The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Liquid Love Brewing, Buffalo Grove

Welcome to stop #85 on the Brews and Choos project.

Brewery: Liquid Love Brewing, 1310 Busch Pkwy., Buffalo Grove
Train line: North Central Service, Buffalo Grove
Time from Chicago: 55 minutes
Distance from station: 1.3 km

Before I review Liquid Love, I need to apologize for having a couple of breweries on this list that meet the criteria but really don't belong here. If Hailstorm in Tinley Park didn't have it's great beer and vibe, I would not recommend it, for the same reason that I can't recommend Liquid Love. Alter Brewing in Downers Grove got a "maybe go back" only because you only have to slog 800 meters through an unwalkable industrial park.

No such luck here. From the moment you get off the Metra at Buffalo Grove, you have almost a mile of stroads and sidewalk- and shade-free light industrial park hellscape to traverse before you get to this little taproom next to the ironically-named "MiR Tactical" paintball supply shop in the same strip mall. ("Mir" is Russian for "peace.")

Their beer was not too bad, though I found their palate a bit malty for my taste. I tried the Monarch Pale Ale (5.6%), which had a nice balance and was quite drinkable. The Oktoberfest (5.8%) tasted like a very sweet Märzen, with a lot of malt, apple, and honey notes. And the Monarch ESB (4.5%) was a decent example of the style, but still too malty for me.

If you paid attention to my review of Tighthead yesterday, you know that I used the one and only southbound afternoon NCS train to get from Mundelein to Buffalo Grove. Getting to my friends at Sketchbook Skokie required a Lyft to Deerfield, the MD-N to Morton Grove, then another Lyft to Sketchbook. Yet another reason not to trek out to an industrial park 1,300 meters from the one train home that had just OK beer. (Of course, there's an hourly bus. Whee.)

Beer garden? Yes
Dogs OK? Outside only
Televisions? Yes, avoidable
Serves food? No
Would hang out with a book? No
Would hang out with friends? No
Would go back? No

Tighthead Brewing, Mundelein

Welcome to stop #84 on the Brews and Choos project.

Brewery: Tighthead Brewing, 161 N. Archer Ave., Mundelein
Train line: North Central Service, Mundelein
Time from Chicago: 59 minutes
Distance from station: 200 m

Planning to visit the handful of breweries along the North Central Service line presents certain challenges. Metra runs a total of 7 trains in each direction during the work week, but only one in the reverse-commute direction. And until they restored train 105 last December, there was literally no way to get back to Chicago by train.

I spent a few minutes working this out on Friday, however, and managed to visit two of them, starting with Liquid Love in Mundelein. It helped that the brewery is only 200 meters across the parking lot from the train station.

For just $20 I tried six of their brews, though one of them was a free sip of IRIE IPA (7.8%, >100 IBU, pronounced "aye-ree" like they say in the Islands). I mean, my word, 100+ IBUs. OK, I've now had that experience.

For the real tasting, I started with the Comfortably Blonde (4.8%, 20 IBU), a lovely malty beer (bottom right, above) with slight banana and honey notes. Next (top left) was the Chilly Water Pale (4.8%, 40 IBU), a clean, crisp, long-finishing, not-too-hoppy pale. The Bear's Choice APA (6.5%, 75 IBU, top right) brought me back to the higher-hops IPAs of yore, but wasn't over the top. It had a complex, malty body and an clean finish that lingered just the right amount. I finished the official flight with a Boxcar Porter (6%, 40 IBU, bottom left) that had nice, complex chocolate and coffee flavors, and a crisper finish than I expected. I had a few minutes for the train so I finished up with a taster-size Casked Oktoberfest (5.5%, 27 IBU, not pictured), which had a lovely balance and a smooth, malty flavor.

I also met a few happy dogs outside. The brewery has a sprawling outdoor area with tons of trees that would make you forget about being in Middle Suburbistan and easily stranded if you miss your train were it not for the sprawling parking lot surrounding it.

