Editor’s Note: This was posted on my personal site (Hindrances to Progress) a few weeks ago. I decided it should also exist here. Some of what’s being said may be out of date. For example, Savor was not two weekends ago, because that is not when May 17th was. You get the idea. Anyway.

Savor was two weekends ago, and of course I was there. Together with Steph (my sister), Tim (her husband), and Mel (my girlfriend), we pounded the floors of the Andrew Mellon Auditorium in Washington D.C. until they crumbled under the weight of our thundering enthusiasm, which was an unfair thing for us to do. The building literally fell to rubble.

For the uninitiated, Savor, which was held for the very first time this year, is like an upscale craft brew fest, with special emphasis placed on food and beer pairings. There were 48 breweries present, each exhibiting two of their finest beers. Each beer was paired with one of 30-40 appetizers and desserts.

The typical frat boys and their light-lager sipping blonde girlfriends were nowhere to be seen. The crowds, the noise, the heat — no concern of ours. The traditional pace of waiting in a line, getting a pour, and then hightailing it to the next line while you drank it gave way to a relaxed, thoughtful afternoon of meandering. This event was about far more than sampling unfamiliar brews; every fest I’ve been to prior has handled that just fine. Savor was about appreciation.

The exhibitors almost always had their brewmasters and brewmistresses present at their tables. Craft brewing bigwigs like Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head and Garrett Oliver of The Brooklyn Brewery were there to man their company’s taps. There were even more than a few company presidents there (Mel and I actually spent a good ten minutes talking to the president of Stoudt’s without realizing who she was). Because of this, it was generally perfectly reasonable to ask the person serving your beer, “What can you tell me about this?” and get a detailed answer. This contrasted from most fests where the servers are usually just lower-level employees of the breweries — I made sure to ask every server about what he or she was pouring for me, and very close to all of them had something interesting to say.

The event was incredibly social. For someone like me, who doesn’t tend to do well around strangers, to be in the mood to go around shaking hands with random people and saying such things as “hi,” there needs to be some kind of magic in the air. Okay, maybe I was a little loose from all the beer and food, but you could see on every face in that hall that everybody, brewer and attendee alike, was extremely happy and excited to be there.

It made for a fantastic tasting routine. Spot a beer you want to try, and then wait in no more than a one- or two-person line to get it. Have a few words with the exhibitor while you sip, pick up the food pairing, and finally retreat to one of the nearby tables to enjoy and discuss every tiny detail of the experience with your fellows before moving on to the next one:

“The oak is a lot more subtle than I expected. It’s almost velvety. Ooh, yeah, you’re right, the vanilla notes come out a lot more after you take a bite of the brownie. Is that coriander? It really compliments the duck. Oh, look, it’s Charlie Papazian. Eep! It’s Charlie Papazian!”

Did I neglect to mention?

The High Imperial Granddaddy of homebrewing, Charlie Papazian could be seen all afternoon, wandering the floor, sampling this and that, and basically being his unassuming little self when Steph skipped up to him with her hand out, squeaking, “Hi! I’m Stephanie! I’ve read all your books!”

His response: “Mmf… Muh mouf iff fuww…” This basically made Steph’s weekend.

To most other people, he was just another guy with a STAFF badge on. Those who understood the man’s importance, however, were in for a treat. Getting to stand around and shoot the breeze with possibly the most important person in modern brewing is hard to describe. You could tell that Charlie was having a great time, perfectly content to spend his day eating, drinking, and chatting, and we were all too happy to indulge him.

I think it goes without saying that photos were in order.

Charlie with Steph and Tim. He was relaxed. He was not worried.

And now with me and Mel. Interesting side note: I said, “It’s an honor to meet you,” when I shook Charlie’s hand. I’d never said that to anyone before.

What Savor accomplished above all else was to open, or at least further proliferate, the greater discussion of beer’s place in fine cuisine. Right now, the dialog doesn’t extend far beyond the beer snobs like us, and while Savor won’t have done much to spread the word directly, the people who made the trip to D.C. came away armed with new passion and education with which to create new snobs. Craft beer is a bigger world now because of Savor.

