Some Funny Pun About Screams

April 12, 2009

Before we began the religious holiday sometimes known as “no beer or bread week, so what the hell are we going to do” and otherwise known as Passover, I indulged in this bottle of Upstream Oak Aged Ebenezer. This whole issue of Nebraska lambic/sour brewing is quite amazing if for the only reason that I still cannot wrap my head around quality Nebraska beer. Add to that bias the element of the sour, and I am even more confused. Can Nebraska do this style? The state can. And the output is quite good. The Ebenezer was tart and sour and delicious. Cherry and the wild yeasty-ness that marks a solid lambi lingered in the taste. I write this as I have begun to read Jeff Sparrow’s Wild Brews, an examination of wild yeast brewing in Europe and America. The “wildness” of lambic/sour beers continues to fascinate me. From Allagash to Russian River, we have, geographically, Upstream in the middle of a growing interest in revitalizing the lambic/sour tradition in America.

All this is also to say that I must push my familiar connections in the Cornhusker state to bring more in a month. Wild yeast/wild search for beer. Is Upstream available anywhere outside of Nebraska? For beer porn folks, here’s the full back nude pic of the bottle:

The highpoint of Passover is the annual brisket and the flourless chocolate cake. I am asked for weeks leading into the holiday to make the cake. I complied as usual. But then I thought: we are going to eat all this cake? Let the others do it. Too much cake. Culinary heuristics kicked in and the cake, I realized, could become flourless chocolate cake ice cream.