RVA Beer Explorer: Board, Kindred Spirits, Lifting the Veil, Power, Roots, Final One

I’M BOARD

Most local breweries have a few games sitting around for patrons. Garden Grove on Monday and Triple Crossing on Tuesday have taken it a step further and host game nights where you’ll likely see a different breed of game. You’ll see your more traditional games like Scrabble or the destroyer of peace and quiet, Jenga. If you look closer you’ll also find board games that take the strategy, luck, and fun up a couple hundred notches.

My favorite gaming site Shut Up and Sit Down has a series of videos that show off many of the games you’ll find at theses two game nights.  Triple Crossing tends to skew a little heavier on the complexity scale of games than Garden Grove. Go to both and find the folks you’re comfortable with or bring in your own pack of gamers.

If you’re up for a bit of thinking with your drinking I highly recommend giving one of these nights a try. Everyone is friendly, welcoming and more than willing to teach a new game. You’ll see games you can’t find, can’t afford and get to play them all while drinking beer.

CALLING KINDRED SPIRITS

A new brewery is opening this weekend. While not in Richmond proper it’s located right off 288 so that means easy access while you’re out and about. I’m totally in the dark on this new spot so if you’ve got words of beer wisdom please share them with the group. The Kindred Spirit Brewing Facebook has more details.

LIFTING THE VEIL

Good Beer Hunting, which should get an award for that name, has an article and beautiful pictures that dive deep into The Veil Brewing Co. Seriously one of the best written and photographed articles on a brewery/brewer I’ve ever seen.

“I never had any ideas of opening a brewery,” Durrance says. “When I met Matt, one of my first thoughts after ‘Wow this is the nicest brewer I’ve ever met,’ was, ‘I wonder if he would ever want to set up a brewery in RVA so I don’t have to drive to Vermont all the time.’ I definitely wasn’t thinking of ever trying to start a brewery.”

But then they started considering the opportunity to import a bit of what was happening in the Northeast down to The River City.

MUSICAL ROOTS

This event is FREE to attend and open to all ages. Hardywood taprooms open for service at 2PM, with last call at 9:30PM. Entertainment will be staged outdoors. Enjoy refreshing draft beer and delicious gourmet food from Shamasuki, Happy Empanada, Arroz RVA & Dank Eats!

MORE INFO

POWER DRINKERS

Style Weekly has released their 2016 Power List. In the category of Food and Drink there were two beer related entries and surprisingly Stone Brewing wasn’t one of them. Stone was mentioned in the introduction but we’re all about the list. No number in front of your name means you don’t count. We’re pretty sure they just forgot to mention us.

Eric McKay and Patrick Murtaugh – Co-owners, Hardywood Park Craft Brewery came in at number one.

Murtaugh and McKay lead by example, actively helping the craft beer scene with advice and cultivating relationships with lawmakers. In November they broke ground on the first phase of a $28 million expansion project on 24 acres in Goochland County, with Gov. Terry McAuliffe and other state officials by their side.

At number 10, Matt Tarpey – Co-founder and brewer, The Veil Brewing Co. was selected but you already knew Matt was awesome because you read the article that we linked to above.

Tarpey, a pedigreed brewer from Vermont’s Hill Farmstead Brewery and Alchemist, had the chops to pull off the stellar India pale ales and the wild fermentation of the best sour beers. The Veil has become a craft beer enthusiast’s tourist stop.

FINAL ONE

Final Gravity is tiny but mighty and this weekend they turn one year old and are having a party. Head out there and wish them a happy birthday by having a beer or five.

It’s our one year anniversary! Come by and help us celebrate. We will be tapping a keg of our bourbon barrel aged Irish Goodbye that we saved from our opening as well as serving several new beers just for our anniversary. Los Gauchos will be serving up some tasty Argentinian food on site from noon to 7:00 or so, a bluegrass band starts at noon and Zion #5 Dub Squad will be playing the crucial dub starting at 7:00. It should be lots of fun and oh yeah, we’ll have cornhole set up outside too!

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