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In honor of Earth Month , we at Lakeshore Beverage want to celebrate the beverages that do more than just satiate our palates and do some good for the environment around us! One such beer helping out the cause all year long is a collaboration between Oregon based brewery Deschutes and Patagonia named Kernza Lager. What makes this super beer so special for the earth? Well, it’s due to its namesake grain, Kernza.
Kernza is a soil-saving, carbon-capturing, perennial grain. it helps prevent soil from being eroded and helps preserve biodiversity and waterways – making it a favorable grain to use when helping the environment.Kernza Lager also uses organic ingredients and uses innovative brewing technologies to create a one-of-a-kind beer that truly has the environment in mind.
Deschutes x Patagonia Kernza Lager comes in both alcoholic and non-alcoholic varieties so you can enjoy this revolutionary beer any way you want at any time. Click below to find Kernza Lager in your area. And remember that beer isn’t just environmentally conscious, it is a great beer to celebrate and kick back with yourself or with friends, Celebrate Earth Month this year with a truly eco-conscious Kernza Lager.
Click here to read more on Deschutes’ Kernza. Happy Earth Month!
We did it, we made it through yet another Chicago winter. Temperatures are slowly (but surely) rising and the sun doesn’t set at 5pm anymore. Spring is right around the corner – and that means more outdoor activities like hanging out at patios with friends and just enjoying the nice(r) weather.
And of course your friends here at Lakeshore Beverage are here to make sure you spend the spring months with the best beverages in the world. No matter if you drink beer, seltzers, cocktails, or something else. Keep reading to find out who’s on this murderer’s row of hot spring beverages!
For this Women’s History Month, we wanted to collaborate with ERIS Cider House and Brewery and take a look at how they craft their award winning ciders. Founded by Michelle Foik and Katy Pizza, ERIS is named after the goddess of chaos, and they certainly have brought chaos into the hard cider category. For a deeper dive on ERIS’ leading women, and the history of the cider house, click here.
Have you personally ever wondered how a batch of cider is made? It’s similar to beer, but different, actually. It’s quite easy to learn how to brew online – there’s websites, video tutorials, even entire online communities on how to brew beer. But what about hard cider?
Hard cider is a steady staple in the alcoholic beverage world, and it’s a drink that everyone enjoys. Women and men drink hard cider roughly at a 50/50 split, according to CiderCraft Magazine. It’s often seen as beer’s fun loving relative, but they’re not too different in how they’re produced. We went to ERIS Cider House and Brewery in the Old Irving Park Neighborhood one day to see how hard cider was made, and to have a few ciders ourselves.
“There’s a lot of similarities to beer, but also glaring differences.” Says Owen, a 15 year veteran brewer at ERIS. “There’s no brewing process.” This is a very important distinction, as there’s no cooking or any of the previous steps. You would go straight from the juice of the apple into fermentation.
Owen walked us through a regular cider process at ERIS. It starts with them getting their fresh juice. Once they pump it in through their lines, it ends up in their holding tank, where it sits until it’s ready to be transferred inside. This is the fermentation process, and it can take about two weeks for it to perfectly ferment.
“[We] see how much sugar is fermenting out, and how alcoholic it’s getting. Owen says. They do this by taking a sample from the tank, bringing it inside and using a hydrometer and the Brix scale to measure the level of fermentation. After a few days, it’s onto the next step.
The blending process is where they hi add flavors, depending on their recipes, and it involves a lot of experimentation. In the case of Pedestrian, ERIS’ most dry cider, they use little flavoring, as they want the apples to tell the story themselves, but it depends on the cider – and considering they have several year round, seasonal, and other ciders in rotation, the recipes and concoctions are plenty in between.
Afterwards, they move the cider into filter tanks and it goes through a complicated looking-but-actually straightforward filtering device. It goes in through one part, spins around, and comes out into one of their “brite”, or serving tanks, and that’s where it’s ready to be canned, wrapped up, and shipped to your favorite bar or liquor store for you to pick up, crack open, and enjoy!
The entire process from juice to canning takes a few weeks, but the result is award winning hard ciders, and absolute fan favorites that keep cider drinkers coming back for more. This cider drinker really enjoys their Blush cider. It’s a love letter to rose wine, made with cherries and has a sweet finish. But, if I’m outside on a patio or a porch, I’ll opt for their Pedestrian cider, a crisp, dry take on traditional hard ciders. Regardless of which one either me or you choose, ERIS has a cider for you. Crack open a can, and raise it to the goddess of chaos herself. Happy Women’s History month!
The Super Bowl is the biggest day of the year for football fans but it’s also one of the best excuses to get together. Whether you’re a diehard fan, just here for the commercials, or somewhere in between, everyone looks forward to the feast on gameday. Bud Light, pizza, and wings are a great combo but with so many people ordering, it’s not uncommon for orders to get mixed up or missed altogether. Also, if you’re feeding a lot of people, it can get quite expensive ordering in. But what else is as easy to feed a group of hungry people for the game? I was thinking it over one day and it turns out, I was staring at the answer the entire time – super bowls for the Super Bowl.
