Food and Recipes
Cassoulet, Beer, and Thanksgiving
Tuesday, October 20th, 2009 | Beer, Food and Recipes | No Comments
The first Canadian Thanksgiving, yes I know I am well over a week behind, was held by an English sailor named Martin Frobisher in 1576 on one of Canada’s many northerly islands. This is a number of years, 42 to be exact, before America was colonized by the pilgrims, signifying what many consider to be the first Thanksgiving. This means that Canadian Thanksgiving is unique from American Thanksgiving in more than timing; Canadian’s are celebrating a whole different event than Americans.
This past Thanksgiving was the first in many years where I didn’t cook a large holiday meal for family and friends; we left that to other people. Instead of giving thanks with friends and family, my wife and I decided to relax, stay in, and enjoy a Canadian Thanksgiving meal ourselves.
I have already established that Canadian Thanksgiving is significantly different from neighboring America’s Thanksgiving right down to the very first event. Knowing this, I thought a traditional roast turkey seemed inappropriate. Instead I opted to celebrate with a rustic French inspired dish – cassoulet with venison, duck and turkey confit. Although Martin Frobisher was English, many of the earliest Canadian Thanksgiving celebrations would have been held by French Canadians. A hearty French feast seemed the only real option we had.
There are a number of great cassoulet recipes; my favourite comes from Jennifer McLagan’s most recent publication titled “fat”. To me, the subtle use of cloves is essential in a good cassoulet, especially when paired with a traditional Farmhouse biere.
While in Quebec this summer, I picked up a number of French beers that are sitting in my cellar, including a bottle of Biere Nouvelle from Brasserie De Saint-Sylvestre. This particular beer paired perfectly with my thanksgiving cassoulet. The subtle flavour of cloves infused in the cassoulet helped to draw out the pleasant spiciness in the beer. The straightforward malt flavour worked great with gamier meats and the heavy carbonation helped to cut through the richness (aka. fattiness) that all cassoulets must have. Farmhouse French beer and cassoulet – give it a try.
Cheers,
Erik
Beer Ice Cream Floats
Friday, October 2nd, 2009 | Food and Recipes | 2 Comments
Post four of the now canonized beer dinner deals with dessert, Beer Ice Cream Floats. Our gracious hosts broke out the ice cream maker for this one. They followed the vanilla recipe that came with the machine and it produced a very good, very creamy vanilla ice cream.
Fresh Vanilla Ice Cream
I know Erik has previously blogged about beer floats and it is no coincidence that I used one of the same beers that he did. The Philllips Longboat Chocolate Porter went really well with the ice cream. It’s bitterness and roasted malt and chocolate flavors combined well with the sweetness of the ice cream. As one who is not particularly fond of sweets, beer ice cream floats might just be my favorite dessert. We also had on hand a Southern Tier Jahva Imperial Coffee Stout, which was a lot more intense than the Phillips Chocolate Porter. This bad boy weighed in at 11% ABV and, while tasty, was tough to drink in anything but small quantities. It was truly a beer for the veteran beer drinker, but it went well with the ice cream in my opinion. In the below picture, you’ll see two floats, one with ice cream added first and one with beer added first. Whichever way you decide to go, pour beer or add ice cream slowly to avoid eruptions, then enjoy.
Beer Ice Cream Floats
Cheers,
Chris
Beer Battered Fries
Thursday, October 1st, 2009 | Food and Recipes | 3 Comments
On to round three of what is now a world renowned beer dinner, Beer Battered Fries. We considered baking our beer battered fries, but then what’s the fun in that? We lost our deep frying virginity that night and it was good.
Our beer battered potatoes in the deep fryer
We didn’t exactly make fries so much as we cut little potatoes in half. We (again, we more refers to the talented cooks in the kitchen) first baked our potatoes drizzled with oil in the oven for 15 minutes to mostly cook the potatoes. We then prepared out batter and put the pot of canola oil on the stove to heat up. To tell when your oil is hot enough, drop a little piece of bread in and see if it quickly starts sizzling and turns brown. If you get that good sizzle and your bread fries up nicely, you are good to go (eat the bread, it’ll be tasty). Our beer batter recipe was originally meant for fish and came from here. We used Central City’s Red Racer Pale Ale again, mostly because we bought a six pack. Here are the ingredients we mixed together for our batter:
- 1 egg
- 1 cup Central City Red Racer Pale Ale
- 1 1/8 tsp. baking powder
- 1 c. flour
- 2 tsp. salt
- 3/4 tsp. pepper
- 1 tsp. garlic salt
We battered our mostly cooked potatoes and dropped them into the pool. Watch out, the oil is freaking hot! I splashed myself and it hurt a lot. Cook until the batter turns a nice golden brown and looks crispy. Remove the potatoes with a small collinder of sorts and let the potatoes dry on a paper towel.
