We've seen a lot of unusual products turned into beer in the past few years (pizza, banana bread, chocolate donuts, oysters), but something new is popping into the beer market: popcorn beer.
The world's first popcorn beer comes from Rock Bottom Brewery's brewmaster Davin Bartosh, who came up with the idea after watching an episode about popcorn on Alton Brown's Good Eats. From his training at the Siebel Institute of Technology, he says that he realized that wet popcorn would be the perfect grain to brew malt liquor. Using 20 pounds of popcorn (basically the entire volume of his Toyota 4Runner) from Schiller Park's Popcorn Palace, he created a strong American-style lager dubbed POP! Popcorn Malt Liquor, that will make it's debut at the POP! Fest on July 10.
Bartosh says to expect a fermented, very smooth, slightly sweet corn flavor. "I'm very happy with the way it tastes," he says. He warns that it's also kind of high in alcohol (8% abv). Despite time constraints due to the upcoming POP! Fest, Bartosh says the beer was a successful experiment that he's proud to serve at the Warrenville brewery for the month of July.
The upcoming POP! Fest, featuring beer-and-popcorn pairings from Rock Bottom, Goose Island, Gordon Biersch, Metropolitan Brewing, and Flossmoor Station Brewery with gourmet popcorn from Schiller Park-based Popcorn Palace, will take pace on Saturday, July 10 from 1:00-5:00 p.m. Tickets are $15 and available here.
