Mogo goes from tacos to craft beer with Last Wave Brewing Co. collaboration

Few things pair together better than beer and tacos — but how about beer, tacos and a great cause?

Mogo Korean Fusion Tacos, an Asbury Park favorite, has partnered with Last Wave Brewing Co. of Point Pleasant Beach to collaborate on Eat/Drink.

Eat/Drink, a 5.5% ABV sour ale inspired by Mogo's cucumber kimchi and Asian pear hot sauce, will be canned next Tuesday, Sept. 28, and is expected to be in area liquor stores that weekend and will also be available at local bars and the brewery.

It's a collaboration that makes all the sense in the world to Mogo co-founder. Jason Devino.

“We initially chose the taco as our serving vessel because we felt it was humble and it had mass appeal — everyone knows what a taco is," Devino said. "To us, it could serve (as) the perfect bridge between these two worlds. ‘Well, I’m not sure if I’m going to like Korean flavors, but tacos are good and I like tacos, let’s try this out.’

“Like a taco, beer also has mass appeal. It’s been around for, what, like 5,000 years? Everyone knows what beer is, so when something has that level of familiarity, ... it can serve as the perfect medium to introduce something new.”

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A portion of the proceeds from Eat/Drink will support the work of Asbury Park Dinner Table, a nonprofit organization that orders meals from local restaurants to feed those in need. By June, the organization had raised more than $500,000 and ordered more than 120,000 meals.

Eat/Drink draws on flavors of cucumbers, Asian pears and red pepper flakes — three components, as Last Wave co-founder and brewer Nick Jiorle put it, that "are distinctly Mogo."

In addition to combining their flavors, the new beer is a meeting of the minds for Last Wave and Mogo, two businesses that work to support their communities. Last Wave was one of the New Jersey breweries to participate in the All Together India Pale Ale project by Other Half Brewing Co. of Brooklyn, an endeavor to support hospitality workers. 

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In addition to raising funds for Asbury Park Dinner Table, Eat/Drink also will include a QR code on its can so people can find out more information on the organization.

“That was kind of the thinking," Jiorle said ...  "If we can help here, which we can, why not?”

Alex Biese has been writing about art, entertainment, culture and news on a local and national level for more than 15 years.