The Principles of Beer and Food Matching

First, let’s have a round of applause for the wine guys – we have to admit they’ve done a really great job. The average American is fairly convinced that wine is the best beverage for food and that beer is best suited to washing down hot dogs and potato chips. Of course, we know better, but how much thought do we really give to matching our beer with our food? Pay a little bit of attention to matching up the flavors and aromas of your beer and your food, and you can turn an ordinary dinner into a memorable flavor experience. But how do we figure out what beer will match what dish?

Flavor Impact

First, match up the flavor impact of the food and the beer. We start with what I call impact, which is the strength of the beer’s impression on your palate. Belgian witbier, which is light and spritzy, would be an example of a “low-impact” beer, while imperial stout, which is roasty and powerful, would be a “high-impact beer”. To have a successful match, you’ll want to match the impact of the beer to the impact of the food. You don’t want a beer that’s going to overwhelm the food or vice versa. A very light-flavored beer isn’t going to stand up to barbecued ribs or do anything special for blazingly spicy fajitas. Conversely, a strong, dark beer might not be the best thing for a light salad or an egg-based brunch dish. The first thing you’re looking for is balance. For light dishes and salads, you want something brisk, with low bitterness and perhaps some nice fruit character. Beer can be very light without tasting like air. Wheat beers are a good example of this.

Flavor Hook

Once you have the balance, then set the flavor hook. The flavor hook is the part of the beer flavor that matches, harmonizes or accentuates the flavors in your food. When the flavors meet on your tongue, they “recognize” each other and this creates a harmony. Sometimes, rather than harmony, you’re setting up a pleasant contrast. This is the part that mass-market beer can’t do – it doesn’t have any flavor hooks. Here are a few examples of flavor hooks in action:

American Amber Lagers, British Pale Ales, Amber Ales: The flavor hook – caramel.

Caramelized flavors are important for many dishes. Anything that’s grilled, fried or roasted is prized for that flavor – it gives the dish depth and subtle sweetness. The matching beer uses caramelized malts to give caramel flavors that link up with the caramelized flavor in food. The caramelized malts also carry bready malt flavors. The right match will give you a perfect harmony. A grilled steak will taste better with a beer that has these flavors than it will with one that doesn’t. Bready malt flavors can latch onto the bread flavors in the crust of a pizza, while the caramel sweetness works with the sauce.

Brown Ales, Porters and Stouts: The flavor hook – roasted flavors.

In these beers, some of the malt has been roasted, giving flavors of coffee and chocolate, usually with some caramel behind it. Any dish that has a deep caramelization or char may match up nicely with these beers. Charbroiled steaks and burgers, blackened chicken and pork, grilled anything can work very well. When the beer is heavily roasted, as with strong stouts, it becomes the perfect match for dessert. Guinness is very dry and thin – it is not suited to dessert – but many American craft-brewed stouts are. They have big coffee and chocolate flavors and some sweetness as well. They taste like iced coffee, and it’s no surprise that they taste great with chocolate desserts. The match is often incredible – people are stunned when they try this for the first time. These beers can also be great with ice cream, cheesecake, fruit tarts and other desserts, where they offer a pleasant contrast rather than a harmony.

American Pale Ales and India Pale Ales: The flavor hook – hop flavors.

American hop flavors and aromas distinctive and spicy. These beer styles, often aromatized with Cascade, Centennial, Chinook and other varieties can deliver bright, zesty flavors of limes, lemongrass, grapefruit and pine needles. These aromatics match up perfectly with the very similar flavors and aromatics of cilantro and lime juice, and show a great affinity for many spices, including ginger and cumin. There is nothing better with spicy Mexican dishes. These beers also have enough bitterness to cut through beans and cheese, refreshing the palate.

Wheat Beers:  The flavor hook – fruit and spices, using contrast and harmony.

Wheat beers are light, highly carbonated, lightly bittered, bright, brisk and remarkably versatile. They are great with most Asian cuisines, which have bright, fresh flavors. Wheat beers sell very well in Chinese, Japanese, Thai and Vietnamese restaurants. They are also excellent with seafood. Many Japanese craft breweries that have opened in the past five or ten years produce Belgian or German-style wheat beer because they are perfect with sushi. Belgian witbier is particularly good with fish, but the spices and orangey fruit flavor provides flavor hooks for many cuisines. Both types are particularly fantastic with brunch dishes. The high carbonation busts through egg dishes and is very refreshing – better by far than a mimosa.

If you have a brewpub, get the chef involved. Remember that you can design the food to work better with the beer. A sprig of cilantro and a squeeze of lime will help a dish match up nicely with the citrusy hops in a pint of IPA. A touch or orange zest in the sauce for the fish will link up wonderfully with the orange peel in a witbier. Pan searing a roasted chicken to achieve a nice patch of char on the skin will accentuate the flavor match between the chicken and a pint of brown ale. The flavor hook can be developed from both the beer side and the food side.

Whether you’re a stand-alone brewery or a brewpub, the intersection of your beer with the customer’s culinary life is critically important. Everybody eats dinner every day, and as craft brewers we have to stake out our place at the table.

The weather’s getting pretty warm, so it’s time for one of my favorite beer and food matches.

Garrett Oliver is the brewmaster of The Brooklyn Brewery and the author of the award-winning book The Brewmaster’s Table: Discovering the Pleasures or Real Beer with Real Food, published by HarperCollins.