Monday, October 26, 2009

Loose as a Goose

Each Sunday night, my heart sinks and a sense of dread pervades my being.  No, it is not the sad fact that my weekend is coming to an abrupt end.  The dark cloud that hangs over me is knowledge that on Monday I will have to attend the worst class I've had the displeasure of taking in law school, Criminal Law.  I'm not going to go into any real detail with the reasons I dislike the class, but it's so disorganized that it makes a three hour long class seem like a six hour long class.  Today was a double-shot of terrible because I also had to get a tetanus shot so that I can register for classes soon.  I look forward to feeling like I was punched in the arm for the next four days.

You may be asking yourself, "wait, isn't this a food blog, what does this have to do with anything?"  Well, relax, everything will be tied up shortly. 

I decided to do an experiment to make this terrible class more bearable.  This heavily scientific experiment can be summed up in one word...drinking.  After my tetanus shot at Walgreens on North and Wells, I went a few blocks to the Goose Island Brewery.  The Goose Island Brewery is located at 1800 N. Clybourn, and their website is http://www.gooseisland.com/.

To start, I really wish that I liked Goose Island beer more than I do because I think it would be great to drink Chicago beer.  Unfortunately, I find most of their beer to be very mediocre.  The exception to this regrettable rule is Matilda.  It is not the best beer I've ever had, but it is a great effort from the Goose.  Matilda is a Belgian style ale that is creamy, spicy, and hauntingly sweet.  It has an interesting note of burnt caramel that I think is strange, but interesting, for a light colored beer.  Here is a picture of the fancy Matilda glass.  Look at the fancy crest!



I'm very happy that I have found a Chicago beer that I enjoy.  Although Goose Island has let me down in general, there is another Chicago brewery that has some promise.  I still have to taste more of the offerings from Metropolitan Brewing, which is relatively new, before I make any judgment on it, but the few beers that I have had from them were very good, so there is still a bright, shining beacon hope for Chicago beer. 

Moving onto the food.  I had the Amablu Burger.  This burger consisted of a pepper-crusted patty topped with blue cheese and german mustard served on pumpernickel bread.  This burger had numerous problems, but I'll start with the parts that I did like.  The pepper-crusted patty had great flavor with a slight spicy kick.  I think the patty could have worked very well with some other accompaniments, but I also think riding a  unicorn would be nice, unfortunately neither are reality.  The fries were also very good - crisp exterior with a creamy, although slightly grainy interior.  Now the bad....  The blue cheese was heaped on the burger.  I like blue cheese as much as anybody, but it completely drown out the flavor of the tasty pepper patty.  The mustard did very little to cut through the glob of blue cheese, and thus was a pointless ingredient. Eating this burger was like eating mouthful after mouthful of blue cheese.  Perhaps if Goose Island shrunk the burger and served it as an appetizer, it could work since it would only be a couple bites, but as it stood, I could not finish it.




At least I had the Matilda though!

 

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