This Is My Blood: Lionshead Pumpkin Ale

Sunday thoughts for you, the poor soul who stumbled upon this shitty tossed-off postscript of a blog post. (Thanks for reading.)

 

FIRST: I can't believe I'm just noticing this now, about fifteen years too late, but is "Lionshead" seriously one fucking word? It's not called "Lion's Head"?! I am flabbergasted. Blogger.com is telling me that there are twenty-five motherfucking posts on Puke on Your Birthday that I have to go back and change, including a This Is My Blood post from February for which I drank a goddamn Lionshead, and misspelled it while drinking the goddamn beer and writing about it. This is insane. My world is sincerely upside down right now.

SECOND: I think it's kind of funny that Lionshead still has any kind of foothold here in Philadelphia. I know Lion Brewery is only two hours away, and plenty of other craft beer mainstays in my go-to stores are from much farther, but still, the beer itself is completely forgettable. Is their ubiquity really only because we—the collective of former underage drinkers—can't stop drinking this beer ironically? I wonder. Leaning into every craft beer trend that comes their way does nothing to dissuade me of that notion. Oh, this is Lionshead, but it's a pumpkin beer now? Okay then. I'll bite.

THIRD: My Sunday suds plan is usually dictated by a roll of the dice—whatever part of the city (or its outskirts) I find myself in that morning governs the beer purchase. Today, I found myself in Roxborough with like twenty-five minutes to spare, so I decided to check out their version of the Foodery. Since I so voraciously love the Rittenhouse version, I figured that there it was worth at least one visit to the Northwest Foodery post at least once this year. I dunno... it was a relatively unsuccessful trip. First, their deli was closed, which, I mean, is not a fucking new thing for me, re: Sunday mornings and everything being goddamn closed. Second, there were a ton of unmasked beardos staring at the beer shelves in the partially lit store, everyone silent, like zombies. It was kinda creepy. Lionshead popped out at me, and the price tag ($2.35) spoke volumes, so I grabbed two and hit the road asap.

FOURTH: Hey, Roxborough is pretty nice. I don't think I'd ever want to live there, but as far as places to spend a half hour on a Sunday morning, you could do a lot worse than Ridge Ave. It was rather quaint (relative to the rest of Philly, I guess). I was starving, and since the deli at Foodery was shuttered, I spit in the air and ate wherever it landed. Across the street was a hoagie place. Google names it about four different ways, but I'll go with "Lennie's Hoagies." Quirky names—e.g. I ordered a "Godfather Part One." It was fine, but not as much meat and cheese as I would expect from a "South Philly-Style Hoagie." Though South Philadelphians are spending the weekend venerating a murderous rapist, so what the fuck do I know.

FIFTH: I wish I had time to check out a new brewery on Ridge, but I just didn't. It's called, um, New Ridge Brewery. It looked packed; good for them. When it's safe to bring the kids into public places like breweries, it'll be on my list.

 

NOTES

BEER: Lionshead Pumpkin Ale

STYLE: Pumpkin Beer

ABV: 4.5%

BREWED BY: Lion Brewing, Inc.

LOCATION: Wilkes-Barre, PA

PURCHASED AT: Foodery Roxborough

PAIRED WITH: a decent yet unsatisfying hoagie

GRADE: 3 pukes out of 5

 

BEER COUNT: 426