And last but certainly not least, the final Things We Love Summer Of Beer dinner hosted by Toro.
This is how all beer dinners should be hosted. This dinner was quite possibly the best beer dinner we have ever hosted. Toro not only brought it, but they have set a bar that all restaurants should strive to follow or achieve for any beer dinner being hosted.
Jen Fields, the GM and I got together and sorted out a plan to host the final Things We Love Dinner for the summer. We wanted to go big on this dinner. Price was not an object and the size was to be very limited. I am not going to lie, it was once of our more pricey beer dinners. But once you see what it entailed, it was well worth it. If you have never been into Toro before, it's a very quaint and small restaurant. They have two large high tops in the center of the restaurant and we put them together for a limited 20 person engagement. We wanted it to be exactly what the restaurant is, super casual and super chill with some of the best food in the city being served to you. Again following the mantra of Things We Love, we chose beers and ciders that the everyone in the restaurant agreed on, and Sous Chef Mike Smith, created a wonderful menu to compliment the choices.
In my evil mind, I wanted people to feel sorry for themselves if they missed this dinner. I wanted them to feel bad about not jumping all over this opportunity. Toro is not only one of the best restaurants in Boston, but they treated this beer dinner so well, you should feel sorry for yourself if you missed it. And let it be a warning to you to never miss a beer event at Toro ever again.
I don't want to spend too much time hyping this up. I want to get right into this recap and waste no time getting to the glorious food.
Welcoming:
Bud Light Lime Margarita with tequila, elderflower, grapefruit, and lime.
B.L.L tempura rock shrimp with lime salt, shrimp mayo, and charred jalapenos.
I don't need to get into the controversy that we stirred up by backing Toro's decision to use BLL in a swanky beer dinner. I already did that in way too much detail here. We did it to be cheeky on purpose. We did it because it was a pricey dinner and we were there to have fun.
Needless to say, this is was an awesome choice. The BLL margarita was delicious. The rock shrimp and shrimp mayo were wonderful with slightly spicy charred jalapenos, nice crisp but light batter and creamy mayo. It was on both plate and in drink, sweet and tangy flavors.
So much going on here. What we did for this course was highlight the comparison of a Belgian Geuze to this terrific Spanish cider Toro carries that drinks just like a sour ale or a geuze. We were really surprised at how much the cider was like a gueze and how terrific it was. We wanted beer geeks to know that something like this existed.
When Jen mentioned cheeses and charcuterie for this course, I immediately agreed knowing how acids and sour beers are perfect for cheeses and fatty meats. What I didn't know was that huge trays of meat and cheese would be coming out in bulk portions. Each one of the cheese and meat boards was served to every four people at the table family-style. We had agreed that family-style was the best way to serve this dinner. We have been big fans of this since the Journeyman dinner. But this was impressive.
Now, you will have to forgive me because I did not write down every cheese or bit or charcuterie. There was so much going on with both plates. But I encourage you to click on each picture and enlarge them to see the details on the boards. I was most impressed with the crab apple butter on the meat board. The little pink dollop in the center of the board. It was a well rounded condiment for all the meats. So fun to explore and try the different condiments.
This was our second go with a "Things We Love" concept at Hungry Mother. The idea of "Things We Love" is to not have such rigid guidelines for beer dinners anymore. No more themes, no more working with only one brewer, and no cheesy holiday schtick either.
It's about doing what we want do and featuring what we love at that moment. It allows us to encompass the best of a restaurant. In this case Hungry Mother. From the beers we love, to the food we love, and even a few cocktails.
This wasn't a dinner for lovers only. This was dinner for beer lovers, foodies, friends, and lovers alike. We wanted to host a dinner on Valentine's Day that wasn't your typical wine and fine dinning meal followed by ordinary sex, mediocre chocolates, and the obligatory red roses. No, our dinner was down and dirty, and about friends, beer, soul food, and awesomeness. If you were a couple at this dinner, I have no doubt you went back and had mind blowing, wake-the-neighbors kind of sex! Nothing ordinary about what we set out to accomplish with this dinner. That's how we roll.
I ran out of the house on my way to this dinner without my Nikon. These are iphone pics so please don't front about image quality.
Amuse Bouche: Vermont Cheddar Cheese Straws
Beer: Beer Cocktail: Vida Mezcal, grapefruit 'concentrate,' beer syrup, Miller High Life, salt.
