When Capo Has a Crush, it's Serious

When you combine true food love with true local love with one brilliant kitchen willing to try anything once, you wind up with beer gelato, concocted using Dogfish Head's best and brightest flavors. When Wendy, our local Dogfish rep, calls me breathless saying "SARAHYOUGUYSGOTTAMAKEGELATOWITHTHIS!", I know it's serious. And guys, this beer is crazy amazing. It's got a huge ABV, firstly, so at 10.5% you know it's going to be flavorful from the get, but what really shines is the mint finish. They used 100 lbs. of organic mint from Green Grocer, a local and sustainable produce distributor based out of Washington, DC. The mint flavor comes in at the end, once you've been courted by the initial stone fruit and chocolate notes. It's a serious beer to get through a glass of, but if you're into barley wines or doppelbocks (or the ever elusive trippelbock), then you'll be right at home with it.
What're we gonna do with it? Make it awesome. You know what else we're gonna do?
GET WAY MORE AWESOME.
With Punkin Ale gelato.Cause we love you. We might even have a crush on ya. They'll both be hitting the cafes this weekend, just in time for the Midtown Village Fall Festival! Hooray! Beer for everyone. Sort of.

Brewer's Plate!

Booze, food, and playing hard, don't mess with us, guys, we take em all pretty seriously. This weekend we're gearing up for an event that's sure to be a blast for all involved, and one we're doing with some of our favorite people, Fair Food Philly. Brewer's Plate is Fair Food's annual fundraiser that brings together restaurants, farmers, artisans and brewers located within 150 miles of Philadelphia for a giant food loving tasting fest of goodness. This year we really pulled out all the stops...we've got a super special flavor featuring a super special spirit from Philadelphia Distilling that I couldn't BE more excited about...Also in the liquor category, we're going to be featuring a super summery sorbetto made with cucumber and VeeV, a distilled (NOT infused!) Acai berry liquor that's not only sustainable but with every sale donates money to Sambazon's Sustainable Acai Project. Awesome.
Beer? Oh yes, we'll have beer flavors. We called on our friends at Rogue and will be using their Chocolate Stout (Hi Sebbie!) as well as (my personal favorite) their Chipotle Ale to mix things up a bit. We're mixing up a batch of Lancaster Brewing Company's Strawberry Wheat Ale for you fruit lovers...and don't forget about DOGFISH HEAD! (Delaware hollllller!!!!) Super stoked about this, we snagged a bottle of Red & White from the Foodery. Stoked? How stoked!? SO STOKED!!! It's gonna be crazy. You can tell when I get excited because I turn into one big exclamation point, and I'm pretty sure from a grammatical perspective, this blog could be categorized as one big yell.
Hopefully we'll see you on Sunday! Tickets are going fast, there are only VIP's left but that means you can still come hang with us! The Brewer's Plate will be at the Penn Museum, this Sunday, March 13th from 5PM-8PM....

How excited?

Friday! This Friday!

Come play with us and the good Delaware folk from Dogfish Head brewery! Punkin Ale & Brownstone gelato, beer floats, rare bottles from the Dogfish vault...and it's Halloween weekend! Start it out with us.

Homerific in the Fall: An Ode to October, by Jay S.

So, October. Seriously, how can it not be everyone’s favorite month? We’re well and truly into cooler temperatures, baseball gets serious, football is getting up to speed (If you’re wondering, yes I’m Capo’s resident sports nerd. My fantasy football team is ROCKING it)…BUT! It’s a great time at CapoPenn, too.

Now, it’s a great time at ALL the Capogiros. We’ve still got some summer flavors lingering, thanks to what must have been a monster Lancaster County watermelon crop, and all the autumnal flavors are starting to come in as well. There are at least two you have to jump on: Our local pear with Wild Turkey Bourbon sorbetto is totally in our sweet spot, with stellar fruit conversating with that sour mash note we all love. And have you tried our gelato with Dogfish Head Punkin Ale? I think it’s the “longest” gelato I’ve had. A big beer wallop at the start mellows into that classic, sweet Capogiro milk flavor, and then the pumpkin low note comes on at the finish to make you think about trick-or-treating and the promise of Thanksgiving. I can think of people I know who don’t have kind of depth, never mind food. Admittedly I didn’t know that gelato could have that kind of complexity of flavor. Then again, I’m sort of the new guy.

Now here’s the best part—we’ve got the Dogfish Head crew coming to hang out at our store later this month. Being a native Delawarean, I actually got choked up one seriously homesick day in Seattle when I stumbled across a bar pouring 60 Minute IPA. The upside of Seattle, though: a few months later, I got to have pretty much all the Life & Limb I wanted while all my East Coast friends were tearing their hair out trying to find it anywhere at any price. (Okay, me: new guy, sports fan, beer nerd). The Slower Lower DFH Crew—and I get to call them that because I’m from Hockessin—stops by to play on Friday October 29^th, and of course we’re already hearing rumors that they’ll be bringing “something special.” DON'T TEASE ME.

