Prepare to pair with food off the grill
Beer offers huge palette of flavours to go with flame-cooked fare
Burger, bun, beer. This summer cooking thing is easy, right?
Slow down there, sunshine. What’s the rush? Food is for savouring — as is beer, for that matter. Happily, there’s a craft beer to pair with pretty much every grilling occasion.
But be ready to throw out your preconceptions. It may be bright and sunny on the patio, but that doesn’t mean you should always opt for bright and sunny beer styles, says Vancouver-based cicerone Don Farion.
“Everybody thinks it’s outside and it’s sunny and nobody drinks dark beers,” he says. “If you’re doing pulled pork or a pork chop or ribs, then a porter is awesome. They look dark but they’re light drinking.”
Similarly, a loaded burger or steak finds a happy partner in dark lager.
“So you’re still drinking that crushable, easy-drinking, light-feeling lager, but then you have the roasted and chocolate malts that work great with that sear in the steak,” says Farion, 45, who’s also the owner/operator of East Van’s Bomber Brewing and Vancouver’s three Biercraft restaurants.
Beer’s carbonation alone gives it the edge over wine when it comes to pairing with grilled foods, particularly if those foods are fattier, says Farion.
“If you’re having a big cheeseburger and you have a glass of wine, the wine slides right off the grease on your tongue,” he explains. “Whereas a crisp pilsner or saison will brush that away and then your next bite of food tastes better because your tongue isn’t covered.”
Beer can be also used to great effect as an ingredient in sauces, marinades and dressings. Farion says he always makes his summer marinades with beer, using bolder styles whose flavours withstand and are even developed by the high heat of the grill — for example, English-style IPAs, Belgian styles and dry stouts.
Chef Paul McGreevy says that those interested in using beer in food should start with a light style in a simple application.
“Start even with lagers, just to get used to the carbonation and the flavour profile it can give. Generally, lager doesn’t have bold flavour, but even try a fish batter made with beer instead of tempura flour and soda,” suggests McGreevy, who has worked intensively with beer in the kitchen since he took up the role of corporate chef with Craft Beer Market in Calgary almost five years ago.
Talking to McGreevy, 36, it’s clear that he’s like the proverbial kid in the candy store whenever he’s in the kitchen.
“You say ‘beer’ and there’s the thought from 10 years ago that beer was just this fizzy stuff ... Now the flavour profiles you have to work with are so diverse,” he says. “And because of the carbonation level it helps to lighten things, while at the same time it can provide a lot of depth and richness.” When it comes to pairing beer with food, as he often has to do for Craft Beer Market’s brewmaster dinners at the restaurant’s Vancouver location, McGreevy delights in beer’s versatility.
“There’s less rules, less clichés like red wine is meat, white wine is fish. It doesn’t really apply to beer with food,” he says. “A porter can work with beef and a porter can work with fish if the fish is smoked.”