Well, no trip to a city is complete without a look at a local brewery. East End Brewing Company was highly ranked, so we made our way over to check it out.

The red building is located along a residential street, but we found some parking a little further down. Outside, there are two rows of picnic tables in a concrete parking lot behind a fence for brewery-goers to sit, and inside, there were a number of tables as well.

You can get a flight of three for $8, so I went with Strawberrye, Monkey Boy and Big Hop, their flagship. We took these outside and sipped away. I liked the strawberrye, which didn't so much taste like strawberries as much as it smelled like it. A bit sour, which I like. The Monkey Boy is a hefeweizen, which I typically love. This one was decent, a little heavier than I anticipated. And the Big Hop is definitely hoppy and a bit bitter. Overall, not bad.

The ambiance leaves something to be desired. Picnic tables on concrete, behind a fence, while you stare at the house across the street. Any sort of greenery or some sort of view would make this feel like something other than a concrete jungle. But for decent beer, I think people make do.

Grade: B

I can't think of a much better way to spend a Saturday afternoon than at a whiskey tasting. Right? 

Pittsburgh's Wigle Whiskey (pronounced 'wiggle') does tours of both its distillery and barrelhouse. We bought tickets to tour the distillery, and while we were waiting, we were treated to a complimentary drink (I guess not complimentary because it's probably in the ticket price BUT). Score.

The sort of garage door space opened so there was a light breeze blowing through. A few different stations were set up for people who were doing just a tasting of the various whiskeys. It's a small, but pretty cool space.

I ordered the Rhubarb Party cocktail while we waited. It had ginger, rhubarb syrup, simple syrup, fresh lime juice, seltzer, rosemary lavender bitters and something else I'm probably forgetting - but this was phenomenal. Like, in the top drinks I've had in my life phenomenal.

The tour itself was a bit lackluster. Our tour guide was funny and poked fun, but I had to roll my eyes a few times with the West Virginia jokes and only men like whiskey jokes. Whatever. But, there wasn't a ton to the tour - we kinda walked around back and he constructed a story about how the company got started. There were a few samples along the way.

And as far as the actual whiskeys, I liked the wheat better than the rye, but I don't know that I've been properly schooled on how to taste whiskey. I think I might need to take another stab at this because once I learned how to taste bourbon, my experience on the bourbon trail was totally different. I should've taken some of that knowledge I had learned there, but the drinks started hitting me so I don't even know if it would have mattered.

And, to finish off the tour, we got to try these small chocolates. They were OK, but darker chocolate isn't my favorite. Overall, something fun to do on a Saturday afternoon. Prep your tastebuds for a good bit of whiskey and have fun.

Grade: B
 

There's just something ~special~ about visiting a restaurant's original location. Maybe it's the charm or authenticity, but going to the original - the first - location is usually what people seek out. "Oh, you went to so-and-so? But did you go to the one on ____ street? AW MAN you gotta go to the original! It's way better for X reasons!"

Whether that's true or not, I'm not sure, but if my trip to the original Primanti Bros. is any indication, this theory might be right on point. Located right along the Strip District, the original Primanti Brothers usually has a bit of a line stretching out the front door. While this is the original location, they have expanded significantly out of Pittsburgh and into surrounding states like West Virginia and beyond - Florida, Indiana, etc.

But, while I've tried some in the burbs of Pittsburgh, and of course the one in Morgantown, there's just something about ~the original~ that is attractive. So, we made our way to this restaurant, which had a dozen or so people spilling out the front waiting to snag a table. Since there were just two of us, and we weren't picky about sitting at the bar, we got in pretty quickly.

It's a small space with Pittsburgh sports memorabilia and art on the walls. The folks at the bar were no nonsense and took our order in a sort of quick, brash way I would expect. Afterall, these folks got their start by feeding hardworking truckers a hefty meal at the height of the Great Depression. The menu is basic, with a bunch of sandwiches that are all the same, just swapping out the protein: fries, slaw, tomato and your choice of meat piled high on white bread.

You can get baloney, egg, hot sausage, ham, bacon, pastrami, corned beef, turkey, roast beef - and tons of others. But, this time, I went for the kielbasa, and I think it was my best decision yet. Maybe  I should have known this, because I'm a big fan of kielbasa, but despite not even being very hungry (we did just have breakfast), I tore into this thing. You can call it my choice in sandwich, or maybe it's the location, but the combination of that kielbasa with the crunch of slaw and nice french fries all on a good piece of bread was simple but so, so good.



Grade: A

After brunch near the Strip District, Heather and I walked through to see if anything caught our eye - lots of tasty hot foods, scarves, Steelers merch and art.

And, then I saw candy. Yep, candy will catch my eye.

Grandpa Joe's Candy Shop is the stuff dreams are made of. As soon as I walked in, I saw a giant wall full of various candies in containers. Everything form gummies and tootsie rolls to gumballs and suckers. And, you could fill one of these small boxes up with anything from that wall you want for $5. Consider it done.

I got a little of this and a little of that - mostly tootsie rolls, laffy taffy and some gummies.

On the opposite wall, I saw some British candies I recognized my friend Dave liked to get (and you can't find them everywhere), so I sent him a picture and ended up with a request to purchase $20 worth of candy.

So this place is cool in that it has this gigantic wall of goodies, then candies from other countries, some candies that are throwbacks you don't see in stores often and some other fun candy gifts. PLUS, there's more.

They also have more than 325 flavors of old fashioned glass bottled soda like: Natrona Bottling's Red Ribbon Soda, Boylan's, Sprecher, Johnnie Ryan, Frostie and more.

Oh, and I saw the biggest Rice Krispie treat I've ever seen in my life there.

So, this is a neat place to fulfill literally any candy need you may have. I made my dad a sort of "time capsule" of candies from the 60s for his birthday last year, and it took a bit of searching to find ones that were big during that time period (Cracker Barrel was a big help), but if I had known about this place, it would've been great, too!

Have you been? What's your favorite find?

What?! More Pittsburgh restaurants? Yep! Heather and I spent two whole food-filled days in Pittsburgh recently, and I have the restaurant reviews to show for it.

And, what better to start our day in Pittsburgh than with brunch? Bar Marco has been on my to-try list for some time (not sure how it got there, but alas). After finally finding parking on a Saturday in the Strip District, we made our way inside.

One of the cool things about Bar Marco is that they've done away with tipping. Instead, they pay their team a salary, and that is reflected in the prices. I like the convenience, and I think it's great to make sure all the staff are paid a livable wage. But, I do wonder if it removes the incentive to go above and beyond for service.


We were seated quickly as soon as we walked in, without reservation. Heather ordered some cinnamon donut holes that had a warm creamy center. Donuts and cinnamon aren't necessarily my favorite things, but Heather seemed to be a big fan.

Instead, I ordered a cocktail: The aviation had gin, lemon and violette. It is a bit small for $12, but it packed a little bit of a punch. It was different, and I'm still on the fence about whether or not I liked it. But, it was different.

The menu for brunch had salad, pancakes, gemelli, eggs, fried chicken, a burger and, my selection, smoked salmon benny with biscuit, egg and hollandaise.

I'm not sure what happened between our order and the time the food came out, but two other tables that came in after us were served and left before we even got our meal. I think it took about 40 minutes - a tad long in brunch land. And, without explanation from our server.

When it did come out, though, it was tasty. The salmon, the eggs and the hollandaise were top-notch. I expected more from that biscuit though. It was a bit chalky and hard; not inedible by all means. Just not the warm, flaky, buttery one I was hoping for.

Overall, good food. But, there's some stiff competition in Pittsburgh. I might have to continue the search for best brunch.

Grade: B