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I have a friend, a lawyer named Gary, who perpetually indulges in a habit that occasionally disturbs people who taste beer with us. It’s nothing terribly anti-social, or at least I don’t think so, but you’d be surprised at how taken aback, even shocked, some people are when they see him do it.
This is particularly true if any of the tasters at the table are wine pros rather than beer aficionados.
What Gary does is blend. Once the tasting has been concluded, he enjoys appropriating whatever remains in the bottles which have been left unfinished and combining them in inventive ways to produce a blended beer which, to be perfectly frank, is sometimes better than anything we’ve already sampled. And sometimes not.
(On one memorable occasion, a wine writer I had invited to a tasting remarked at the uproar that would surely result if anyone tried to do as Gary did at a wine event. Having attended more than a few wine tastings in my life, I had to agree with him, but also wondered aloud how much difference there really was between a winemaker blending, say, cabernet sauvignon and shiraz at the winery and us doing the same thing at the table, other than the timing of the mix.)
What Gary does is create beer cocktails, and it’s a concept I have wholeheartedly embraced over the past few years. In fact, I am so entranced by the notion of beers blended with other beers, spirits and even fruit juices that on the second printing of the beer menu at beerbistro, I incorporated a full page of proprietary beer cocktails. With the third printing I moved it to the front.
Imperial stout and port? Belgian-style white beer and orange juice?? Beer Sangria!?!? Depending upon your point of view, these are either concepts that stir your curiosity and whet your palate, or abominations of the brewing arts. Since I developed one of them, hit upon a perfect combination for another and became a late convert to the third, I obviously class myself in the former category.
It was not always thus. Back in the days following Miller’s take-over of the late, great Celis Brewing in Austin, Texas, the marketers at the then-flagging beer giant decided it would be a terrific idea to promote a drink they called the ‘Orange and White.’ The cocktail was, naturally, Celis White blended with orange juice, and it was advertised as much on the merits of its taste as on the happy coincidence that the Austin-based University of Texas Longhorns just happen to wear those same colours. At the time, I ridiculed the idea as a terrible thing to do to a great beer. Now I promote the exact same drink, except the white beer is Unibroue’s Blanche de Chambly rather than Celis White, which is now brewed by Michigan Brewing.
(Mind you, I should also add that promoting the drink, which I call a Mimosa Bianco, is not the same as drinking it. Although I do enjoy the taste of the blend, I much prefer the flavour of the Blanche on its own.)
Since that time, I’ve changed my position 180 degrees. Or, perhaps more accurately, about 160 degrees. I still pale at the mere thought of the peculiar British concoction known as lager and lime — sickly sweet lime cordial is a taste I’ve never enjoyed, even as a child naturally disposed towards all things sickly and sweet — and I steadfastly maintain that the mix of stout and Champagne is a waste of both, but I now endorse a host of variations on the cocktail theme. In fact, some of my most enjoyable days at beerbistro are those during which I play mad scientist with the draughts and bottles and develop the new seasonal selection of beer drinks.
Which is not to say that I arrive at the restaurant in the afternoon and simply start pouring one thing into another. In my view, the most important factor in the creation of a good beer cocktail is respect for the integrity of the beers involved, since I feel that to approach it any other way is to denigrate both brewer and beer. So, for example, if you want to create a cocktail using amaretto, you must begin with a beer that boasts a flavour profile that will easily adjust to the added sugar and almond flavour of the liqueur, such as the whole fruit raspberry beer, Amsterdam Framboise, I combine with Amaretto di Saronno to make an Almondberry.
The same is true of blending together beers. The success of the British classic Black & Tan is entirely dependent upon the compatibility of the two partner brews, traditionally a not-too-hoppy ale and a porter or stout, just as beerbistro’s Coffee and a Smoke works because of the flavour harmony found between the peated malt and coffee-accented porters used to create it. Add a spirit and that dynamic changes, but the underlying principle remains the same, as with the Bourbon Black and Tan we featured at the restaurant over the winter — a warming and fortifying blend of silken St. Ambroise Oatmeal Stout from Québec and malty Black Oak Nut Brown Ale from Ontario, given a boost by a shot of Kentucky bourbon from Maker’s Mark.
Without doubt the most daunting practice, however, is the blending of beer with wine. Or at least it is for me. When I first saw it mentioned on the Burgundian Babble Belt Internet beer discussion board (www.babblebelt.com) the idea of blending port and Imperial stout, I recoiled. “Beer and fortified wine?” I thought, “How can someone even suggest such a thing?!” Even as an experienced beer blender, I thought my limit had been reached.
But the notion wouldn’t leave my brain. Eventually, I realized that in my refusal to consider the idea, I was simply reinforcing the absurd idea that there is something special about wine, that it should somehow be viewed only within the context of its own rarefied, snob-spawned atmosphere. Beer and wine? Why the hell not!?
And so, when next I found myself hankering for a nightcap at the beerbistro bar, I asked the bartender to pour me a two ounce serving of Taylor Fladgate Late Bottle Vintage Port and top it with a full, 12-ounce bottle of Victory Brewing’s intense Storm King Imperial Stout. Within moments, this unusual elixir was placed in front of me.
I could smell the cocktail even without raising the glass off the bar — sweet, fruity, with more than a hint of alcohol. Lifting it to my nose, the aromas intensified, with “fruity” becoming rounded notes of plum and overripe grapes, and the sweetness releasing elements of chocolate, toasted brown sugar and well-sweetened espresso.
I knew that I had a winner well before I tasted this new invention, and one sip confirmed my instincts. It is a remarkable medley of tastes, this drink we call Any Port in a Storm, with absolutely every constituent flavour combining in near-perfect harmony towards a rich, warming, chocolaty-fruity whole.
It is also proof positive that the creation of beer cocktails knows no limits, nor should it. And that Gary was right all along.
Toronto-based beer writer and author Stephen Beaumont maintains a website at www.worldofbeer.com
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