These were small but tasty little snacks we were treated to as we sat down at out table. Awesomely rich cheddar cheese flavor and a High Life Beer cocktail. Ya betta ax somebody! You could imagine my great joy in seeing High Life 40's being poured from behind the bar to fill these glorious little beer cocktail treats. I loved it. It tasted great and worked really well the cheesy straws. A little snack but the exact right taste to the set the mood for the rest of the pairings to come.
First Course: Hoppin' John "Burger" with bacon, lemony mayo, b&b pickle, fingerling chips.
This was fun. A veggie burger with the consistency of a perfectly cooked medium rare burger. And it had bacon! I love sweet bread and butter pickles. This gave it the perfect hint of sweetness coupled with the malts from the beer. Some earthy flavors from the burger with the earthy micro greens and awesome little fingerling potato chips for a hit of salt. This was cool and fun. This beer was really good too and the perfect choice. When it comes to burgers you don't need to over think your beer. A good lager or a pale ale will suffice and this was perfectly malty and exactly what the earthy burger needed.
Second Course: Cornmeal fried Chesapeake Oyster with Virginia 'surryano' ham, pea tendrils, citrus-buttermilk vinaigrette.
Both of these were wonderful. Todd got the Oysters, but we ended up switching our courses midway through. I really liked the oysters course the best with My Antonia. That is a phenomenal beer from Dogfish Head. It's a beautiful Imperial Pilsner.
The oysters were big and plump and perfectly coated in cornmeal. The dry and crisp flavor of the beer helped balance the fatty creaminess of the oysters and buttermilk dressing. The citrus in the salad and the citrus flavors on the beer helped round out this course.
The duck course was rich and flavorful. Awesome cracklins' on the side for a play of textures. I did think maybe the hominy could have been a bit softer, but this course was rich and fatty and delicious. The beer was not my personal favorite, but how it paired with the course was dead on. It was funky, extremely bread-y, citrus, and peppery. A nice choice to help off set or cut though some of the rich fattiness of the duck. Nice big chunks of duck meat as well.
Third Course: Pineland Farms Boneless Beef Shortrib Steak with Maine shrimp, Tasso ham, and creamy grits.
Or
Barnegat Light Sea Scallops with crispy pork belly confit, escarole, red onion jam, lemon brown butter.
These scallops were unbelievable!!! So succulent and sweet with a gorgeous sweet and tangy sauce. My friend Paul and I, ordered the same thing and both of our faces lit up with the first bite. These scallops and that brown butter and onion jam were so good. The pork belly was perfectly cooked. That crispy top was fantastic and the pork belly was soft, rich, meaty, and fabulous. I thought I had died and gone to heaven with this course.
The Sculpin was great for this pairing. So many times with seafood, especially scallops, people think to pair lighter beers, less hops. Saisons and other boring repeated choices. The rich sweet scallops held their own and the pork belly was an added bonus.
The steak course was just as awesome. Perfectly cooked as you can see in the picture above. Creamy grits is a specialty of Hungry Mother. They do southern food so well. The richly spiced shrimp with IPA's are a no brainer, and of course steak and IPA's are great together too. The hops and the spiced shrimp really pulled it all together though. I only had a few bites so I didn't have enough time with this dish to fully evaluate it, but the few bites Todd slipped me were outstanding.
Dessert: Flourless Taza Chocolate Cake with sorghum marshmallow and peanut butter creme anglaise and spiced tuille.
Lawd have mercy! That chocolate cake with peanut butter sauce and oozing sorghum marshmallow cream was effing amazing! It was the exact right thing with that very robust porter. I am not a Taza chocolate fan at all, but twice now, Hungry Mother has not only made me enjoy their chocolate desserts, but they have slapped me in the face with their Taza desserts and made me love them. This porter is full-bodied, chocolatel-y roasted, and delicious. To make that chocolate stand out more, peanut butter creme anglaise completely made that porter show its full roasted quality and allow the chocolate notes to come full forward. Normally if you pair chocolate on chocolate one will over take the other and allow other characteristics to appear. In this case the chocolate cake did not interfere with the beers chocolate character thanks to the peanut butter. Amazingly rich, and fabulous dessert.
Sex on a plate! Fo real!
