Ebisu: The Town Named After a Beer

Residents of Tokyo and visitors might now know of Ebisu as the hip little grown-up enclave next to crazy Shibuya. But actually, 100 years ago, Ebisu was a pretty open land, where a bunch of dudes decided they wanted to create some German style brews. Fast forward a few decades, their beer became so famous (including a grand prix at the 1904 World's Fair, ahead of both European and American beers) that they needed to build a railroad station to ship their goods. The town was then named after the train station, which was named after the beer. They even created a god of business, Ebisu-sama. That's powerful.

(photo by r.)

One Woman and This One Guy took a trip to the headquarters of Ebisu/Sapporo beer, and sampled some tasty sips of fresh Ebisu Beer (lager) and Creamy Top Stout - "what a creamy taste." Indeed. The Ebisu is a lovely golden wheat color, silky smooth, with tiny perfect bubbles on top (thanks to high-tech tapping technology: one tip for the beer, switch to a specially designed tip to create the head). Really nicely balanced malt and hops and a little bit of young hop taste make this a great beer for lightly flavored Japanese food and other rice/veg/fish/tofu based meals. Yum!! 

(photo by r.)

Here's the Ebisu song. This catchy tune plays every time the JR train stops Ebisu station.

Stay tuned for more beers from around Japan. Gotta go now! One Woman and This One Guy have a Shinkansen to catch!

minipost: what's the life-form of the month?

olivia judson votes for yeast - the lovely stuff that makes "bubbles, bread, and beer."
(read her column as she bubbles over everyone's favorite micro-organism of the kingdom Fungi).

and a bonus reading for the curious and the microbially obsessed:
click here to learn more about Saccharomyces cerevisiae, or brewer's yeast.

Moving and Thank You

Dear Angel of Beer,

THANK YOU for leaving a six-pack of Tecate in my fridge (is your name Irene??)!! Were you somehow able to anticipate those moments of tearful panic on the phone with the moving company? Negotiations about parking laws with the crazy lady next door? Did you know that I would have to battle a floppy mattress down the stairs in the middle of the night?

Tecate: Fizzy, yellow, lager, and so, so fine.

Sincerely,
     O.

P.S. Here's the musical pairing, from Love in Tokyo (1966): Aa jare aa zara - classic Bollywood flick. If the amount of rain during a love song is a measure for the guy's love for the girl, this dude is serious. Actually, Rafi Sahab, known to some as "the voice" or "man with the golden voice" is serious pretty business.

Boont: Extra Special Brew of Excess, California Style

The Boont ESB may be an ESB ("extra special bitter") by name, but it's a totally Californian one at that. Meaning, for its category, it's big, a little bit brash, and has way too much personality to be any kind of well behaved ESB. For example, the brewing process involves "four separate additions of Pacific Northwest hops" which gives it a very strong hop character (most beers have one or maybe two occasions when hops are added). In terms of alcohol content, at 6.8% ABV, it's pushing it towards the high end of what's already an amplified version of the English Bitter. No matter. It's tasty, and it's got an undeniably Californian character that you just have to go with. And what's not to love about giant coastlines, big sky, and abundant greenness, Death Valley, hippies, Hollywood, Lakers, Silicon Valley, facebook, ebay (oh, wait...)? Anyway... in the case of beer, excess is fine by One Woman, as long as it works. But what makes the Boont ESB extra special is the little hint of spiciness in the hops that lingers on the tongue after the initial sweetness of the higher alcohol content and the bitterness of the hops passes.

Food - Some kind of weird, gourmet junk food, like tri-color popcorn tossed with Anderson Creamery pepperjack would probably be a very good combo for this one.