Breweries, Brewfests, Craft Beer, Pairings 1 Comment »

Welcome to our first contribution to The Session, a monthly event in which beer and brewing bloggers get together to all write about a chosen topic on the same day! This is Session #17, for which Pfiff! writer Rob DeNunzio has chosen the topic, “Going Against the Grain Bill: Drinking Anti-Seasonally.”

Stouts — how I love them. Now people who keep their beer consumption to what is in season would typically thumb their noses up at my summer-stout-sipping ways, and really, that’s fine. I completely understand that certain beers are best consumed in their season, but I also feel that there are certain stouts that you can drink comfortably when the days are longer and the weather muggier.

The first stout I have to mention is Steph and Tim’s Foreign Extra Stout, quiet possibly the stout that brought me to love these roasty, dark beers. The stout is malty, roasty, and chocolatey, but not heavy, as many stouts are. Instead, this brew is intended to be enjoyed in tropical climates.

Steph and Tim’s Foreign Extra Stout, paired with Steph’s Banana Monkey Ice Cream Cake. Photo credit, Stephanie Weber

With an ABV of 7.2%, it has a bit of a kick, but it is intensely smooth and refreshing. Definitely a beer that I always look for when I’m digging around in Steph and Tim’s kegerator!

Another stout I would like to mention is Young’s Double Chocolate Stout, which I had the pleasure of having on draft in mid-June when I was in NYC for business. After a full day of being on my feet, and the majority of the Northeast enduring a heat wave, you would have thought I would have selected a refreshing Hefeweizen right? Nope.

I had decided to go to a pub by the name of Stout NYC. You can bet your best growler I wasn’t going to order a Hoegaarden! Sure, my friend did, and he enjoyed it, but he’s not a Stout Girl, now is he?

Needless to say, the beer was perfect: roasty, chocolatey and refreshing.

So, drinking out of season: I say it can be done, but you must remember that often the availability of some brews will be less because of the season. If this is a worry, buy during the season, and then cellar the leftovers so you can crack one when it fancies you!

My year-rounder is barleywine. These sweet, high-octane monstrosities have no place being consumed during the summer, as evidenced by the fact that I feel like crap after having one mid-afternoon in July. But I drink ‘em anyway — They just taste so good. If you can disclipline yourself to save them for dessert, after the house has cooled off, they make a great compliment for cookies and orange sherbet.

I also quite enjoy quadrupels during the warmer months, which probably isn’t that off-kilter. They’re actually supposed to be in season when spring is breaking. I usually see them coming out in April and May, but I feel like they’re more of an October/November beer, so I consider it out-of-season to drink them in the summer.

Man, it’s making me sweat just thinking about having one.

Craft Beer, Pairings, The Session 1 Comment »

I was cruising through a few sites, and I found this April 2008 post from Omnivoracious. The thing that caught my attention first, aside from the words beer and books, was a picture of The Monsters of Templeton with a bottle of Ommegang’s Three Philosophers next to it! The book is fantastic, and the beer, as you know, is outstanding. So that means I had to read the blog post.

Most of the post mentioned beers that I will not sully our own blog with, but I was interested in what was said about MOT:

Of course, some writers have more invested in the beer-book question than others. Rising star Lauren Groff, author of the Orange Prize-nominated The Monsters of Templeton, has first-hand experience, having worked as an intern “one very fuzzy summer in college” for “the country’s best brewery (in my humble opinion) in Cooperstown, New York, which is where my novel is based–Brewery Ommegang. They make Belgian-style beers. Though all of their beers are absolutely stellar, I’d say their Three Philosophers goes best with Monsters–they call it a “luscious blend of rich malty ale and cherry lambic.” Like MOT, it’s fruity on the surface with a dark, rich texture beneath.”

-for more from this blog post, go here.

Well said Groff! I highly recommend this pairing of book and brew, and if I might have a try myself, I will suggest this pairing:

Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips paired with Victory’s Golden Monkey.

Gods Behaving Badly is an entertaining read about a group of Greek gods and goddesses stuck living together in a London flat amongst mortals. And of course, since they have powers, they tend to misbehave a little. I don’t want to give away the whole story, but I certainly found it entertaining, and feel that when paired with the playful, yet strong Golden Monkey, you’ll certainly get your money’s worth of both book and brew.