The cheese course was right up Todd's alley. I found the cheese to be a bit too funky, and the beer too funky and lemony for me. But once again, for someone like Todd, whom loves the funk, this was a spot on pairing. The beer was heavily lemony, sour, mildly carbonated, and a bit earthy underneath all that lemon. Citrus cutting though that creamy and funky cheese. This is one of those times where similar flavors paired together work well. Funk on funk is a good thing. Grassy, lemony, creamy, earthy, beer and cheese.
And a little parting treat with our check, handmade truffles.
The black truffles were a feature on the cheese plate, but it was also offered shaved on the main courses. They are Tennessee grown black truffles from friend of Hungry Mother's, Tom Michaels. First commercial scale black truffles grown in the US.
Something to take note of. I always, always offer a vegetarian menu for my beer dinners. The menus may not always be posted because to me the meat courses just really bring it home for people, but you can always attend my beers and find amazingly paired vegetarian courses.
Vegetarians were treated to:
First Course: HOPPIN’ JOHN ‘BURGER’ lemony mayo, b&b pickle, brioche bun, fingerling chips Cottrell Brewing Company ‘Old Yankee Ale’: american pale ale (5%), Pawcatuck, CT
Second Course: WILD MUSHROOM & HOMINY STEW delicata squash, vidalias, poached ‘flying dutchman’ egg Hill Farmstead Brewery ‘Arthur’: barrell aged saison (5%), Greensboro Bend, VT
Third Course: SMOKED MAINE TOFU ‘SCALLOPS’ A LA PLANCHA white sweet potatoes, escarole, lemon brown butter Ballast Point ‘Sculpin’: india pale ale (7%), San Diego, CA
The same desserts were offered.
This dinner was amazing. It really is Hungry Mother + BeerAdvocate = 4 eva!
They really now how to make comfort food elegant and flavorful and truly wonderful. They respect beer and really get it. Their waitstaff is friendly and patient. They consistently blow me away and prove time and time again that they are whats up in this town.
Todd's birthday dinner at a very special new place in Union Sq., Somerville called Journeyman. A new restaurant focusing on local and fresh daily offerings. This restaurant is tucked away in a small nook next to the Independent in Union Sq. A great spot for beers before or after dinner.
Journeyman is the project of a handful of food-loving friends who believe that fine dining should be a comfortable, intimate, and delicious experience. We’ve created a small, refined restaurant that serves elegant but unpretentious food and drink with relaxed and respectful service.
Our food comes from local farmers and artisans, often people we know and respect in our personal lives. We grow edible herbs and flowers in our window garden, and are working to become an active member of the Union Square Community by supporting as many local producers as we can, including some neighborhood favorites like Taza Chocolate and Pretty Things beer.
Our beverage program focuses on the strange and wonderful back alleys of production, featuring wines made in traditional ways in unusual areas, beers brewed with special care all over the world, and a wide selection of superb aperitifs and digestifs. We bring in our teas from Upton, and our coffees from Counter Culture, and the selection rotates regularly.
When I first heard about Journeyman, I met a guy name Seth Hill, their beverage buyer, who told us about this new place opening and it was going to be very small with maybe 35 seats and a menu that changes every day to every couple of days based on what is available and what was sourced locally from the area markets and surrounding farms. Cocktails, wines, and he assured us good beers too. Sounded right up our alley.
The restaurant is a very large open space from floor to ceiling but still small enough and intimate enough for a small restaurant with only around 35 seats. Open kitchen that kind of feels like a kitchen in someones apartment. Simple decorations and boxes of herbs next to the window. Great location.
We were most impressed with the pricing. You can do a 3 course, 5 course, and 7 course tasting in both meat or vegetarian for $39, $65, and $85. This is very reasonable for fine dining. Especially with locally sourced foods. You won't that anywhere with this kind of quality. Also, we were most impressed that they advertised on their website that not only do they pair the courses with wine but beer as well. Most places will accommodate you with beer, but never make mention of it unless you ask. Our fine dining in this city really appreciates beer and we as BeerAdvocates, couldn't be more thrilled. Our constant questions for restaurants are why would you feature the finest ingredients on your menu, the finest wines, the finest spirits, but only have a minimal and lame selection of beers?
Here is there beer list from Monday night.
Started off with a Bushnell Spritz, a cosmo with a sugar cube and bitters topped with champagne (Dope yo!) and Todd had a Pretty Things American Darling.
We opted for the 7 course tasting. Why not jump right in? It's new, the waitstaff was super friendly and fun, why not indeed?
First Course: Butternut squash puree.
