Cooking with beer: Brewer's feast

by Tony Armstrong

Beer and wings. Beer and burgers. Beer and pretzels. Sure, beer goes with food, but it’s just as good in food.

What is it with cottagers and beer? Commercial breweries in Canada go back to the 18th century, so we probably had beer at the cottage long before running water. And the earliest settlers—resourceful little proto-cottagers, really—operated their own micro-microbreweries, taking an Ojibwa and Iroquois beverage of corn and maple sap and turning it into beer.

Beer is a fermented tea of water, grains, and hops. Grains, most often barley, are first malted (allowed to germinate and then quickly dried) to increase the sugar content. Brewers add yeast to convert these sugars to alcohol and carbon dioxide (those golden bubbles), and add the female flower cone of the hop plant to enhance the flavour. Ales, which the Egyptians and Mesopotamians drank at their cottages at least 5,000 years ago, use yeast that ferments the beer quickly. They are typically more flavourful, with a sweet and fruity taste. Lagers ferment slowly and at a cooler temperature, with a different yeast. The result is often a less floral-tasting, cleaner drink.

Even though it isn’t any good for dousing barbecue flare-ups, beer is very useful in the cottage kitchen. With some exceptions, beer can replace water, stock, or wine in many savoury recipes. I’ve had success with beer reductions—bitterness from the hops and sweetness from the malt add concentrated flavour to meats, sauces, and even desserts. Some craft beers with unusual flavourings, such as herbs, fruit, or even coffee, just beg to be played with in the kitchen. Experiment with dark ale, dry stout, porter, pilsner, or wheat beer, to name a few of the many varieties on the market. Just remember to buy two bottles of each: one for the pot and one for the glass.

The Recipes

Beer-Steamed Mussels
Sweet Pickle Barbecue Sauce
Ale-Braised Mushrooms
Maple Beer Bread
Beer Cheese Fondue
Beer-Battered Fish
Ale Potatoes
Beer-Butt Capon

Too much beer to cook or drink?

Consider saving it for next weekend: cottagelife.com/beerstorage.

Published in the May 2009 issue of Cottage Life magazine.

Copyright © 2009 by Cottage Life. All rights reserved. Reproduction of any article, photograph, or artwork, for other than personal use, in whole or in part, without the written permission of the publisher is strictly forbidden.