Enjoy!

Books, Craft Beer, Pairings Comments Off

Jerk is weird and wonderful. On its own, the word Jerk traditionally refers to the style of Jamaican cooking in which meats are given a dry-rub of Jamaican Jerk Spice, a hot-as-all-hell mixture of allspice and Scotch bonnet peppers (a breed of habanero, the most feared pepper in the world), and then dried over smoke. In the North, Jerk is usually cooked, instead of dried, over a hot grill. The mixture of the cinnamony, nutmegy, clovey allspice with the eye-watering heat of the Scotch bonnet creates a fantastic and unique contrast between dessert spice and hot spice.

All of that heat makes Jerk a perfect summertime style (sweating = cooling off), and also an ideal pairing with a roasty stout or a well-hopped Imperial IPA. For this recipe, I used my version Jerk seasoning in a grilled chicken pizza. Steph also had the crazy idea of substituting pureed roasted red peppers in place of pizza sauce, which turned out to be delicious.

I am just now remembering that I forgot to take a picture of the final results, which makes me sad and remorseful. If I make this again and I remember to take a picture, I’ll update this post.

So, recipe time:

1lb pizza dough

Pizza sauce:
12 oz jar of roasted red peppers, drained
1 Scotch bonnet pepper (substitute a jalapeño if you don’t want to chance an encounter with a habanero)
2 tbsp skim milk
1 tsp salt
1 tbsp ground black pepper
1/2 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp dried basil

Toppings:
1 lb chicken breast
1 c lime juice
1 c apple cider vinegar
3 tbsp Tabasco sauce
3/4 c chopped scallions
12 oz mozzarella cheese, grated

Jerk seasoning:
1 tbsp onion powder
1 tbsp dried thyme
2 tbsp allspice
1 tbsp ground black pepper
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp salt

———

Mix the lime juice, vinegar, and Tabasco. Marinate the chicken for at least 8 hours, preferably 24 – 48 hours.

In a grill, prepare a searing hot flame. You should not be able to hold your hand over it for more than two or three seconds.

Remove the chicken from the marinade and grill for about 5 minutes per side, until charred on both sides. If it takes any longer than a few minutes to char a side, do not continue trying or the meat will become overcooked. Set chicken aside to cool.

Preheat oven to 500°F.

While the chicken cools, prepare the sauce: Drain the red peppers. Slice and seed the Scotch bonnet (wear gloves). In a food processor, blend the peppers together with the skim milk and spices until smooth.

Spread the pizza dough over a 16″ pizza pan. Spread a thin, even layer of sauce over the dough.

Prepare the Jerk seasoning: Mix together onion powder, thyme, allspice, black pepper, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, and salt.

Roughly cut the chicken (use a steak knife and tongs) into 1/2″ pieces. Toss well in a mixing bowl with the Jerk seasoning. Spread evenly over the sauce along with the scallions. Finally, spread the grated mozzarella cheese over the pizza.

Bake at 500°F for 5 – 10 minutes, until crust is golden brown.

Serves 4.

I went ahead and substituted in the jalapeño for the habanero. Surprisingly, I think I could actually take the heat, but I have sensitive skin and didn’t want to risk exposing it to the inside of the habanero. Maybe I’ll try it next time if I remember to get a glove.

The roasted red pepper sauce proved to be a perfect mix of bitterness and mellow sweetness to counter the heat of the Jerk seasoning. We also mixed the leftover sauce into a tomato sauce the next day. I’d like to find more uses for this.

I personally felt that the seasoning was a little too hot, so you might consider toning down the cayenne just a little bit, or omitting the habanero/jalapeño. Everyone else who tried the pizza thought it was good as it was, though, so you might also consider leaving everything as is. Basically, this paragraph was not worth writing. Oopsie!

We all paired this with Heavy Seas’ Red Sky At Night Saison, an unusually — and pleasantly — sweet and citrusy Saison, with almost none of the funk that one usually associates with the style (which I almost see as a strike against it, actually). It was great to have in between bites of the pizza — the citrus did a lot to help extinguish the heat, even despite the heat-exacerbating carbonation. I’d like to try this again against either a Hefeweizen or a big IPA.

Pairings, Recipes 1 Comment »