Simple, elegant and very fresh. Not spiced to hell with nutmeg and allspice either. Just tasted like gorgeous warm squash. Look at that gorgeous orange color. So many times you see butternut squash soup and it's pale yellow and loaded with cream.
Obviously it didn't suck. This is what every plate we were served looked like when we were done.
House-made breads with butter served on a slate rock. Nice touch.
Second Course: Wilted spinach salad.
A sort of deconstructed salad with lots of veg and purees. I don't recall what everything on the plate was, but it was so tasty and delicious that believe me when I say I decimated this course. The colors once again really stand out and make for a lovely presentation.
Third Course: Celeriac Broth with Oysters and Chorizo.
THIS!!!! This course was so unexpected and so awesome. It was very simple yet the flavors were so unique and fantastic. Loved this course. Spicy chorizo which I believe is house-made with fresh and amazingly soft and delicate yet fatty oysters.
Fourth Course: Cod and onions.
Soft poached cod with leeks, spring onions, braised onions, pickled onions, and a ravioli with caramelized onions. This was another unexpected yet fantastic course. The cod was so deliciously soft and flavorful and the onions were perfect. Each adding their own unique tastes to the plate so that each bite was different.
Fifth Course: Charcuterie Plate and Pork Belly Raviolis.
A split in offerings for both Todd and I. Their menu was rotating in and out of things so we picked a few different choices here. Awesome rillette (center right) and lamb (bottom of pic) on the charcuterie plate. The real winner here though is the pork belly raviolis with (I think) a clementine reduction and onions. TO DIE FOR!!!!
Sixth Course: Foie Gras with persimmon and grapefruit foam.
Who does that? Who serves two huge slabs of Foie like that? Not that I am complaining mind you. Delicious, chilled, biting fresh grapefruit foam to help add acidity to the fatty foie. Rich and delicious just as you would expect. Just a bit too much for us though. We did the tackiest thing and asked if we could take it to go. No way I wanted to waste it, but after a few bites I could feel my heart slowing down.
Seventh Course: Lamb two ways.
Braised and grilled with butternut squash ribbons, eggplant, chickpea puree, fresh green chick peas, and roasted chick peas.
Middle Eastern inspired and simply presented. Loved this course. The lamb was delicate, soft and perfectly cooked. The chick peas added various textures to the plate and the squash ribbons added a hint of sweetness to the plate. Delicious and again simple.
Vino with dinner and Todd had Oerbier from De Dolle. Todd was a happy man to have that this foie and lamb course.
Intermezzo: Lime sorbet with coconut.
This course is a bit fuzzy for me forgive me. I was reaching food coma status at this point. It had limes and coconut but I can't remember what the foam on top was. That doesn't make it less tasty or mean that it's a forgettable course, it just means I was enjoying the shit out of myself.
Dessert: Semolina Cake
Whole grains and semolina cake with coffee foam, rice pudding, lemon sauce, and sorbet. Off the top of my head I forget what the bruleed sauce was. Might have been vanilla. Once again things we're getting a bit food coma fuzzy for me.
This was a very nice and clean dessert. Lot's of flavor pops that all seemed to work in harmony despite how contrasting they were in comparison to one and other. As the Official Chocolate Advocate, I am saying that not every fancy restaurant has to serve you a big rich chocolate dessert to feel like you were treated like absolute royalty on this culinary adventure.
They paired this course with an awesome sparkling pear cider. I haven't had a more aromatic, and fresh tasting cider before. I really dug this and will have to find out where to buy it. It was the exact right pairing for this dessert.
Treats: Lapsang Souchong Tea Custard with butter cookies and brownies.
Word is bomb!!! That tea custard was phenomenal! Normally that tea is too smoky for my liking but this was subtle tea and smoke flavors on a custard. It was awesome. I couldn't stop eating it. And a natural fit with the small brownie and cookie bites. Awesome ending.
Amazing meal. So well excecuted, extremely friendly staff, just an awesome time. I can't wait to go back and visit them. The prices were good, the restaurant is cute and intimate like being in someone's loft. Very inviting. The chefs, Diana Kudajarova and Tse Wei Lim are also interested and maybe doing a beer event. More on that soon!!!
Just wanted to post some fun food pics taken from my phone. Yeah, yeah. Some of these were taken with my old phone. Okay most of them were. But I have long since retired that phone. Bare with me as we go back into last summer with some of these pics.
