In addition to my day job and my evening job and my side hustle - I spend a fair amount of time watching various homebrew Discord channels. There’s lots of activity out there for people to read through!
Brewers Anonymous out of Orlando has an active discord channel that they use for planning and chatting. One of their members Dave Fetty gave a talk in Asheville on Beer Dinners and just posted the beer dinner that he and his wife put together - 5 courses, 5 beers.
That got me to thinking - why not do a “distributed” version of this with your club. Get folks together (since brewers tend to love to cook), each person makes a “small plate/tapas” style course and pairs it with a beverage.
So let’s hear it - what would you server - both plate and bevergage.
My easy one would be an appetizer of a sliced granny smith apple with a small bit of a mild goat cheese, smoked salmon and topped with whipped creme fraiche, a caper and chives. Served with a Spring Saison ~5.5%, wheat and spice forward.
Soup course - naturally it’s a New England Style Clam Chowder with Clam Chowder Saison.
The cooking-with-beer angle is what stands out to me—using a home brew as an ingredient rather than just a drink gives a dinner a theme. I’m curious how people handle the bitterness when reducing a hoppy beer in a sauce, since that can concentrate fast. For anyone pairing courses, does the same beer go into the food and the glass, or do you switch styles between the dish and the pour? Reading how others plan the menu would be genuinely useful.
I think it’s important also to state - just because you’re pairing a beverage with a course doesn’t mean the dish needs to use that beverage in the dish!
The idea of building a dinner around home brewed ingredients is interesting, though I would want to know how people handle the timing. A dish that relies on spent grain or wort has to be made close to brew day, which makes planning a full menu tricky. For those who have tried it, do you lean on beer as an ingredient throughout the courses, or keep it to one or two dishes so the flavors do not compete?
This very idea came to me after planning 3 big beer dinners back in the 90’s. Too much work. Why not have each person bring a course specifically designed for a beer pairing? We could even help with the beer. Thus “Try This!” was born. If I can find some sample menus from past years, I’ll post them.