Scoop them out with a small collinder and be careful!
We were probably the most skeptical of how successful we would be with our beer battered fries, but they were delicious! They were perfectly cooked and wonderfully crispy. Combined with the soup, it was a very heavy meal. The salad provided a very refreshing contrast to the rest of the dishes. Despite the heaviness, dinner was excellent. I recommend deep frying to you adventurous sorts.
The salad balanced out the fries and the soup
Cheers,
Chris
Beer Cheddar Soup
Wednesday, September 30th, 2009 | Food and Recipes | 2 Comments
Dish number two in my famed beer dinner series is Beer Cheddar Soup. I hadn’t had too many, if any, Beer Cheddar Soups before, but I was excited to give it a try because beer and cheese are two of my favorite things. The combination sounded mouth wateringly magical to me.
Our soup simmering on the stove
We used a five year old sharp cheddar and, again, Central City’s Red Racer Pale Ale. The recipe we started with was found online here, but we (those actually cooking, not me) made some alterations. We meant to add bacon, but ended up forgetting it. We also left out the leeks, mostly because we didn’t have any. Here is the recipe that we used:
Ingredients
- 2 medium carrots, cut into 1/4-inch dice (1 cup)
- 2 celery ribs, cut into 1/4-inch dice (1 cup)
- 2 teaspoons finely chopped garlic
- 1 Turkish or 1/2 California bay leaf
- 1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter
- 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
- 2 cups whole milk
- 1 3/4 cups reduced-sodium chicken broth (14 fl oz)
- 1 (12-oz) can of Central City Red Racer Pale Ale
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1 teaspoon dry mustard
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 lb 5 year aged Cheddar, grated (4 cups)
Preparation
Cook carrots, celery, garlic, and bay leaf in butter in a 4-quart heavy saucepan over moderate heat, stirring occasionally, until vegetables begin to soften, about 5 minutes. Reduce heat to moderately low and sprinkle flour over vegetables, then cook, stirring occasionally, 3 minutes. Add milk, broth, and beer in a stream, whisking, then simmer, whisking occasionally, 5 minutes. Stir in Worcestershire sauce, mustard, salt, and pepper.
Add cheese by handfuls, stirring constantly, and cook until cheese is melted, 3 to 4 minutes (do not boil). Discard bay leaf.
Our soup was very delicious, you could really pickup the sharpness of the aged cheddar, which balanced out the richness of all the added fats. The flavor of the beer was also apparent, contributing positively to the soup. Our gracious host thought our soup compared favorably to the one he regularly orders from Big Ridge, success!
Cheers,
Chris
Beer Can Chicken
Tuesday, September 29th, 2009 | Food and Recipes | No Comments
Some friends and I conglomerated on a beer themed dinner last weekend. We made beer can chicken, beer cheddar soup, beer battered fries, salad (lame), and beer floats. By “we made”, I mean that I mostly stood around and watched while others with more skill actually cooked, although I did get the token easy job here and there.
This week I’m going to blog about each dish (except for the salad) and share with you the recipe we used. First up, Beer Can Chicken…
Our cooked beer butt chicken, so tasty...
Personally, I prefer the name Beer Butt Chicken over Beer Can Chicken, but that isn’t really very important. I’ve previously blogged about beer and chickens, so we used the same recipe I’d previously posted. Why mess with success, right? If executed correctly, this recipe produces a wonderfully moist chicken that almost falls off the bone; the skin will also be delightfully crisp and tasty. This is a very easy recipe, but be careful not to miss the crucial step of drinking one and half beers before getting started. We used Central City’s Red Racer Pale Ale as our beer stuffing/stand because it is both cheap and delicious. One pitfall to avoid would be dumping the beer into the drippings when attempting to remove the beer can from the chicken. I did this and the gravy we made from the drippings ended up being more bitter than the beer itself. Luckily, our chicken was so good that we didn’t need the ruined gravy.