Buttermilk fried chicken with mashed potatoes, sawmill pan gravy, and peas and corn. Look at those huge breasts in that first pic! Shit was banging yo!
Green Street: Fry of the day of Queso Fresco Taco and the Charcuterie of the day Pork Rillette.
I had a craving for something sweet. I had cake in mind but wasn't sure what kind of cake I should make. At the same time I had a friend blogging about a Peanut Butter and Jelly pie. Then another friend bragged about making a peanut butter cake. 1+2=3. Peanut Butter and Jelly Cake.
I wanted the cake to be super light and fluffy. I found a good recipe for Vanilla chiffon cake. First time making it and it came out very good. Albeit, loaded with technical errors.
2 1/4 cups cake flour 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar 1 tablespoon baking powder 1 teaspoon salt 3/4 cup cold water 1/2 cup canola oil 5 pieces raw eggs, separated (eggs at room temp.) 1 tablespoon vanilla extract 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1.1 Combine flour, 1 cup sugar, baking powder, and salt in a mixing bowl then mix well.
1.2 Pour-in the cold water, canola oil, egg yolks, and vanilla extract then whisk until the texture becomes smooth. Set aside.
1.3 Transfer the egg whites in a separate mixing bowl and combine cream of tartar.
1.4 Beat the egg white and cream of tartar mixture using an electric mixer (high speed) until texture becomes fluffy.
1.5 Beat-in the remaining 1/2 cup sugar a teaspoonful at a time and continue mixing until everything is properly distributed.
1.6 At this point, you should have two mixing bowls with different mixtures. Combine the egg white mixture with the egg yolk mixture gradually by folding the egg white mixture in the egg yolk mixture (start with 1/4 of the egg white mixture followed by another 1/4 until everything is fully combined).
1.7. Grease two 9-10″ round cake pan and pour-in the folded mixture equally.
1.8 Preheat oven to 325 degrees Fahrenheit and bake both cake pans for 33 minutes.
Make sure your egg whites are at room temp. for whipping. If they are too cold, they won't make stiff peaks.
My cake had a minor issue of not having the whites and cake batter being blended enough. As you can see upon closer inspection of the cake. The more yellow, the less mixed. I thought I had mixed it up well enough and I was trying not to over mix it. This in turn make the other half with less cake batter deflate a tiny bit once out of the oven and cooling. It was so minor that I flipped it over and made it my base. That did end up causing a slight imbalance in the cake which I didn't realize until later. After putting the top layer of the cake on it would slide a little bit. Should have used the bottom layer for the top layer.
My technical issues explained. Still for an unsightly cake chock full of mistakes, it was damn tasty.
I used a strawberry conserve for the filling, but I feel like a chunky strawberry jam would have been better. But feel free to use any jam filling you like with peanut butter.
In a large bowl, beat butter and peanut butter until light and fluffy. Slowly beat in 1/2 of the confectioner's sugar. Mix in 1/4 cup of the cream. Beat in the remaining confectioners' sugar. If necessary, add a little more cream or milk until the frosting reaches a good spreading consistency. Makes enough to frost one 2 layer 9 inch cake or one 9x13 inch cake.
Make sure the frosting is not too stiff or you won't be able to frost your cake. It needs to be very soft and spreadable so as not to pull up cake bits. And don't judge me on my cake frosting abilities. I already know I can't frost a cake for shit. Mostly I don't care if it looks like a gorgeous store bought cake or not. I care if tastes good or not.
And there you have it. A technical disaster of a cake, but fucking awesome in my belly!
I was sick and tired of beer dinners. Sick and tired of trying to come up with concepts for beer dinners. I had hosted a series of cool beer dinners in the past like the Aztec Beer Dinner, or Soul Food Brunch pairings, chocolate beer dinners, Russian beer dinners, even the now infamous Gallia Belgica.
All of those events were cool. No scratch that, they were amazing. But I now I am done with concepts or themes. I am done working with one sole brewer and only their line up of beers for beer dinners, and I am done with beer dinners that serve amazing food, but all anyone walks away with is, did they get enough of the geekiest beer being served that night.
I am through with coming up with beer dinners for beer geeks. A lot of them will never be satisfied and only want dinners that include full pours of Allagash Gargamel or something equally rare, they want the finest food to be served with it, and only want to pay $45 dollars max to be served like and eat like kings.
