-sugared banana-bruised overtones, dawdling cinnamon-toasted apple mellifluence, and vanilla-nutmeg-spiced fig-prune-raisin undercurrents.