As for the recipe itself, you should try it because it is really easy, very tasty, and it seems impressive. Here it is:
- Season the whole chicken (skin on) with salt and pepper. Chop some rosemary and thyme and rub it on the dry chicken. Take a few rosemary springs and shove it under the breast skin.
- Drink one and a half beers (minimum) – leave half of one beer in the can and put some of the fresh herbs used in the rub into the can.
- Get a chicken stand and put the beer can into it. Shove the stand with the can in it into the chicken’s butt.
- Turn one side of your BBQ on and leave the other side off – you want a convection oven effect. Once up to 350F put the bird on the off side of the grill. Cook for one and a half hours or when you hit 165F internal temperature. Rotate the bird once or twice during the cooking process.
- Once done, wrap the chicken in foil and let is rest for 2o minutes or so before carving.
It should be noted that we didn’t use a chicken stand. We stood the can holding the chicken on a pan to catch the drippings for gravy purposes, which worked just fine. I wouldn’t put a can right onto the BBQ for stability reasons.
Cheers,
Chris
Beer and Chicken
Sunday, July 12th, 2009 | Food and Recipes | 4 Comments
A while back I wrote about Beer and Meat and I have once again started pouring over the The River Cottage Meat Book by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. I picked up the book recently to learn about the cuts of lamb (Erik and I are splitting a whole one!), but, having just watched Jamie Oliver’s Fowl Dinners, I started reading about chickens instead. It turns out that the average chicken has it pretty rough. Some facts I learned about chicken from Jamie and Hugh:
- The average westerner eats 15 chickens a year.
- The average chicken lives for 41 days before slaughter.
- During those 41 days, the broiler house (where the chickens live) is not cleaned.
- Of the chickens we eat, 98% are intensively farmed (i.e. live at Chicken Auschwitz and never see the sun).
- Between 6-30% of a batch of broiler chickens die before slaughter.
- Chicken density in a broiler house can reach 38kg per square meter (at 2kg per chicken, that means almost twenty chickens in a square meter!).
- The Ross Cobb chicken breed (the breed we mostly eat) is genetically obese and can’t reach sexual maturity without being starved so it doesn’t get too fat and die.
- Around 25% of broiler chickens can’t walk because they get too fat and don’t have enough room to walk around and develop muscles. Ever had a drumstick where the foot end was a bit black? That is a result of acid from the chicken’s own feces seeping into the bone because the chicken was walking on its knees.
Pretty gross, eh? I was shocked to learn about how bad chickens really have it. I really recommend watching Fowl Dinners for a crash course in chicken provenance. Jamie even slaughters a chicken in front of the live studio audience, who looked on with abject horror. I don’t understand why we pay to watch people die in movies, but can’t tolerate watching our food die. If we are eating 15 chickens a year each, we should be prepared to slaughter a chicken. Obviously all non crazy people won’t enjoy taking the life of an animal, but not being able to do it yourself is the ultimate in hypocrisy.
I also learned from Jamie and Hugh that happy, healthy chickens who are able to grow slowly and vary their diet with natural forage taste better! I can attest to this first hand. My wife recently acquired a chicken from one of her coworker’s hobby farm. The chicken was free range, organically fed (no medicated protein soup), and likely led a pretty good life. We cooked the bird using Erik’s Beer Butt Chicken recipe and it was the most delicious chicken I’ve ever had in my entire life. Here’s the recipe:
- Season the whole chicken (skin on) with salt and pepper. Chop some rosemary and thyme and rub it on the dry chicken. Take a few rosemary springs and shove it under the breast skin.
- Drink one and a half beers (minimum) – leave half of one beer in the can and put some of the fresh herbs used in the rub into the can.
- Get a chicken stand and put the beer can into it. Shove the stand with the can in it into the chicken’s butt.
- Turn one side of your BBQ on and leave the other side off – you want a convection oven effect. Once up to 350F put the bird on the off side of the grill. Cook for one and a half hours or when you hit 165F internal temperature. Rotate the bird once or twice during the cooking process.
You will not regret trying the above recipe. Make sure you drink at least one and a half beers! You’ll also find that your chicken will taste better if it had a good life. I implore you to ignore most chicken products unless you can gain some assurance that they had a good life. Even if you don’t like chickens as birds (they are pretty dumb), think of how great a happy chicken will taste!
