Red Oak Brewery and Sweet Potato Gnocchi and Chicken Recipe (with apple cider sauce!)

This weekend we took a tour of the Red Oak Brewery off of I40 between Greensboro and Gram. We had driven by it multiple times on our way to Charlotte and were interested due to being fans of the beer. The tour is $15 ($10 for military!) per person and involves an hour tour of their three main production spaces and then a sample of their beers after. It starts at 2p on every Friday and it was quite a large group of us that showed up! We ended up being at the head of the pack for the tour, but I'd recommend hanging back. The first in end up beign the back of the group in the different rooms so it was a touch hard to hear. Our guide was really informative and passionate and I felt I learned a lot about their product on top of about beer in general. At the end, the beer tasting was really fun because it was pretty much all you can drink and I got to try the three beers they were brewing on top of their mustard and jam made from brewing spices. I loved the jam and picked up a jar for $5. I wish they sold a bulk amount because its novel enough to make great Christmas presents. My favorite of their beers was the Helles Hummingbird golden lager, although the Red Oak and Big Oak were fun to taste side by side. The boyfriend also picked up a 12 pack of Red Oak. The tour also came with free pint glasses and a bottle opener. With the swag and beer - the tour was a great deal and a great way to spend a Friday afternoon.  They have a indoor drinking area and outdoor patio. It was very casual and lovely.

Tonight we made some sweet potato gnocchi. The last attempt as bland so I googled what kind of sauce people serve it with and got this recipe. Following their lead and tweaking it, we had a delicious dinner. What we did was boil a pound of chicken cut into bite size chucks while cooking up the sauce. I took 2 tablespoons of butter and sauteed it up with 2 tablespoons of flour. While stirring that up I added 2 scoops of diced garlic, some diced up apple and 2 cups of apple cider. I then added the boiled chicken and while it was brought to boiling and reduced, I cooked the gnocchi. The packaging only called to cook the pasta in boiling water for one minute. So I drained it and added the gnocchi to the apple cider/chicken sauce. The boy thought it could use some additional thickening so we added a bit of cornstarch and cold water to the mix to thicken the sauce. I thought it was super yummy!