Category Archives: Beer

Drinking beer out of a can is rarely my first choice; the metallic taste, the quick warming of the contents and the god-awful selections usually available in this format. 

That being said, sometimes a can of beer is a necessity – camping, the ball game, fishing or as one of my mother’s favorite stories goes – getting your three-year-old child to take her medicine by putting it inside her father’s beer can.

Fortunately for all of us, Oskar Blues has done something about this.

But wait, there’s more

Ferran Adrià, Juli Soler and the elBulli sommeliers in partnership with Estrella Damm have created Inedit, which means “never been done before”.  Quite a bold claim for a beer. 

If you follow the food scene, you’ll recognize these names, but if not, here’s a little background.  Adrià and Soler are partners in elBulli – named for some French bulldogs, which is a restaurant in Catalonia, Spain, where the chef is known for his work with molecular gastronomy.  The restaurant has been named the best in the world five times by Restaurant, holds 3 Michelin Stars and is next to impossible to get in to (2009 is fully-booked).   Adrià’s put out many books and is also quite popular on the foodie lecture circuit. 

Anthony Bourdain, on one of his No Reservation shows mused about Adrià’s techniques, “Pastry chefs everywhere—when they see this—will gape in fear, and awe, and wonder. I feel for them; like Eric Clapton seeing Jimi Hendrix for the first time, one imagines they will ask themselves ‘What do I do now?’”

Estrella Damm is an independent Spanish brewery established in 1876 and their pale lager is known as the “Beer of Barcelona”.

The NYC launch of Inedit was last week and there was a to-do at the River Café in Brooklyn, with Adrià himself in attendance.  I couldn’t make it, so a friend picked up a bottle for me.   Isn’t it pretty?

So, what is special about this beer?  Well, first you’ll notice that it’s 750 ml – same as a standard wine bottle.  They claim that it’s intended for sharing, which I did, reluctantly.  Secondly, it’s a combination of barley malt and wheat, with coriander, orange peel and liquorice, that undergoes a secondary fermentation in the bottle. 

The seeming driver behind “never been done before” is that it’s been specially formulated to accompany food.  I guess the Egyptians, Bavarians and Belgian monks didn’t eat.  To be fair, they probably didn’t eat anything close to what comes out of Adrià’s kitchen.

When most people think of food and beverage pairings, I bet wine comes to mind.  I even teach food and wine pairing classes, but there are times when a beer simply works better.  Where wine can fall short: citrus and oil notes, like salads and vinegar-based sauces; bitter notes that you might find in asparagus, artichokes or arugula; oily textures in fattier fish such as salmon or tuna.

I decided to put this beer to the test with a meal full of tricky items: a bibb lettuce salad with apples and goat’s milk feta, topped with a dressing containing wine unfriendly things like apple cider vinegar, soy sauce and parsley; a warm sandwich with mozzarella and arugula; and spaghetti with broccoli and garlic oil. 

I’ve never seen a beer come with so many instructions.  The accompanying documents beseeched me to serve it in a white wine glass, which we did (shame on the man for spilling):

It was also recommended that we keep it chilled in an ice bucket as we were enjoying it.  Getting ice out of the freezer seemed like a big chore, so we opted for the wine chiller instead:

Now, for the important part – yes, it was delicious and it worked with the menu I concocted.  Bright gold and slightly opaque, it smelled of citrus, yeast, flowers and sweet spice.  And it drank like a wine – it was lightly carbonated and had a rich, creamy texture with great acidity. 

The finish went on and on, sadly outlasting its wine-sized bottle. 

I’ve only found it in two places in the city so far.  I hope to add L’Ecole to the list soon.  As more people try it, I bet it will become more readily available.

So, never been done?  Perhaps not this tastefully.

This is not really something you need to know (unless you’re a beer nerd), but I wanted to clarify and expand my initial definition.  A beer’s IBU is measured by the amount of hops used and their acid content.  So yes, the higher the IBU, the more bitter the beer.  This can be misleading, though and I’ll give you an example.  If you look through the tasting notes on my previous posting, you’ll notice that the Cherry Imperial Stout has the highest IBU number and I didn’t mention anything about it being bitter.   The malt sweetness in this beer is playing against the bitter hops. 

