When Old Irving Brewing Company opened in 2016, I was elated. Well, not elated. But I did think it was rather neat as I grew up in Irving Park, the larger community area of which the Old Irving Park neighborhood is a part of. I still have family in Old Irving and it is a neighborhood dear to my heart. Besides being famous as my old stomping grounds, I believe Irving Park is home to Wilco’s recording studio, The Loft. And so the neighborhood deserves a nice brewery.
Trying their beer was put on my Chicago to-do list – along with more than a few other things that are still on that list. The way I recall it, whenever I saw their brews for sale, it was always an IPA or a fruited sour. And, truthfully, I just couldn’t care less about these styles. Do you think Gustave Brand was supping on beer that tasted like fruit punch when he was painting the murals at Schurz?! Of course he wasn’t. He quenched his thirst from a hard day of laying portraiture on the library’s spandrels with a beer that tasted of malt and Noble hops.
And so I bided my time until I could find something from Old Irving that was less trendy and less fruity. Now, while it may have taken 6 years, I can finally say that I have sampled one of their brews.
I found it at a suburban Binny’s, Binny’s being a Chicagoland chain of gigantic warehouse liquor stores. Their local beer selection is enormous as there are a lot of breweries down there. Perusing the shelves gets very tedious very quickly. It’s IPA after IPA after fruited sour after fruited sour. Occasionally you run into a farmhouse ale whose label is adorned with an apocryphal tale about the style’s history replete with idyllic imagery of the French countryside and the farmers’ daughters who wander the fields running their hands along the top of the grass like in a Terrance Malick movie pining for a bearded hipster from the American Midwest.
I then run into the Dovetail section and find that it’s all the stuff that I can get here in Madison.
Recommence scanning.
Metropolitan. Ooh! Arc Welder! Ooh! Grab a six pack of that.
After a few dozen more variations from the Simcoe-Citra-Mosaic Empire, I stumbled upon Old Irving’s Lifesblood, a dark bock. It was late November. Bock weather. Perfect because not many breweries in these parts brew a bock. Sure, they have a doppelbock ready in January with some clever pun-ator name, but a regular bock for late fall instead of Arctic vortex weather is a bit hard to come by. New Glarus brews one off and on – Honey Bock, Back 40, or Uff Da. You’d think Capital would have more than one (Mindblock) but they favor doppelbocks. (Capital did have another regular bock bock back in 2020 but that was taproom only.)
So I grabbed a 4-pack of Lifesblood and sat down one chilly night to sample.
I was dumbfounded that I actually got a decent pour as my glass was blessed with a big head of firm, tan foam that had staying power. Lifesblood was a deep reddish brown and clear. I spied a goodly number of bubbles inside. Caramel and roasty grain aromas were strong but I also smelled a little honey, some milk chocolate, and a hint of hop spiciness.
On my first sip, I noticed the beer's medium body along with a nice, mellow fizziness pulsing through its veins. While I tasted sweet things such as plum, milk chocolate, and caramel, it wasn’t extremely sweet, which I appreciated. There was a bit of bread hiding in the background too. Grassy hops helped keep the flavors in balance.
After swallowing, I found that the sweetness faded slowly out while the grassy hops slowly faded in allowing for some medium-light bitterness and dryness.
This is a very good beer. I really liked the milk chocolate flavor and how the moderate fizz allowed for a nice smoothness. Although it had plenty of flavors associated with sweetness, Lifesblood wasn’t cloying. The emphasis was squarely on the malt but it had certain lightness to it that kept it from becoming a big, heavy brew. Perfect for a chilly, but not freezing late fall night.
Junk food pairing: Lifesblood is a fine dunkel bock and should be paired with hearty junk food. I recommend a bag of Lay’s Kobe Beef potato chips.
2 comments:
I have | had(?) a Binny's club discount card. I guess it works when in a store. But when I tried to logon to the account associated with it, it said I entered the wrong password. I tried invoking it sending me the password reset e-mail. Binny's e-mail provider bounced this missive. This is weird because Binny's seemingly has no problem SENDING marketing e-mails to it.
Well, if it's going to do this; I don't really need its marketing e-mails. So I unsubscribed.
Let's see if it heeds this request.
My guess is that it will involve setting up a different account for it, with an e-mail address that it hopefully will allow. It will not be from Google, Microsoft, Apple, or Yahoo.
I have been to Old Irving Brwg. a handful of times. It is a four-block walk from the CTA route #54 Cicero northbound terminus. It seems farther because it involves crossing the Kennedy Expressway. The beers are pretty good. I am more grateful it has overcome the potential sceptre of the edifice it occupies. Chicago chef Homar Cantu hung himself therein when contemplating operating a brewpub | restaurant.
Old Irving has bought the structure that was Finch Brwy's. packaging facility in the Chicago Brewing District near Ashland Av. and Kinzie St. It intends to open that to the public.
I have some kind of Binny's card. Somewhere. I don't really keep track of it since I don't go to Binny's very often. Good luck!
I didn't know that about OIB and Homar Cantu. I hope to actually go there someday.
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