Cheers,
Chris
Beer and Waffles
Friday, June 19th, 2009 | Beer, Food and Recipes | 3 Comments
Does beer pair with strawberries and waffles – well, not really. With the short seasonal availability of fresh local strawberries, I have been trying to find ways of incorporating them into every meal, snack or a bored moment in my life. Eating out of boredom is healthy, isn’t it?
As I posted previously, yesterday was strawberry, waffle and beer day. Growing up, waffles were never a breakfast food, I was raised thinking that waffles for dinner was perfectly reasonable. Some people seem to find breakfast for dinner a bit odd, those people are truly missing out. Although eating waffles for dinner was a normal childhood occurrence, beer was never included.
We tried a myriad of different fruit beers with the waffles only to find that beer and waffles just do not work all that well together. We worked our way through Swans Berry Ale, Wittekerke Rose – “the fruity pink beer”, Lindemans Framboise, Morte de Subite Kriek, Lindemans Peche(Peach) and Morte de Subite Geuze. Unfortunately I was unable to find strawberry ale. Not one of the beers truly complemented the meal – the beer was either too grainy or too cloying. The Framboise was over the top sweet and overpowered the strawberries, in contrast Swans Berry Ale tasted too much like beer. The berry ale also had a distinct cheese flavour and reminded me of eating raspberry jam with processed Kraft singles on top of my grandma’s homemade bread – good memory, bad flavour. The top beer of the evening was Wittekerke Rose, described as “the fruity pink beer… with a sensual body” I kid you not; it really says that on the label. The beer flavour was subdued as was the fruit flavour – perhaps this is why it didn’t taste terrible with waffles and strawberries.
In hindsight, my approach for selecting the beer was critically flawed. When eating a sweet meal, fruit punch is probably one of the last drinks to reach for. Instead, a drink that helps to balance the sweetness, my choice has always been milk, is a more appropriate choice. Drinking a fruit beer with waffles is no different than drinking fruit punch with waffles.
I think it would be a real struggle to find a beer that works with a sweet fruity meal. Finding a beer that cuts through the sweetness of waffles and strawberries while providing a complementary contrast would be a struggle for even the most knowledgeable beer aficionado. This may be the one meal where beer stays in the fridge.
Cheers,
Erik
Ughh!
Tuesday, June 9th, 2009 | Beer, Food and Recipes | 1 Comment
All four of my wisdom teeth were ripped from my jawbone this weekend, and with the four unsuspecting teeth, so went my identity. For the past four days I have been unable to eat proper food, drink beer, smile widely or sing loudly in my car while driving home from work. Eating, drinking, grandiose facial gestures reflecting my inner joy and wide mouthed singing pretty much sum up my entire identity – I am now just a shell of a man roaming the world until my mouth heals. The bright colorful world surrounding me has faded to black and white and the Ricardo’s are nowhere to be found to cheer me up.
But not all is bad with the world; pureed food can be good. I have a new appreciation for a well prepared broth and have had a chance to (been forced to), in order to ward of starvation, play around with a beer and tomato soup recipe. The recipe turned our reasonably well and I thought it may be worth sharing – in the style of Gordon Ramsay.
- Olive Oil – Hot Pan
- Mirepoix,– Sweat
- Beer 12 oz – reduce
- 28 oz San Marzano tomatoes
- Great Northern Beans – Simmer
- Puree
- Season
- Done
Over the past four days I have missed a total of 8 full meals– no beer either – and will have some serious catching up to do in the following weeks. I should be back to usual within the next few days, replacing all of this bitching and moaning with pure unadulterated gluttony.
Apparently the steroids that my dentist directed me to take as an anti inflammatory can cause mood alterations as a side effect. So please take this post with a grain of salt.
Cheers,
Erik
Beer Float
Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009 | Beer, Food and Recipes | 4 Comments
It is hot in Vancouver – temperatures reached upwards of 35 degrees Celsius this afternoon. Living in a part of the world where most homes do not have a central air conditioning unit, this kind of heat can be somewhat stifling. But there is good news, hot weather means cooling off with cold beer. But along with good news comes bad news – tonight I didn’t feel like a lager, blond ale, wheat beer, cream ale or other beers that are generally served cold, I wanted a porter. I know it is completely out of season, but I don’t lead my taste buds, my taste buds lead me.