Sorry beer geeks, it's simply not about you anymore.
It's also not about the uber foodie either. I am frankly sick of them too. They don't have any idea about good craft beer (some of them anyway, not all of them), and they still turn their noses up at the idea that beer can be and is amazing with food.
Of course I am completely generalizing here, but you get the idea.
No Mas! No more creating dinners to suit other peoples needs. I wanted to create a series of dinners that highlight the things we love. From the restaurants, the chefs, the waitstaff, the style of food, and various beers. It may also include a wine versus beer tasting, a beer cocktail or spirit served with the meal, or even a beer battle itself!
The idea is to elevate the foodie to beer, and bring the beer geeks back down to reality with good solid beer and food offerings.
We had been discussing a possible beer dinner with Hungry Mother in Cambridge. A favorite restaurant who hadn't hosted a beer dinner before but was really contemplating the idea of working with us. I decided this was the right place to launch such an idea. Anyone who is local around here already knows Hungry Mother and how awesome they are. If you don't, drop whatever it is you are doing, shut your mouth, and go over there and have dinner immediately.
Their style is Appalachian-style southern food with local ingredients, and French techniques.
** When I say Appalachian, I mean App-il-lay-chin. The fine folks at HM will disagree with me until we are all blue in the face, but actually being from Virginia, and more the Appalachian Mountain chain extending way up into New England, I am right! Only in the deep corners of the south and the Blue Ridge Mountains do you call it "App-a-Latch-chan."
This is the kind of place that will serve you cheesy grits and bacon that will make your mama cry. They will serve it with a Hickory Dickel (Gingerale, George Dickel, a tiny hint of liquid smoke, and a bacon lardoon garnish. They will serve you a gorgeous country-style gnocchi with peas, mushrooms, and bacon, but serve you a Genesee Cream Ale with it. This is exactly our kind of place.
Together with Todd and Jason, myself, Alon and Rachel Munzer, Barry Maiden, John Kessen, and the various waitstaff and barkeeps, we created a fun menu to showcase the fun stuff Hungry Mother likes to create, and we all had a hand in picking our favorite beers for this menu. Beers that WE loved and it didn't have anything to do with whether they were super rare or super generic. It's all about what we love and what we wanted to share with our friends and patrons.
I want to highlight that at the very bottom of the menu listed all the things Hungry Mother loves.
Things We Love: BeerAdvocate, Deep Ellum, The Gallows, Carolina Chocolate Drops, East by Northeast, pizza, opera, Dylan & Mira, our lawyer, Jamison Farm, Tetris, Anson Mills, Eastern Standard, Muddy Pond sorghum, bourbon, hot dogs, Ridgeway Blue, rainbows and puppydogs, Kanye, days off, snood, golf, ukuleles, drinking, Strangeways Here We Come, (ex) data synapse, Joe-Joe's, Brazil, Hulu, bonfires on Wiborgs Beach, boo ya later.
We welcomed everyone to dinner with southern specialties of house made dilly beans, boiled peanuts, and homemade chips.
*Click to enlarge any image.
Great social foods to pick at and get introduced to your table. We sat a lot of people together in groups. The Dilly beans were spicy and tangy, the chips were crisp and addicting. I will take the word from everyone at the table that said the boiled peanuts were fantastic. They ate them all! I am a southerner who who doesn't care for boiled peanuts. I know, it's pure blasphemy. But it's a classic none the less and perfect for the table.
We also opened up with a beer cocktail of Campari, sorghum syrup, and Smuttynose Star Island single.
First course:
Miss Lewis' Tomato Aspic with Deviled Quail Egg and Bacon.
Beer: Pretty Things Beer & Ale Project American Darling, 7% abv
I think this was my favorite course. The aspic was soft and extremely flavorful with tomatoes. The deviled quails egg was cute and packed just the right amount of pop of creamy texture and flavor contrast for the beer. The bacon was just an awesome hint for the plate that tied every thing together. Really, who can deny a lovely piece of bacon? They should have had a piece of bacon on every course served for this dinner.
The beer was perfectly fresh, crisp, and delicious. Just a tad too hoppy for the aspic though. Not enough to clash, but while pilsners and lagers are excellent for tomatoes, the added hop bite of American darling, almost proved to be to much. But as a hop head, I never mind big hops.