Beer garden? Yes
Dogs OK? Outside only
Televisions? Yes, avoidable
Serves food? No, but food trucks come by
Would hang out with a book? Yes
Would hang out with friends? Yes
Would go back? Yes

Annals of the mafia state

Since today is the last Friday of the summer, I'm leaving the office a little early to tackle one of the more logistically challenging itineraries on the Brews & Choos Project. So I'm queueing up a few things to read over the weekend:

Finally, via Bruce Schneier, a report on Mexican food labeling laws, how manufacturers have gone to absurd lengths to skirt them, and how these fights are probably coming the US soon.

Ravenswood platform opens after 12 years and 3 months

Would you just look at that:

Metra finally opened the inbound Ravenswood platform on the UP-N line after tearing down the previous permanent structure in July 2011.

For the first time since then, we commuters got a solid surface to walk on, shelter from the elements, and (for me, anyway) a 4-minute-shorter walk from Cassie's day care to the Leland Avenue stairwell at the far south end of the station.

They still haven't completely finished, however. The fully-enclosed waiting area with benches and heaters was locked this morning, and the ramp on the north side of Leland still had a plywood barrier. But boy howdy! We won't get rained/snowed/sunned on anymore!

I still want Bruce Rauner to stand on the "temporary" platform for 12 years so he understands what it felt like. Someday, when I'm running Purgatory...

Stuff to read later

I'm still working on the feature I described in my last post. So some articles have stacked up for me to read:

And while I read these articles and write this code, outside my window the dewpoint has hit 25°C, making the 28°C air feel like it's 41°C. And poor Cassie only has sweat glands between her toes. We're going to delay her dinnertime walk a bit.

Could our 12+-year wait finally end?

On my way downtown to hear Brahms' Ein Deutsches Requiem with some friends, I saw this notice, hung with a tragicomic level of incompetence, at the Ravenswood Metra station's 12-year-old "temporary" inbound platform:

What? We get our "new" platform that has been almost completed for the past 24 months on August 1st?

There’s only one brief note on the station info page, but otherwise…nothing. No ribbon cutting, no acknowledgement that the platform is opening 6 years late, no recognition that former Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner (R) cut funding to the project for four years, no one taking any responsibility for the 10-month delay between finishing almost everything and getting “the tiles” or whatever they were waiting for since last summer.

If they open the thing, I'll post photos on the 2nd. If they don't, I'll post derision.

In any event, the Grant Park Symphony had a wonderful performance of one of my favorite choral works, in perfect weather:

And walking back to the train, I was reminded how cool our architecture was in the 1920s:

Tuesday's child is a weird one

It's Tuesday afternoon, and I think I'm caught up with everything in the way of me ploughing through some coding at work the remainder of the week. At some point, I might even read all of these through:

Finally, North Korean troops detained a US soldier after he intentionally crossed the demarcation line in the Joint Security Area, apparently after deserting while en route to the US for unspecified disciplinary measures arising from a separate incident. When I visited the JSA in 2013, a tour guide told me that this happens occasionally, and the North Korean army rarely gives the person back. Not sure life in a North Korean prison beats an other-than-honorable discharge from the US Army, but what do I know?

The future arrived last year

On Friday I posted about Amtrak's $75 billion windfall from the Biden Infrastructure Bill, and I wondered whether the new Siemens Venture rolling stock would make it to Chicago. Well, I took the Wolverine to and from New Buffalo, Mich., over the weekend, and rode in them. My contact at Amtrak said the states of Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Michigan own them.

Photos and more details tomorrow.

Amtrak's $75 billion expansion

The Federal Infrastructure Bill that President Biden signed into law in 2021 allocated $66 billion to Amtrak, which they plan to use to bring US rail service up to European standards (albeit in the mid-2000s):

Amtrak’s expansion plan, dubbed Amtrak Connects US, proposes service improvements to 25 existing routes and the addition of 39 entirely new routes. If the vision were to be fully realized, it would bring passenger rail to almost every major city in the US in 15 years. (Right now, only 27 out of the top 50 metros are directly served.) The agency estimates that this would add 20 million trips annually — about double the number currently served on state-supported routes, or those less than 500 miles.

