Nebraska Brews

Kiki and I are in the Cornhusker state visiting my folks so we decided to check out a local watering hole.  Lincoln is a college town and has over a 100 bars within a mile radius in downtown.  But Brewsky's is a block away so it was a convenient place to grab a drink. 

The first beer I had was a local Lincoln beer made by Lazlo's Brewery and Grill.  Lazlo's was started in 1991 and people in Lincoln and Omaha are obsessed with it.  I had eaten there in high school but never tried their beers.  Brewsky's had Lazlo's Luna Sea ESB on tap so it seemed like a good time to try it out.  The beer is technically Lazlo's, but it is made by Empyrean Brewing Co.

At least Lazlo's has the restaurant thing going for them because the beer sucked.  Considering they've been around for 20 years you think they could perfect a decent beer.  It tasted like someone added hops to sparkling water.  For being 6.3% ABV its a pretty light drinking beer, which I guess is what all the yuppies and college students that populate Lincoln want to drink.  For me it tasted really watery, not much body, and just a very light hop aftertaste.

There are over a million people in the Omaha-Lincoln metro areas and Empyrean is really the closest thing to a craft/micro/regional brewery serving all these people.  And it sucks.  Eastern Nebraska is aching for someone to make some decent local beer.

The Luna beer was a whole lot better than the second beer I tried.  Brewsky's "makes" their own American Pale Ale.  Its not really made by them, but made by SchillingBridge Winery and Microbrewery exclusively for them.  Schilling is in Pawnee City, Nebraska (pop. 1,033), which is a good hour and a half southeast of Lincoln.  Which puts it near where I used to hunt, which you don't care about.  Anyway, this APA tastes like water, has a little bit of a hop taste, but then the taste drops off and there really is no aftertaste.  Even the hop taste that is there tastes a little weird, so they're not exactly picking the best hops to get the best flavor. All in all, not a very memorable beer.

Lesson: Nebraska beer not so good (although I'd rather drink it than Bud Light).  But at least it was only $3 a glass, so they've got that going for them.