Once you adopt some basic rules of thumb about flavor compatibility and intensity, you can start drilling down into which beer styles tend to work best with specific dishes—making a sensory experience greater than the sum of its parts.
Consider the possibilities of split-batch brewing—to get twice the variety without a lot more work.
For Sam Pecoraro, head brewer of Von Ebert Brewing, articulating the idea of a new beer—flavors, aromas, mouthfeel, appearance—is the first step in writing a new recipe. Whether they’re brewing lager or IPA, it all starts with the written idea.
This comforting recipe features a Craft Beer & Brewing Magazine® Beer of the Year (but you can sub in any bright, crisp, West Coast–style IPA or IPL).
Early hours, hearty food, and mountain views set this coffee/beer bar apart for students, locals, and visitors to Missoula.
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One of Vitamin Sea’s mainstays is Double Summer, a hazy-juicy double IPA powered by Cascade and Citra. It began as one of their first homebrew recipes; here’s a more recent iteration that you can use as your own launch point.
In Weymouth, Massachusetts, Vitamin Sea Brewing are tinkering with and launching trendy styles to flavorful new heights—and finding plenty of fans up for the ride.
Bitter, sweet, sour, salty, spicy, fatty, umami... Knowing which basic flavors are in your beer can help you match it with a food that has similar flavors—or with one that has contrasting flavors. Greg Engert explains.
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When the De Ranke brewery opened in 1994 as part of a new wave of Belgian microbreweries, its first beer was a beer inspired by Westmalle Tripel, Orval, and brewer Nino Bacelle’s love of hops.
On the industrial eastern edge of San Diego County, a group of self-described delinquents have embraced a bit of SoCal outlaw culture with Burning Beard Brewing. The secret sauce? Being authentic and embracing fun, while painstakingly improving everything.
One of Belgium’s most distinctive tripels leans in a more bitter, aromatic direction. Inspired by Orval as much as Westmalle, De Ranke Guldenberg is a contemporary classic. Here, Joe Stange speaks with cofounder Nino Bacelle about its origins and makings.
Still buying only what you need for that next batch? Josh Weikert makes the case for building a library of ingredients, where it’s not just about quality, it’s about quantity.
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Want to get messy with marshmallow? This hefty imperial stout recipe from White Elm Brewing in Lincoln, Nebraska, includes marshmallows in the kettle and coconut toasties in the fermentor.
We often drink beers out of context, not thinking about their stories, backgrounds, or what dishes might be best enjoyed with them. As Greg Engert explains, knowing that context and explaining it can increase our enjoyment when beer and food come together.
