This combination of radically different flavours, textures, and fat content is enough to give anyone other than a world-class Sommelier nightmares.

For a beer connoisseur, it’s easy – give me a good Saison or French Farmhouse ale, and we’re done.

The explosive carbonation lifts the fats off your tongue – goodbye butter. There’s a sweetness in there that plays nicely with the turkey and the sweet potatoes (and brown sugar or marshmallows, depending which way you like to make it).

There’s a sharp acidity in there that laughs at the cranberries, and there is a final sharp snap of bitterness from the hops that scours your tongue, leaving it refreshed and waiting for the next bite.

Wine with my Thanksgiving meal? No thanks! Give me a Saison and I will give thanks

Some rights reserved:

Beerlicious articles by Stuart Carter, stuart@beerlicious.net is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Burgers – who doesn’t like them? Brie – a cheese I have only recently discovered a liking for. And beer – the classic combo.

I went with the Indian Brown Ale from Dogfish Head, one of the best breweries in the world. Their IBA clocks in at 7.2% ABV, and is ranked as one of the best beers in the world on both major beer rating sites (95th percentile and A-, if you’re curious). The flavour is wonderfully layered, with hops, coffee, and caramel – almost like a caramel latte made with hops. It’s beautifully carbonated, with a gentle effervescence on the tongue. I wanted to know how this dangerously drinkable beer went with burgers and brie, so I kept it simple: bun, burger, a little ketchup, brie, and beer.

The malt sweetness and roastiness played off the caramelised surface of the burger. The hop bitterness contrasted nicely with the rich lushness of the brie. The combination – having the burger, brie, bun, and beer in the mouth at the same time – produced an explosive combination of flavours – coffee, chocolate, hop bitterness, beef sweetness, mushroomy creamy buttery extravagance from the brie.

Could you find a better pairing? Probably. But for me, on this nice September afternoon, this simple combination raised itself head and shoulders above the crowd into a memorable moment of beerliciousness.

Some rights reserved:

Beerlicious articles by Stuart Carter, stuart@beerlicious.net is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Grilled Gulf Shrimp served on a Fried Green Tomato and Remoulade paired with Terrapin Rye Squared
The high gravity Terrapin beers have just entered Alabama. This was my first experience with the Rye Squared. As usual the hops in the Terrapin worked wonders with the spice in the remoulade to make an explosive spice mix. Wonderful.

Jolly Pumpkin La Roja served with a traditional Chef’s Salad and La Roja Vinaigrette Dressing
Jolly Pumpkin make very interesting and complex beers using wild fermentation, and are not the easiest to get hold of. All of them have some brettanomyces to provide a sour, wild flavour and unique taste profile.
The combination with the vinaigrette dressing and the chef’s salad is divine. The gentle sourness provides an almost vinegary tang that works perfectly with the salad. Seek out Jolly Pumpkin ales – don’t be put off by the description “sour” – this is an exceptionally good beer.

Three Cheese Tortellini covered in an Alabama Chevre Pasta Sauce accompanied by Rochefort 8 Trappiste Ale
The three-cheese pasta and goat cheese sauce is a great dish in itself.  The Rochefort is the 73rd best beer in the world (at the time of writing) and deserves this place – it is stunningly flavourful, rich and malty, explosively carbonated and delicious.
The combination is sheer perfection. The maltiness in the beer matches the rich unctuousness of the cheese, while the explosive carbonation scrubs the palate – and tongue – clean with every mouthful, cleaning and refreshing the palate to make every bite of the tortellini just as tasty as the first.
An example of a perfect beer and food pairing.

Cask Conditioned Ola Dubh Special 40 Reserve along with Sliced Smoked BBQ Mutton
Ola Dubh – Scottish Gaelic for Black Oil – is an old ale from Scotland. It’s matured in a cask that was previously used to mature single malt Scottish whisky from Highland Park, Scotland’s second most northerly distillery. It is rich, dense, tasty, with profound notes of single malt; a sublime beverage.
The Ola Dubh stands in stark contrast to the rich smokiness of the pulled mutton and the citrus-infused BBQ sauce, perking up your taste buds and providing a nice digestif to finish off the main course.

Good People Fatso Imperial Stout Ice Cream Float
Fatso is the new Imperial Stout from Birmingham’s own Good People brewery. Its taste has masses of coffee richness and an almost silky mouthfeel. In the ice cream float, it mutates into the richest, densest, most silky mocha coffee you can even imagine.  Absolutely wonderful.

Some rights reserved:

Beerlicious articles by Stuart Carter, stuart@beerlicious.net is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

The core question was which is better – Doppelbock or Old Ale? I always went with Doppelbocks because Garrett Oliver recommended it highly in his book. I agree with him that Doppelbock is great with roast pork, but pulled pork BBQ is a very different eating experience.

