Last night didn’t turn out exactly as planned. If you haven’t yet followed our Twitter feed (get on that!), but Jamey’s flight was cancelled yesterday morning, which invariably led to my cancelling of his dinner reservation. Luckily, my friend Anne was still onboard, and the evening turned into a wonderful girls’ night out at Old Village Post House in Mt. Pleasant.

The Old Village is tucked away in the off-beaten paths of Charleston, where every home has a front porch as wide as the house and trees draped with Spanish moss. The homes in this neck of the woods epitomize Lowcountry living, settled into the marsh and most glorious at the time of the evening sunset. (I used to live in the Old Village, and wandering over there last night made me want to live there again.)

Dinner was a lovely progression of food and beer tastings, paired with brews from Lefthand Brewing. While the food was good, what really overpowered each course were the beers themselves.

I’ve never paired multiple courses with beer before, and I’m not sure this one exactly turned me into a beer pairing convert. I still am astounded by the incredible wine and food pairings we had at Tristan…those flavors truly were exceptional. Therefore, the bar was already set extremely high when I sat down for my meal last night. It’s hard to compete when the last paired wine five-course meal you had blew anything else out of the water. 

One of my favorite elements of last night was the spiced rum mojito that kicked off the dinner, which was mixed with the new Firefly Sea Island rum that is set to debut June 1. And good lord, was that delicious.

Then, of course, there were the steamed mussels. I just got all hungry again:

The sun was setting at this point, and the food and beer settled in. The meal’s next two courses were a pork tenderloin followed by a lemon chicken, which the beer once again overpowered. (I think this is why the courses were milder flavors; they helped play off the strong hops and malt mixings.)

Now, onto my favorite part of the meal:

The baked brie wrapped in a puff pastry was divine. The Fade to Black beer, pictured here in the coffee mug, was strong and bitter and happily reminded me of my other favorite beverage.

All in all, the food was solidly delectable. The beer was a difficult match for the chefs to pair, and I think they thoughtfully created a meal to complement the beer as best they could. Still, it was no match for our Firefly-paired dinner at the Post House last summer; watermelon lobster gazpacho was our starter then, so how could this meal even compete? Sorry, mussels.

It gave me something to ponder, though: Jamey and I have truly become gourmands in the kitchen. When I tasted the scallops in one of the courses not pictured above, I was astounded that they were just about as good as the bacon-wrapped ones Jamey and I sous vided a couple weeks ago. Therefore, I think you know what recipe how-to is coming next. [Editor’s note: Here’s that recipe post now!]

It’s going to be a good Friday today, my friends. Let’s all hope Jamey gets home safely, and let’s knock this workday out to get the weekend started. Hop to it!