Also, hops aren’t the only culprit – roasted malts (think espresso), lower serving temperature, higher carbonation and a low residual sugar content can all make a beer seem more bitter.  Bitterness makes a beer refreshing and is necessary to balance out the sweetness of the malt.  It is also the backbone of the beer’s structure – think tannin or acidity in wine.   So, please don’t think of bitter as a dirty word.

This weekend marked the inaugural camping trip for our 1990 Volkswagen Vanagon. We purchased it in December and up until this weekend had only slept in it in someone’s driveway. Inspired by the middle-of-August temperatures, we reserved a site at Wildwood State Park in Wading River, NY.

Shortly after arriving at our campsite, we realized we were less than 25 miles from a brewery that started out as “two guys with a dog, a van and a dream”. Granted, we were a guy and a girl and we had no dog, but we had a van and we were thirsty. The tasting room at Blue Point Brewing Company is open on Thursdays and Fridays from 3-7 pm and Saturdays from 12-7 pm. And by tasting room they mean they give out free beer and lots of it (take note, Brooklyn). They do offer tours on Saturdays as well (1 and 4 pm), but we opted for the tasting part.

We bellied up to the bar and tasted through all they were offering on tap that day. Here’s what we found:

(you can find definitions of IBU and ABV at the bottom)

Golden Ale (16 IBU’s, 4.39% ABV): light gold in color with a crisp, clean, mineral taste. slight floral and citrus note with a malty finish. great for a day in the sun.

Toasted Lager (28 IBU’s, 5.5%ABV): this is their award-winning, flagship brew. pretty amber color. reminded me of grape-nuts, which might be due to the fact that they make it with 6 different malts. it is toasty, too, because of their direct-fire brew kettle. round, creamy and delicious.

Pale Ale (36 IBU’s, 5% ABV): yellow grapefruit and pine on the nose, with just the right level of bitterness and floral notes on the palate. rich, full and well-balanced.

Bruins Bitter (19 IBU’s, 4.9% ABV): yeasty, just like the smell of bread rising. would be better from a cask – too cold and carbonated here.

Blueberry Ale (14 IBU’s, 4.39% ABV): like a summer trip to Maine (lots of wild blueberries there). I do not care for fruit beers of any kind, but if I had to drink one, this would be it. they use 132 lbs of blueberries in each batch.

Oatmeal Stout (30 IBU’s, 5.2% ABV): chocolate, toffee, Quaker oats on the nose. rich and creamy with a campfire or smoked bacon finish. “tastes like it has fat in it” or “the lowest calorie bacon you could have”.

Hoptical Illusion (60 IBU’s, 6.3% ABV): rich, copper color with notes of pine, ruby red grapefruit and red bell pepper. would make an excellent Christmas beer, but I’d be happy to drink it anytime.

“Black and Blue” – 3/4 Oatmeal Stout and 1/4 Blueberry Ale: like having pancakes and bacon. the bartender shared her favorite comment about it, “some guy told me it tasted like he had eaten a blueberry muffin when he burped it up later”. classy. the ale lightens and brightens the stout. it’s punchy (both because of the light and bright and because it’s sweet, ripe fruit).

Rastafar Rye (48 IBU’s, 7.25% ABV): this is a rye pale ale and I thought the most interesting of the bunch. similar to the oatmeal, but less toasty (like provolone vs. Parmesan in terms of intensity). drinks like a stout, but finishes like an IPA – a Jekyll and Hyde brew – smooth, then bites.

Double Pilsner (48 IBU’s, 6.48% ABV): mean, lean and clean and goes down dangerously easy for the alcohol content it has. like Pilsner Urquell’s sexier cousin.

Cherry Imperial Stout (67 IBU’s, 9% ABV): like an iced coffee you’d want every day during summer. rich, smoky, fruity. wouldn’t have guessed cherries had been added had it not been in the title (just a fruity coffee aroma and flavor).

It’s very satisfying when local things are done well. You can find a rotating selection of Blue Point Brewing Company’s beers here.

IBU = International Bitterness Units – the higher the number, the more bitter

ABV = Alcohol by Volume – the higher the number, the sooner you should hand over your car keys