Categories
beer and food

Dark chocolate mousse and Sam Smith's imperial stout

samsmithis2

I often like to have a dark chocolatey beer for dessert, but I’d always been a bit sceptical about matching beer with sweet treats, particularly after some unsuccessful attempts.  For example, Young’s double chocolate stout just tastes like a watery bitter ale if you drink it with real chocolate.

However, having tried a dark chocolate orange mousse with Sam Smith’s Imperial Stout, I think it can work beautifully when you have a full-bodied and bitter beer. In this particular case, the mousse did bring out the bitterness in the beer, but in a fabulous way. It made the stout taste like really dark, unsweetened chocolate (not unlike Yeti by Great Divide). It certainly works better with chocolate than with cheese.

Recipe for mousse after the jump.

Categories
beer reviews Beer styles

British Versions of Continental Beers

In the last few months, we’ve come across a couple of welcome attempts by British breweries to mimic continental beer styles. More of this, please. It’s surely the best way to compete with imported lagers?

Wylam Czech-style Pilsener beer is malty, fruity and very satisfying.  It’s nowhere near as good as a fresh Czech beer on tap, or even Derbyshire brewed Moravka, but compares very well with a bottle of Budvar.  An impressive offering from this Northumberland microbrewery.

cainsdoppelbock

Cain’s Double bock is very ‘true to style’, despite its origins in the north west of England, rather than the brewhouses of Bavaria. It’s really heavy and malty, but without being too sickly. It’s got some very pleasant milk chocolate and vanilla flavours and a soupy body.  At 7.1%, it goes straight to your head. Is this is available in cask form? If so, we’d love to try it.

Categories
homebrewing

The joy of parti-gyling

birthdaybeer

We’d been playing with the idea of a parti-gyle brew for a while.  This is where you take the first lot of sugary liquid from the mashed grain to make a strong beer. You then run more water over it to flush out any remaining sugar and that  second, less-sugary liquid is used to make a weaker beer.  Here’s  an old article by Randy Mosher on how to do it.

When I hit upon the idea of brewing Bailey a surprise birthday beer, I knew I couldn’t brew an entire batch in secret, but I could hide a small carboy of beer. So, part-gyling seemed the natural way forward.

I was definitely impressed by the results, and I think Bailey was too (well, he can’t say he doesn’t like his birthday present, can he?).   More excitingly though, it showed us that parti-gyling is pretty straightforward and allows you to experiment a lot more on brew day and make two very different beers with only a little extra effort.

Full details on how I made the beers can be found after the jump.

Categories
beer and food

Beer and Cheese #3

ssimperialstout

This is a fun way to spend an evening, although it can interfere with your sleep.  Using the same cheese line up as first time, we tried each against a couple of contrasting beers, namely Brooklyn’s East India Pale Ale, and Sam Smith’s Imperial Stout.

The goat’s cheese didn’t really work with either — it accentuated the bitterness (at the expense of the malt) in the pale ale and killed the roastiness of the imperial stout.  The cheap camembert didn’t make a dent in the imperial stout’s flavour but brought out a little sweetness in the Brooklyn.  However, the beer made the cheese taste like rubber.  We had hopes that the imperial stout would be a good match for the Roquefort and it did stand up to it, but again, lost some roasty flavour.  The Roquefort made the pale ale harsher and more bitter.  So – we’re still looking for a good match for this one.

The best match for both beers was actually the boring cheddar.  It made the East India Pale Ale more balanced (we’re fans of the beer but think the hops are a little too grassy and dominant) and it intensified the flavours of the imperial stout.

Categories
beer and food beer reviews

Pretend Mongolian beer better than expected

This is what Mongolia looks like (picture by XXX at Flickr, under Creative Commons).
This is what Mongolia looks like.

Baadog describes itself as a “Mongolian craft beer”, brewed under licence (in Ireland, apparently) for the for the Mongolian Barbeque chain of restaurants.  We weren’t expecting much — another slightly dull, fizzy “world lager”, perhaps, like British-brewed Asahi?

In fact, it’s pretty good and way exceeded our expectations. It’s almost brassy in colour, slightly cloudy and accented towards the malt.  Ratebeer has it classified as a Vienna-style lager.

Whatever the origins, it’s nice to see restauranteurs coming up with an interesting beer to go with their food rather than just sticking with wine, or filling their fridges with Becks, Stella and the appalling San Bloody Miguel.

We picked this up from Paul’s Wines on Orford Road in Walthamstow.

Picture by Tiarescott at Flickr, under Creative Commons.