When it gets cold, something I love to call “stew weather”, I bring out the slow cooker and I put that thing to work. A slow cooker meal is great for feeding multiple people, something you don’t have to babysit, and easy to make ahead of time and serve. To go with the Easy to Gameday motto of Bud Light, I wanted to share a couple of ideas that I will be using that are easy to make and easy to enjoy this Super Bowl. And as always, all these dishes are perfect for pairing with Bud Light.
If you love chicken wings, this is a great way to satiate your cravings. Served with tortilla chips, pita bread, or celery & carrots, this is a crowd favorite that is easy to make. This one may be the easiest to make on this list so this can be a great choice for those of you who don’t cook very often. Using store bought shredded chicken or even pulling apart fully cooked chicken yourself means there’s nothing raw you need to worry about. Combine that chicken with some hot sauce, ranch dressing, and cream cheese in a slow cooker to make a delicious dip in about an hour.
Pork shoulder is a delicious protein that’s also easier on the wallet – something that really matters when feeding a lot of guests. With a little seasoning and broth, pork shoulder turns into an easy pulled pork that melts in your mouth. Stir in your favorite BBQ sauce after shredding and it can be an easy sandwich filling or do as I did and top off some fries to create a bowl of loaded fries. I like to call this one a pulled pork “poutine” because I like alliteration but I’m sure there will be some Canadians that would not agree with the naming. Regardless, it’s tasty, easy, and relatively cheap to feed the masses from kick-off to game’s end.
This is my favorite dish to make in the colder months and the reason why I call it “stew weather” instead of soup weather. This dish is so packed full of meat, veggies, and flavor, that to call it a soup would be a disservice. This is definitely a make the day before kind of dish so make sure you get this going by Saturday night. Take a large cut of stew beef, making sure that it’s one large piece. It can be from different cuts as well so look for chuck, pot roast, bottom round, and even brisket. You’re looking for something with heft and don’t be afraid of all the connective tissue. On a bed of potatoes, carrots, and celery, add a few cubes or spoonfuls of beef bouillon, mashed up garlic cloves, and a splash of soy sauce. Lay your big beautiful piece of beef on top so it’s resting on the bed you just made and pour a little beef stock over the meat. Cover it up and cook on high for 8 hours for a stew so delicious and simple, people will be begging for the recipe. Simply shred up or chop up the beef, stir it back in, and serve in a bowl.
If you have a lot of people coming over and your slow cooker is already taken up by one of the dishes above, we’ll have to recruit our oven for this next dish. In a casserole dish, simply putting a jar of sauce and uncooked pasta with a little bit of water can make you a very filling dish with unlimited potential to be improved upon. I like to make my own sauce because I really enjoy making a “Sunday Gravy” like an old Italian grandma since I never really grew up with that tradition. It fills the house with such a pleasing aroma of garlic, basil, and spices. A bonus is that it really warms up the kitchen and adjoining den – very nice when you live in an older drafty house. Top it off with cheese and let people scoop out as much as they want into their bowl and you’ve got yourself another great dish for the game.
I love baked goods but I usually find fruit pies to be a little too dry for me. That’s why I like to get it ala mode when possible but even then, on a dish, it’s less than ideal to get the perfect ratio on every bite. At home, I like to take a slice of pie and place it in a nice mug to heat up in the microwave. I then top it off with ice cream for an easy dessert for one that gives me the perfect bite every time. My wife thinks I’m weird for eating pies in this way but she always thinks I’m weird – so for this year’s Super Bowl, I thought I would scale it up for our guests to get their opinions. I’m not a baker and by the time the slice of pie gets in the mug, it’s just a jumble of pie filling and crust. To make this dessert bowl for a large group, I decided to make a simple pie filling, get store bought pie crusts, and just bake it in a cast iron. Guests will just scoop out their pie (that sounds odd) into a bowl and top it off with some caramel English toffee ice cream. Hopefully it will be a big hit and maybe I will get less side-eye from my wife in the future when I make a mug of ice cream and pie.
Whoever you’re cheering on this year, Bud Light is a great choice to enjoy the Super Bowl and these super bowls with. Also, if you’re attending a party, don’t show up empty handed! A case of Bud Light or any of these dishes would surely be a welcome sight for the host. Have a great Super Bowl Sunday everybody!
Well what do you know? It’s almost 2025! I feel like it was a month ago when we were talking about 2024 goals and resolutions. How did those go, by the way? Successful? Congrats! If not, don’t worry – 2025 is a blank slate.
So – what are your goals for the year? A healthy lifestyle includes enjoying yourself, so you shouldn’t have to compromise taste and quality as part of your resolutions. Here’s a guided breakdown of resolutions and some products to help you along with your goals!
Last month the annual Great American Beer Festival was held in Colorado. Thousands upon thousands of beers were submitted in varying categories but only a handful came out on top. Many award-winning beers were created by some of our great brewery partners. So what award winning beers do we have in our lineup? Keep reading to find out!