All Shook Up

Today Elk Grove Village is a bustling place, both to live, to love and to brew beer. But back in the 50’s it was all plain farm land with only a few shops along the dusty main street. One of these shops was the famous, and also somewhat notorious, “Maximilian Frentz Family Creamery”. The thing was that Mr. Frentz – a 5th generation German immigrant – was well into his 80’s but still insisted on serving his kids, as he called customers who were now both moms and family fathers. Mr. Frentz – or Old Max to the townspeople - used to make ice cream so good that people would travel half a day to visit his parlor. But lately he had become so eccentric, if not downright whacko, that it had become a local sport to guess what he would serve you – no matter the order. You might ask for an ice cream float and get meat loaf with a scoop of sherbet on top, or even worse when a 5-year child ordered a chocolate shake and got a Whiskey Sour – triple shot. One day a regular customer, Mr. Pallen, ordered his weekly vanilla milkshake, and for no particular reason, other than his increasing senility, Old Max this day added the local and hoppy Reisch Gold Top Lager to the mix, blending in a spoonful of lime juice and a dash of Angostura Bitter. The customer’s first reaction was to spit out this foul liquid, yet he also found it so strangely intriguing that he not only finished it but also told his sons about it so often that this particular shake from this particular day became a family legend. Show Less