2010/12/04

New Desert Beer

So I found an excellent pairing. I was assisting my restaurants chef in pairing some beers with an Xmas dinner. Originally I had decided to go with a belgian double ( heavy, sweet, dark beer). However since we were just doing a test dinner, and the beer in question is fairly expensive, I randomly grabbed Fullers London Porter out of the fridge. Its imported by one of my parent companies so I figured its use would please everyone.
We tried a number of food pairings for this dinner coming to these conclusions: First, Paulaner works fine with salmon with basil dressing, but not so good with salmon + spicy salsa. On the other hand hoppy beers, like a pale ale, or an amber with good bitterness work quite well. Second, Fullers ESB is a hefty beer. We tried it with turkey with stuffing and all that and it was just too much. When we substituted in London Pride, the result was much better.
Finally, London Porter is great with chocolate cakes/tarts/ chocolate. Puts wine to shame. Not even a contest. We tried the porter with a chocolate tart with a raspberry sauce ( real raspberries, watched chef blend them) Flavor ride. First you get luscious semi sweet chocolate, and all the little flavors that come with it. The raspberries follow it up with that tart, woody flavor that they have. Then you drink the beer. All of a sudden the chocolate flavors from the tart and the chocolate flavors in the beer come bursting back out. Weeee! But wait, whats this? Its a peety, burt, bitter finish which contrasts so well it real feels, filthy is the best way I can describe it. Afterwords I tried the beer with some other chocolate deserts with similar results. Its quite versatile and surprisingly robust. Try it for yourself and tell me Im wrong.

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