To beat the heat this evening, my wife and I went for a drive to a the Marble Slab Creamery, a popular ice cream shop. It seems we weren’t the only ones trying to cool down with an ice cream cone, the lineup was far longer than my patience and we were forced to leave. But that is when I put the two together, rich chocolate porter, cool vanilla ice cream – chocolate porter float! We rushed to the nearest liquor store to find an appropriate porter or stout for this beer float, we ended up with Phillips Longboat Chocolate Porter.
I have seen a porter/stout beer float on restaurant menus before, but never had a real desire to give it a try. It turns out beer floats are delicious – an adult version of a rootbeer float. Next time I see a beer float on a menu I will definitely consider ordering.
Cheers,
Erik
Incendio West & Rocky Mountain Flatbread Company
Monday, May 18th, 2009 | Beer, Food and Recipes | No Comments
My obsessive drive to find the perfect pizza and beer led me to two Kitsilano pizzerias – Incendio West & The Rocky Mountain Flatbread Company. Both of these restaurants are situated within a stones throw of each other and have both received positive reviews, they also happen to offer a selection of craft beer in both bottles and on draft. If I was making the effort to visit one pizzeria , I figured I should make the most of the evening and visit both. If I really want to find the best pizza and beer in the Vancouver area I will have to make sacrifices. This particular sacrifice comes in the form of eating multiple dinners in one night – a sacrifice I am more than willing to make.
We started the evening at Incendio West. Incendio West belongs to the Incendio Group which operates two Italian pizza & pasta eateries and Stellas Tap and Tapas Bar. Currently one of Incendio’s pizza joints is undergoing extensive renovations after a fire caused damage to the kitchen and dinning room - after learning about the fire I was not all that surprised to discover that the word incendio means fire. Chris recommended Incendio’s Gastown location to me months ago stating that they offered great pizza and a good selection of craft beer. I was saddened when he told me the restaurant had caught fire and would be closed for quite some time, but was equally happy to find that Incendio West was in full operation.
The beer menu at Incendio West is made up of bottled domestic and international beer – mostly light lager. Their draft selection includes R&B wheat ale and pale ale, Shaftebury Cream Ale , Okanagan Spring 1516 and Pale Ale and Stella Artois. Having never tasted R&B Sun God Wheat I decided to give it a try – it turned out to be a mild wheat ale and was not impressive. R&B Red Devil Pale Ale proved to have a much greater depth in flavour, which paired nicely with a Incendio’s pizza.
I originally thought that Incendio West baked their pizza in a wood fired oven – I was wrong, they use gas. I have no evidence to support that a wood fired oven creates a better pizza than gas, but my preference leans towards the wood fired option. Gas may be capable of creating enough heat to properly bake a pizza, but gas will never have the same authentic charm that a wood burning oven does. The pizza at Incendio’s was good – well topped with an appropriate amount of sauce and cheese. My only complaint was the soggy crust, a sign of an undercooked pizza. Looking around at other tables I found that almost all of the pizza lacked a slightly charred crust, which is a sign of a well cooked pizza. Proper pizza cookery requires enough bravery to leave a pizza in a hot oven long enough to fully cook the crust, even if the pizza is starting to char around the edges.
After feasting at Incendio West and a taking quick walk through the neighborhood and along Kits beach we arrived at The Rocky Mountain Flatbread Company. After spending an hour walking with hopes of burning off at least one slice of pizza, still none of us were hungry enough to sit down for a second meal, so we opted for takeout instead. Takeout would give me a chance to enjoy a fresh slice of their pizza while saving the remainder for the next day. Waiting for the pizza gave me enough time to poke around the restaurant to see if they used a wood fired oven and to also take a look at their beer selection. I am happy to confirm that Rocky Mountain bakes their pizza in a wood fired oven. Their beer selection is quite impressive as well, offering beer from Howe Sound Brewing in both 1 liter bottles and on draft – R&B Beer was also offered on draft. Seeing a table with a 1 liter bottle of Howe Sound made me wonder why more restaurants don’t offer 650 ml bomber bottles. A bomber is the prefect size for sharing and does not require the restaurant owner to commit to a full keg. The pizza at Rocky Mountain was good, but although the crust was fully cooked, it was noticeably inferior to Incendio’s Crust.
I have many places still to visit in my pursuit of finding the greatest pizza and beer in Vancouver. By the end of this summer I hope to conclude my search – I gladly welcome any recommendations for places to visit.
Cheers,
Erik
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