FE -I know you are not from Cleveland, where are you from and what were you doing before you created Pizza Beer?

Tom – Suburban Chicago. My wife and I worked in the Real Estate Profession for the past 14 years. Athena did loans for the past 4 years and I have owned a brokerage.

FE - Had you ever made any kind of beer before?

Tom- All flavors of beer. There are about 26 categories of beer and several sub categories. We have made very light beers and some very dark and dangerous ones. We tend to experiment a lot and have had a lot of success.

                  

FE - Why Pizza beer as opposed to say, buffalo wing beer?

Tom –Well, we have a beer with hint of east Indian spices that Bill Keeler’s crew, Justin, will confirm is delicious with Buffalo wings. Buffalo wing beer would be good for cooking, maybe!

FE - How did you come up with the recipe for Pizza Beer? What was your inspiration?

Tom – Athena’s father drinks beer mixed with tomato juice and hot sauce. We brewed a few successful award winners the prior year with our yield of fresh garden herbs that included basil, oregano, tarragon, mint, thyme and rosemary. The whole ball of wax. Had some extra tomatoes and garlic this past Labor day 2006 and thought, why not? No one else had posted any that we could find on the internet or other print!

FE - So what exactly is in Pizza Beer?

Tom – It is a “culinary beer” that was designed with food pairing in mind. We figured that if we could make a really good beer to go with Italian food, then we could make our guests real happy whilst eating!

Fe - Where do your ingredients come from?

Tom – The original came from our garden and our neighbor’s too. Tomatoes are not in season in the area now. So we go to our local fresh market for supplies.

FE - Can you give me a beakdown of the process of how to make regular beer and what you have to do differently to make pizza beer?

Tom - Only Jethro and I know the secret and he is not telling.

FE – Who is Jethro?

Tom – He is our cat.

Fe - Any Brewers that you idolize?

Tom – Kris Kalar, Minhas Brewery Formerly Huber

FE - Will I find chunks of Pizza in my Pizza Beer?

Tom – No, the mixture is filtered with hot water where as the flavors are infused into a debris free liquid and boiled. Spices and tomatoes are added to the boil.

FE - Any other food pairing suggestions besides Pizza?

Tom – Roast Beef sandwiches, any pasta with clam sauce, hot dogs, spaghetti, chili. Gonna compile a list from our beer drinkers for what they like best with Pizza beer!

                  

FE - What beer would be most like Pizza Beer?

Tom – NONE, Pizza beer is one of a kind, the first beer in the culinary beer category. The beer is a lighter style beer with a dry finish.

FE - So how much does this beer taste like pizza?

Tom – Hmmm, have to find out when it arrives in your town! You won’t be disappointed. The video clip on Fox and Friends speaks volumes.

FE - What other flavors do you plan to develop?

Tom – Not sure, you will be happy. We have salsa, curry and oatmeal raisin beers already in the fridge as prototypes. Salsa is paired with steak and burgers, curry with chicken and hot wings, oatmeal raisin with apple pie or pork chops and apple sauce, and gummy bears.
                   
FE - How is your distribution, how do I get some pizza beer?

Tom – Call your local big time brewery or TV and radio stations, we need a place to make this.

Edwin Traisman, a food researcher who helped create Cheez Whiz and, as an early McDonald's franchise owner in Wisconsin, co-developed the freezing process used to make McDonald's french fries, has died. He was 91.

He had worked as a director of food research at Kraft Foods, where he was the key in the development of what we now call today "Cheez Whiz" cheese spread. His background in food science paid off when he bought his first McDonald's franchise in Madison, Wis., in the late 1950s.

All the french fries in McDonald's restaurants originally were made fresh in each restaurant, with employees peeling, cutting and washing the potatoes before frying them. McDonald's founder Ray Kroc had selected primarily Idaho Russet Burbank potatoes as the best spuds to make McDonald's french fries.

Ray Kroc, Founder of McDonalds, tasked Mr. Traisman to find a way of keeping a consitency in the taste, color and texture of the spuds while in the freezing process. Mr. Traisman found that by maintaining the amount of moisture in the potato before it was frozen was key to its flavor and firmness.

Mr. Traisman's "Method for Preparing Frozen French Fried Potatoes" was patented in 1962.

By 1972, the nearly 2,300 McDonald's restaurants were using the Traisman-Strong method for making french fries.

In addition to his wife of 44 years, Mr. Traisman is survived by five children, Claudia Ward, Barbara Traisman, Steven Traisman, Jenny Denise Traisman-Waddell and Lisa Traisman; seven grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

He will be greatly missed by all Fast Food Foodies.