Fall means cider, in a couple of ways! Given that we’re the boozy Penn crew, we’re really excited to be serving Wandering Aengus Ciderworks out of Salem, Oregon. You must have forgotten to stop by the store the other night when the brewers were here, but we’ll be serving two of their awesome ciders through the fall, including Wanderlust in a 22 ounce bomber—perfect for sharing! The biggest thing I learned from meeting the cider guys: the best ciders are always made from a blend of fruit, not from a single variety like Granny Smith apples or Bartlett pear, not unlike coffee beans.

Six Point Brewing! Details are still firming up a little on this one, but everyone loves it when we’ve got the Sweet Action on draft. “Sweet Action.” C’mon, you even like just saying it in your mind. Six Point comes down from Brooklyn (nobody's perfect) on Thursday, October 14^th.

Now for the HARD STUFF! We’re really proud to partner with Philadelphia Distilling, given that they’re also local people using local ingredients doing something with a serious Philadelphia flavor. We paired their Bluecoat Gin with our own blueberry sorbetto late this spring and early summer, and it was better than we’d hoped and everything we love doing: unique, seriously fresh, TOTALLY delicious (you ask me, I’ll tell you it was the best sorbetto we made all summer) and as local as we can make it. And we’re pointedly focusing on using Bluecoat Gin, Penn1681 Vodka, and Vieux Carre Absinthe on our latest cocktail menu. Have you seen our new menu? We’ve come up with a grip of new gelato cocktails that we’re a little bit in love with, and we’re bringing a little class with some time-honored aperitifs and digestifs. We’re kinda excited about it.

So Philadelphia Distilling is here next Friday, October 8^th to talk about their spirits, making it a particularly good night to come see us. Then again, we always look forward to seeing you. Stop by for Happy Hour sometime and ask Jo our new bar guru to prepare you a traditional Vieux Carre Absinthe. And given how often we’re all going to be screaming “GO PHILLIES!” over the next few weeks, we should probably all stock up on gelato pints.

Super special and awesome!!!! Just for YOU!!

So guys...being from Delaware, I'd always known about the awesomeness that is Dogfish Head brewery. It was only when I came to Philly, however, that I realized they were awesome on a much bigger scale than I'd originally perceived. In celebration of the beautiful fall weather, we busted out a case of the freshly brewed Punkin Ale and are making some pretty amazing gelato with it. We'll have it in the stores tomorrow (Saturday!) and for a short time thereafter, but because of its seasonal (and highly demanded) nature, I wouldn't wait around to try it.

Super Noms.

Love,
Capogiro

...Fall?

This morning I embarked on a shopping mission; seeking out and procuring random things that become necessary in daily Capogiro life (a rack for glassware, a bus tray, etc). Hunting around the general shopping mecca of Ikea, I wandered into Pier 1 and was bombarded with FALL. Glittery, pumpkin scented, Halloween faced, Fall. I have to admit, I was taken back. And not because of the anticipation of the changing season (I'm pretty relieved if I make it to August without seeing a falling leaf decoration), but because of just how...abundant the display was. But then I got to thinking about it, and you know, I'm ready for it. Ready for the crispness, the apples, pumpkins, spices...generally the warmth that October brings. It's a cozy thing, this coming season, and I'm first in line to celebrate it.
One of the things I look forward to the most is cider. Not that you can't have it during the summer, but it's just not the same. And happily, we were contacted by Wandering Aengus Ciderworks, out of Salem, Oregon, about teaming up for an event at our Penn location. Yes, yes please. So they'll be hanging out with us during the last week of September, which will be pretty great.
Penn's got lots going on this Fall - from welcoming the newcomers (oh hai, Freshmen!) to the seasoned veterans who will be tromping the streets of West Philadelphia in a few short days, to the litany of awesome people who will be hanging out behind our bar - there will be no shortage of things to keep y'all entertained. Along with Wandering Aengus, we'll be spending some time with Sixpoint Craft Ales, of Brooklyn. They suggested we concoct a gelato from one of their beers, AND they'd hang out behind our bar. Yes, yes please!
Dogfish Head got in on the lineup, too - their slogan was enough to make me think it'd be a good fit ("Off-centered stuff for off-centered people") and y'all already know about the crazy good things that have resulted from combining our sorbetto with Philadelphia Distilling flavors. They'll be with us spreading the good word on October 8! Clear your calendars!

Booze + gelato + espresso + the shining faces of our baristi all over town sounds like a pretty promising combination to me, don't you think?!

Keep your eyes towards the Fall, kids...eyes towards the Fall.