(SpoCOOL) A Spokane Blog

Hey, what do you know, the #SpoBREW Classic is less than a month away. The date is September 21st -- announcement post holds the information -- and more news and updates will rain down on you soon.

While people were jumping onto the brewing portion long before we announced the event (props to Will Stone for reserving his spot a year in advance) the reception to the beer art portion has been rather... tepid. 

So, you can and should sign up for it! The only rule is the art needs to be something beer related we can hang on the wall. That's it. A beer label, a poem, posters, a moose head made out of beer cans... Be creative and your road to fame will be paved with gold. Go sign up!

As for the brewing portion, we saw some trash talk from Seth just this morning. Joel and Brad have put up some tantalizing photos on Twitter. And with just three weeks to go, we expect to see much more very soon.

The latter will be the case here too, of course. Keep an eye out over the next few weeks for more #SpoBREW news and information. And for heaven's sake, sign up for the art contest.

Just a couple of notes of noteworthiness for today:

Borracho Tacos & Tequieria is, as we mentioned on Twitter a few days ago, set to open in the old Ugly Bettie's space. Some of the key phrases are "an authentic Mexican menu, house made infused tequilas, live music, huge patio with fire pit". With an "early fall" opening, we suppose this could be good. Or not, who knows? Check their Facebook page and judge for yourself.

Wild Dawgs has had its soft opening. No word which direction the new incarnation has taken, but we'd assume they still are doing that hot dawg thing.

And across from the future Borracho you can check out the Blind Buck from Thursday through Saturday. Some have described it as a speakeasy, some have described it as something not quite up to those standards. The review from the Erick Doxey: "i will say 'no comment'".

Finally: We might not be overly excited about Pig Out in the Park, except for one thing... The Spin Doctors are playing! Relive the early nineties hippie revival on September 1st.

Well, we were fans. Then after the pies had turned into grease fests we weren't. Now, though, Flying Goat is back in our good graces, after our last few visits have been something more reminiscent of the days of yore.

Not surprisingly, then, the grease is gone, or at least reduced to a level we gladly can accept. We don't feel the need to dab the pizza with a paper towel anymore, and that is decidedly a good thing.

The crust had also gone kind of south during the dark period, but has again improved. It doesn't quite feel like it used to, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's worse. The crispiness level seems to have increased, and it might be just a little bit thinner now, which we have no issues with. You might, and (we suppose) that's fine.

Toppings and all have a fresh feel to them, though that never stopped being the case, and we like the variety of the choices of pies. Anything from prawns to asparagus to potatoes. Much respect for being one of a handful of places in town that doesn't go all in on a pepperoni pie.

The beer selection is still good, and the service is friendly. The interiors are comfortable. Really, we have few to no complaints anymore. The Flying Goat is once again a place we'd put in our rotation.

Of course, most of you have visited the spot, be it a while ago, recently, or on a regular basis. Your experiences might vary -- or have continuously varied -- from ours. Either way, we find the Flying Goat to be a safe bet now, and a place most should enjoy. Those kind of things make us go :-).

Original June 21st, 2010 post

Well, we're fans.

Spokane has always been a pizza kind of town, though more Rita and Pipeline fast-food style than anything else. Hey, Bennidito's is good and all, but it's no Di Fara.

The Flying Goat might not be Di Fara either, but it's closer than most places in town, and the pizza is of a quality only a handful of Spokane parlors hold. Think of it as Audubon's South Perry Pizza, and you're close; they even use a Wood Stove oven.

And the pizza is excellent stuff. The thin crust is crispy with just a perfect bite to it, and it comes with high quality toppings. The mushrooms did remind me of Di Fara, which is a good thing. There's a good array of pizzas to choose from, some odder than others. While we didn't try the one with an egg over medium, the bianco, it's on my list of Spokane Bucket List Meals. I highly doubt you can go wrong with any of the pies at any rate. Nor the appetizers. Our potatoes, pictured above, were nice and spicy.

The beer selection, too, holds a high standard, and the Horned Aviator, their Northern Light exclusive, should be sampled for all its hoppiness.

Finally, the interiors are nice, but I'm not quite seeing the "Irish/Scottish" influences. Which brings the question, what's so wrong with going for an Inland Northwest look?

At any rate... The Flying Goat makes an excellent pizza. Expect long lines when making your way there. The pizza is worth the wait.

I'd argue that Pizza Pipeline is Spokane's dirty little not-actually-secrets. It's one of those places no-one likes, yet everyone obviously have tried it, and my guess is that most do so on a somewhat regular basis. Maybe not often, but at least now and again, and it's not often talked about.

Hell, we've obviously tried both the Bar and the wings, yet apparently we cannot bring ourselves to mention the pizza.

Today that will change. We will talk about the pizza, and we will be frank about it. Pizza Pipeline does not deliver more flavor to your door, that much is true. But it does deliver, and we're as guilty as anyone of going back there every now and again. Each and every time we question why we did so, in a way I assume a junkie asks why he goes back to his crack dealer.

There is very little to like about these pies. The crust tastes like cardboard, and it would be an insult to frozen crusts to go with my gut thinking that's what it is. Frozen crusts from Safeway would be a step up from this.

The toppings has the flavor of something I would imagine astronaut food tastes like. I sincerely doubt there are any tomatoes in the tomato sauce, and...

It's pointless, isn't it? You've had the pie, you know what it's like, so why harp on about it? The real question is, why is Pizza Pipeline still around? It's a guilty "pleasure", clearly, but then one could argue that Pizza Hut holds a higher standard.

Me, I think it boils down to something simple. Now and again you need to shut your mind down. You'd go crazy if you didn't. And when you do, you want the simple things, perhaps even the dumb things. That might include something on the television that only shows on ABC Family, and it might include something delivered from the Pizza Pipeline.

At least I hope to god that is the case, and that people actually don't like these pies.

If the latter is the case, then Pizza Pipeline isn't the pizza chain Spokane needs, but rather the pizza chain Spokane deserves.