It’s a long way from the giant network of interurban trains that Americans relied on to get around early in the 20th century, but the plan would still mark a dramatic expansion of passenger rail. And it would bring critical environmental benefits. The transportation sector is the country’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, with most of that pollution coming from cars and trucks. (Rail currently contributes a mere 2%.) Overall, train travel is 34% more energy efficient than flying and 46% more efficient than driving, according to Department of Energy estimates — and on partly electrified routes such as the Northeast Corridor, which carried about 40% of Amtrak ridership in 2022, its environmental advantages stretch even further. A modernized and expanded passenger rail network could be a powerful lever of decarbonization.

For residents of cities like Las Vegas, Phoenix, Nashville and Columbus, Ohio, the Amtrak plan is bringing the prospect of being restored to the rail system. In total, Amtrak hopes to add new service in 160 communities in 16 new states, including outposts like Rockport, Illinois; Madison, Wisconsin; and Salisbury, North Carolina.

Amtrak has also bought a new trainset from Siemens Mobility similar to the train I took from Vienna to Salzburg last month, though (sadly for me) only for the East Coast, not going nearly as fast, and not starting until 2026. We'll keep using the 1970s-era Amfleet I and 1990s-era Bombardier Horizon cars in Chicago. (Though it's possible we could start seeing brand-new Siemens Venture rolling stock soon.)

Silver Harbor Brewing, St Joseph

Welcome to stop #83 on the Brews and Choos project.

Brewery: Silver Harbor Brewing, 721 Pleasant St., St Joseph, Mich.
Train line: Amtrak, St Joseph
Time from Chicago: 103 minutes
Distance from station: 500 m

Stopping by the best brewery in St Joseph, Mich., does not mean I'm going to expand the Brews and Choos Project to include every brewery, distillery, cidery, and winery accessible by train from Chicago, no matter how far away, but it's a tempting prospect. No, there's still a 2-hour time limit on the trip. But I am spending more time in Southwest Michigan lately, and probably taking the train up there occasionally, so why not try some beer?

My friends from the area told me that Silver Harbor Brewing was the best brewery in the city, so when I visited them yesterday, we stopped in. I had the brisket flatbread (excellent) and a flight of 5x 120 mL pours.

I started with the Tourist Trap American lager (5.1%, 18 IBU), a great example of the style with some maltiness and a crisp finish. The Hops, Sweat, and Tears AIPA (6.8%, 66 IBU) gave me a well-balanced bitterness, with some pine and a hint of citrus. The Pick Me, I'm Hazy IPA (7%, 55 IBU) burst out with fruit and Citra hops and finished perfectly. The Rye-Donkulus Baltic Porter (9%, 29 IBU) finished out the tasting with my meal; my first note is "oh that's tasty" and "long sweet finish, great complexity." I saved the Golden Ticket Imperial Chocolate Stout (9.5%, 62 IBU) for dessert, and got rewarded with cascading complex dark chocolate, molasses, and vanilla. Then we took the 7-year-old to play Connect-Four (she almost won) and walked around for half an hour so I could metabolize the stout.

And of course, every server passing our patio table stopped to pat Cassie.

Important note, though: while you only have to walk 500 meters from the St Joseph Amtrak station to the brewery, through a cute, summer-resort downtown, Amtrak clearly believes people only take day trips from St Joseph to Chicago. The Pere Marquette departs Chicago daily at 6:30 pm Central, then runs non-stop to St Joseph by 9:13 pm Eastern. The return trip leaves St Joseph at 8:09 am Eastern and arrives in Chicago at 9:08 am Central. Great, it's closer to Chicago than Kenosha or Elburn, but Christ on a cracker, Amtrak, could you run a second train favoring Chicago-to-Michigan day trips?

Beer garden? Yes
Dogs OK? Outside only
Televisions? Yes, avoidable
Serves food? Full menu
Would hang out with a book? Yes
Would hang out with friends? Yes
Would go back? Yes