First up is Tommyknocker Butt Head Bock, which is a Doppelbock despite the name. This is a tasty, easy to drink beer, and I was convinced it would pair well with the BBQ. Sadly this was not to be: although the initial combined flavour is very tasty, bringing out sweet richness in the meat and the beer, it ends with a nasty bitter twist just at the back of the throat. I couldn’t put a name to the wrong flavour, just that it is there. Quite a disappointment as it started out extremely well.

Next up was Ayinger Celebrator Doppelbock. I have paired this very successfully in the past with roast pork and accordingly had very high expectations, especially as this beer is rated (at the time of writing) as the 45th best beer in the world on beeradvocate.com.

This is, indeed, a very tasty combination with some strange effects. The pairing makes the Celebrator taste almost like it was made with English Fuggles hops – it brings out that hop funk flavour that makes English beer so distinctive. The BBQ brings out a subtle but distinct oak woodiness in the beer. This was an extremely agreeable pairing, but how would the Old Stock hold up?

Old Stock Ale is an Old Ale from North Coast Brewing Co and it clocks in at a significant 12.50% ABV. This was recently paired by Danner with smoked ribs. I knew that this would be a good pairing… but just how good?

It’s an absolute winner. The beer and the BBQ go together like they were meant to be: the beer pulls out sweet and rich flavours from the BBQ, the BBQ brings out a creamy rich smoothness in the beer. Old Stock even achieves greatness with BBQ beans! There is never a harsh or clashing moment with Old Stock, just rich, tasty, deliciousness. I have a new “go-to” beer for pairing with BBQ.

Some rights reserved:

Beerlicious articles by Stuart Carter, stuart@beerlicious.net is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

I hesitated to post this pairing, because the entree here has a dirty little secret.  The sauce uses Velveeta cheese.  And Velveeta doesn’t have a great rep with foodies.  It’s not exactly a sophisticated cheese… while Lost Abbey certainly brews sophisticated beers.  On paper it would seem to be a bit of a mismatch.

But on my tastebuds, it was oh so right.  Amazing.  Total fluke, too.  I got home from work today and decided it was an appropriate time to crack open this expensive beer, which I’d been sitting on for at least a couple months.  Only later did I decide to heat up leftovers of the Chicken Wellington.  (Cooked the food last night, but never got around to posting on the first pairing, which involved Terrapin India Brown.  It was meh.)

Judgment Day and Chicken Wellington were destined for each other.  Each one enhanced the other.  The food dish, by the way, has a lot more than Velveeta.  It involves cooking chicken, dicing it, combing with milk and cream cheese, adding spices like garlic powder, and using the mixture to stuff squares of crescent roll dough.  Ingenious.  And the sauce made use of cream of celery soup, condensed milk, and Velveeta.  All in all a reasonably complex dish, and perfect for a Belgian quadrupel.

This year, we settled on filet mignon, roasted winter vegetables, and mixed greens with homemade Roquefort blue cheese dressing.  The dinner was actually quite easy to put together.  It required a minimal amount of prep work–cutting the veggies and blending the dressing–but was otherwise a breeze to assemble.  The difficult part was choosing a beer.  I wanted something special as it was Valentine’s day, so I pulled out a slight rarity, Opus 10 by Two Brothers Brewing Co.  Classified as a cherry lambic, it is entirely unique as it is a dark lambic with more chocolate than cherry flavors.  The result was quite fantastic.

Knowing my wife is not a big beer fan, I also opened a bottle of Kirkland Napa Cabernet Sauvignon.  I figured this was a perfect opportunity to pit beer against wine.  For those who like tannic hearty Cabs, let me say that for $16 a bottle at Costco, you can’t beat the Kirkland Cab.  Really, it is worth it.  To me it tastes like a $35 bottle (despite my affinity for beer, I still love a good wine).  But this is a blog about beer and food, and I digress.

My first comparison came with the filet.  Both the cab and the lambic went well with the meat, but to be honest, the wine enhanced the flavor of the steak and the beer did not.  My next comparison came with the root veggies–carrots, butternut squash, and sweet potatoes roasted under the broiler with olive oil, salt, and pepper.  The veggies went just fine with both the beer and the wine, no weird flavors or anything.  The most interesting pairing of the meal was the Roquefort dressing and the lambic.  If you aren’t a fan of funky beer or funky cheese you would not like this pairing.  The lambic took the spoiled flavor of the cheese and enhanced it ten-fold.  For those who are curious, I looked it up, and the flavor I’m refering to is butyric acid–common in rancid butter, parmesan cheese, and body odor!  Doesn’t sound good unless you’re into that sort of thing, right?  It is kind of like reading reviews of lambics–”horsey,” “sweaty,” “barnyard,” etc.  You have to ask yourself, “But is it good?”  Split decision.

