Barley's Brewing Company: "The Bob Barley"

ATTENDEES:

The Columbus Burger Bum, Pickley Pete, Lame Jeremy

PREFACE:

“Oh the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful, and since we’ve no place to go”… let’s go get a burger and a beer.

BURGER:

Few things fend off the frigid cold weather of the Midwest like comfort food (besides maybe a first class ticket to Southern California or a job in a green house).  On this particular night, I decided to venture out to one of Columbus’ best breweries, one which is recommended by both beer and burger connoisseurs a like – Barley’s Brewery Co.

A quick note for those of you who accidentally stumbled upon my blog because you were doing research on poverty statistics in the capital city and are annoyed because you're also infected with a disease that prevents you from eating red meat; Barley’s makes some GREAT beer.  My beer of choice this evening was their Scottish Ale.  It has a medium body, a maple and caramel flavor, and is very easy to drink.  There's also a lack of alcohol presence, which could mean trouble when drinking a beer with an 8% ABV.

So, the burger.  I gave it a 4.   See you next week!

Alright, so I’m not that cruel.   The burger was great.  If it were a car it would have a license plate that read Hot N Swt and sesame seed racing strips along both sides.  The driver would be the Jamaican relish, the radio would be controlled by the fresh pepper jack cheese riding shot gun, and the back seat would be jam packed with loud, crispy onion straws.  These combinations came together perfectly to compliment the flavor of the meat.  Though, I must add, that after seriously discussing the meat content with Pickley Pete, we think the patties may have been frozen (like fast food frozen) beforehand.  I mean, the flavor was still superb, though the meat was cooked slightly longer than I’d prefer, it just had a texture to it that hinted at “prefreeze”.

Topping off the unique blend of ingredients were your traditional pieces of lettuce and tomato and all were sandwiched between (as used in the metaphor above) a sesame seed bun that was both firm and crisp and had obviously been thrown on the grill while the burger cooked, something that all chefs should be doing, in my opinion.

All in all, the burger delivered both the rush required to warm the bones on a cold winter’s day and the satisfaction to crave a sweat tooth still lingering from the holidays.

And the fries, you ask?????  Perfect.  Nothing special or crazy or out of this world.  Just perfectly fried with a perfect thickness.

RUN DOWN:

Proportion:  1

Flavor: 1

Ground Beef: 0

Bun: 1

Secondary Ingredients: 0

Fries:   1

TOTAL:  4

ATMOSPHERE:

What can I say?  It was a brewery with a warm atmosphere and friendly staff.

ADD COs:

You can buy growlers of beer.  For those of you who don’t know, and I didn’t either, a growler is basically a bottled beer to go.  They come in different sizes, but I believe the growler that Barley’s offers are about a half gallon and yes, you can fill it with any of there brews.