Musical pairing: Fats Waller, "Honey Suckle Rose." Famous for his stride piano playing and his large-than life stage persona (and appetite), Fats Waller's performances are big, bold, promises tons of sweetness, but with an intensity behind power. And then there are the lyrics - "don't buy sugar / you just have to touch my cup" - uh, sure... The old piano in my house always makes me think of him. Check out this other solo piano version for an almost schizophrenic, manic version of the same piece. Excessive, but ends as if nothing ever happened. Manic.

minipost: go green with beer

this awesome logo appears on the website of the japan craft beer association. i learned from them that since a liquor law was amended in 1994, there are now 260 breweries in japan that make craft beer. pretty cool! it didn't tell me how drinking the beer would save the planet though. i do want to believe it. (??????)

bonus vid (in japanese): Japan Beer Festa 2010 – learn about japanese craft breweries and hear the chairman of the japan craft beer association talk about the internet enabling the japanese craft beer movement. the history of beer and technology in the age of fiber optics?!

Destinations: Oakland Beer Tour (Trappist - Bockor Cuvee des Jacobins des Rouge and Beer Revolution - Moonlight Twist of Fate)

Two pretty recent additions to downtown Oakland have suddenly made Oakland a hugely desirable beer destination!

Destination #1 – The Trappist
Very classy, downtown Oakland spot specializing in Belgian beers with Americans and others mixed in. One Woman visited this place with KALX DJ, The Native Disinformant (she rocks--tune in to KALX 90.7 FM!). Super nice and knowledgeable bar staff, this place is a great establishment. See you there everyday. Ever on a mission to explore more Flemish Red Ales, One Woman encountered the lovely Bockor Cuveé des Jacobins des Rouge. It's by Bockor Brewery in Belgium, and the word cuveé, which comes from wine language, refers both to the process and formula of blending (of different kinds of beers), and to the container vats (from the French, cuve). A pretty, red mahogany, fizzy, fresh, and tart, it's the perfect lovely beer for cherry season. Think, Sunday afternoon in the park (like George Seurat) if you were part of the nineteenth century Parisian bourgeois scene.

Destination #2 – Beer Revolution
With its blotchy concrete floor, biker / punk aesthetic, and Ramones on the sound system, Beer Revolution has a totally different vibe from The Trappist. The Revolution specializes in local and American beers with Belgians and mixed in. Beer Revolution has a lot of love, and a lot to love, including the friendly biker dude bouncer, and the awesome patio/deck facing West for full, glorious afternoon sun.  Twist of Fate by Moonlight Brewery in Santa Rosa was the beer of this Sunday afternoon. It's a brick colored ESB, which is the British way of saying extra special (bitter) ale. Not all ESBs are that bitter, but this had a good hoppy bite to it, but not so much that it overwhelmed the nice challah bread smell. Hey! Ho! Let's go!

Alright class! The answer to the question on drinking and driving that was on an earlier post, based on the  California DMV Driver Handbook:

It's illegal to drink, much less drink and drive if you're younger than 21, but if you're 21 years of age or older, it is illegal to drive with a blood alcohol concentration of _______ or higher:
     a) 1%
     b) 0.5%
     c) 0.08%
     d) 0.01%

The answer is c) 0.08%

As you may know, One Woman is learning to drive a car. Cars and American culture seems like an obvious point, but where else has a national infrastructure been built on the premise of the availability of car ownership, and at the same time, mobility both the meaning of freedom (why are highways in California called freeways anyway??) and a huge pain in the ass? Driving might get me on the freeway to the ancient hot springs in the distant mountains, but it doesn't really make getting to and from the beer bar easier. Thank god for local beer institutions. Walk, ride the bus, take BART, bike but don't operate heavy machinery (and your bike may count as that).

Oakland has ended up being One Woman's number one post driving lesson destination.

(Los Angeles, CA – Gorgeous sunsets, beautiful geometric arrays of automobiles, or, traffic jam hell)

***************
Musical Pairings:
Listen to the sound of freedom and feel better that the good ol' days weren't always better. Fahrenheit 104 with the "Highway to Freedom."

Hmm. Since that was kind of disturbing, here's a bonus pairing, probably more in tune with the punk rock rockabilly vibe of Beer Revolution. "Hot Rod Gang" by the 1980s rockabilly group, the Stray Cats.

beer talk: one woman, one beer on pirate cat radio

one woman, one beer on pirate cat radio. check it out!
(if the player does weird things, it might be easier to download and listen offline)