My wife found the combination to be utterly foul.  I thought it was good if not a bit overpowering.  I’ll be honest, I like smelly cheese and all kinds of wild brews, but I actually needed to mix in other parts of the meal so as to keep from being overwhelmed.

The real surprise for the night for me was when I pitted the cherry lambic directly against the dark red wine.  The wine brought out the cherry in the lambic in a way that was quite pleasant.  All in all it was a very interesting experiment.  The only disappointment I had was that I didn’t save any Opus 10 for dessert.  Chocolate-cherry lambic would’ve been awsome with some brownies à la mode with berry sauce.

Exceptional Foundation's 2009 Chili Cookoff

This may have been a once-in-a-lifetime pairing.  I hope not.

This past saturday, the family and I went to The Exceptional Foundation’s Fifth Annual Chili Cookoff in Homewood Park.  The event was widely advertised on Live 100.5 since a.) they were a sponsor, and b.) 100.5 artist Tim Brantley was one of the live performances, and it was ridiculously crowded.  This is the first year that I had even heard of the event, so it may draw equally large numbers every year, but I was really surprised at how many entrants and patrons there were.

There were around 60 booths of various kinds of chili to eat–some with beans, some with just meat, some with brown sugar, some with beer, some with bacon, and most with sour cream, cheese, and oyster crackers or some other starchy sidecar.  My favorite was Protective Insurance’s “Chili of the Gods.”  It had a serious kick, and had lots of fresh chiles and even some fresh herbs (I think).  Fantastic.

Kudos goes to all the businesses who participated as sponsors to the event, but serious kudos goes to Good People Brewing Co. This is the kind of local brewery you can be proud of.  Not only were they a sponsor, they were a participant with a great chili, AND they donated a slew of beer for the event, the sale of which benefited The Exceptional Foundation.  If you were there and were able to try some Good People Brewing Co. beer with the various chili dishes, I’d love to hear about what you had and how it paired with the chili.

Fortunately for us, we arrived early, about 11:00 a.m., and while the place was already crowded when we arrived, the beer line was only about a half-dozen people long.  By the time we left–closer to 1:00 p.m.–the line for $2 beer (yes, only $2!) from Good People Brewing was at least 100 people long.  It wound all the way through the gym and out the door!  I am seriously glad I tried their special Chili Cookoff Beer.  I was told it was their already-exceptional brown ale “dry hopped” with ancho chiles!  Can you imagine a better beer to pair with chili?  I actually considered trying the IPA or the Roggenbier… but I ultimately decided that I’d better go with the special occassion beer, as I might never have the opportunity again (or will I?…).  I’m glad I did.

I’d already sampled some of the food, and my mouth was already stinging from the heat, so initially the anchos in the Chili Cookoff Beer were lost on me.  But, after a little water and a little beer, I was getting awesome vibes from the mellow anchos and was ready for rounds two and three with the chili.

Our system worked well.  My wife would hang out with the kids on a bench in the shade while I would retrieve three or so samples to share.  The ancho brown ale was a perfect match for round after round of chili onslaught.  It handled a Texas-style all-beef chili with aplomb.  It worked magic on the sweet brown sugar chilis, and, of course, one-upped the beer used in the beer-based chilis.  With my mouth again on fire, I relented to the goodness of the brown brew.  My only regret was that I had no time left to go another few rounds with the Chili Cookoff Beer before I had to head home to put the kids down for their naps.  Here’s hoping that the good people at GPBC make the Chili Cookoff Beer a regular in their already stellar lineup.

However, I never drink beer at breakfast, and have no desire to do so.  So I’ve been intending for some time to do a “breakfast for dinner” thing to try a beer pairing with my beloved breakfast food.

Rather spontaneously, tonight was that night.  Not the most exquisite dish, but one of my favorites nonetheless.  Couple slices of white bread, lightly buttered with a slice of American cheese on each piece of bread.  Short toast to melt the cheese, then slap a fried egg on both.  Toast until the bread is brown and combine to form a very cheesy, very eggy sandwich.  Heaven.

Never having had beer with breakfast food before, I wasn’t sure what direction to go.  I happened to have some Sam Adams Blackberry Witbier, which I’d yet to try, and which seemed like it would probably have some flavor commonalities with blackberry jam, a good breakfast condiment.  Solely on that notion, I put a Blackberry Witbier with my egg sandwich.

As it turns out, I was onto something.  Sure enough, there was something of a blackberry jam vibe going along with the toasted bread comprising the shell of the sandwich.  It was very tasty, and breakfasty.  And no clashes of flavor.

I don’t normally go for fruity beers, but this came in a mixed pack and this was the best possible use for it.  If you find yourself with a fruity beer you’re not too excited about, I recommend breakfast food.

Of course not. The rich coffee flavour perfectly complements the chili and moderates the heat, without becoming harsh or unpleasant.

As for the brownies? Well… they are chocolate. See my earlier article