HM always offers a pork plate of some sort. This was the perfect portion size for wonder flavors and two different variations of pork. Paired with the most classic beer for pork, Schlenkerla Marzen larger. Smoked beers are made for pork dishes. It's a simple pairing but packed full of flavor and proved during this dinner why we love it.
Third Course:
Catfish Caveach picholines, capers, poblanos.
Beer: Allagash White, 5.2% abv
Caveach is basically a method of pickling fish. It was fantastic catfish too. It had a lovely earthy rustic taste to it and the Allagash White really went perfectly with it. The tangy capers and vinegars tastes were smoothed out by the lovely and soft flavors of the wit bier. The soft texture and hearty flavors of the catfish were fantastic.
Fourth Course:
Shrimp and Grits with HM tasso, cornbread croutons, and rosemary.
Beer: Cape Ann Fishermans IPA, 5.5% abv
You can't have a real southern meal with out grits. HM always has a grit offering in some way. Shrimp and grits are a classic southern, soul food offering. These grits were slow cooked, creamy and deliciously buttery. The shrimp and sauce was extremely flavorful and worked well with the malty IPA. Malty and hops are good for rich sauces like this. I really didn't want this course to end.
Fifth Course:
Fried chicken picnic with "kohlslaw", compressed watermelon, and Texas Pete.
Beer: Narragansett vs. Genny Cream Ale
Yes! Yes, we did go there with fried chicken and cheap beer at a fancy beer dinner. Genny Cream Ale is a favorite of the HM staff, and Narragansett is a Todd favorite. We thought, why not battle them out and see which cheap beer is the favorite among crowd?
The best part of this was serving the chicken in paper baskets and the beer served in cans with paper cups on the tables. As soon as the beers were delivered, the cracking noises in sync around the room from the cans was amazing. It was super fun and had everyone engaged. I have never seen that many smiles for cheap beer in a long time. It goes to show you that there is a time and a lace for every beer. Only one person wasn't really thrilled with the cheap beer choices because he prefers Budweiser for his cheap beer of choice. I am a PBR girl myself, but I didn't let that stop me.
Before I announce the winner, lets talk about the food. Compressed watermelon? Yep vacuumed sealed so that all the juices compressed further into the melon. Sprinkled with salt to give it an awesome contrast to the insanely sweet and delicious melon. The "kohlslaw" was light and creamy and packed a delicate hit of flavors.
The fried chicken was perfectly southern. Juicy and that right bit of nearly burnt skin flavor. It tasted just like my mom's pan fried chicken and no one beats my mom's chicken! I was surprised to find out it was not pan fried. Close enough though. They deep fried it in a deep fryer but set the chicken high in the fryer like it was pan frying.
Winner: Narragansett!
But winner by a slim margin. The way it worked for me and a lot of people tended to agree was that the Genny Cream Ale was perfect right after the grits and worked extremely well with the "kohlslaw." But it was the 'Gansett that over took every thing by working perfectly with the watermelon and fried chicken.
Very fun course.
Sixth Course:
Pulled Jamison Lamb with hominy tortilla, corn and tomato chow chow.
Beer: Bear Republic Hop Rod Rye, 8% abv
Wonderfully tender lamb. Flavor explosion with the southwest-style flavors perfectly matched with the malty and bitter Hop Rod Rye. This was one of the best matched courses with the beer. Unfortunately this was also the course where we all realized that this we may have been in over our heads. We still had desserts and cheese coming!
Seventh Course:
Meadow Creek Grayson with green tomato and sour cherry jam, crystal malt, and house made beer bread.
Originally we had planned for the beer to be Cerise from Founders. The reason being is that that beer tastes exactly like cherry pie filling! Something so southern, and cherries were in perfect season. However, there was none available and I think it worked out for the better.
Cisco Cherry Woods was available. It too had a delicious cherry pie filling taste, but with a much more crisp and delightfully sour bite to it. Not too sour where it burns your throat going down. It was very enjoyable and delicious. I am not usually a fan of sour ales, but this is one I very much enjoyed and could drink more than one glass of.
The sour notes and carbonation cut right through the cow's milk cheese allowing for an excellent pairing.
The beer bread was homemade and soft and the sour cherry jam was actually pretty mild. I think most people were expecting more of a cherry pop to the jam, but it was soft and mild because of the green tomatoes. If if had been more sour, the beer and jam would have over powered the pairing. I really enjoyed the sweet little accent of the crystal malt sprinkled on the plate as well.
Eighth Course:
Chocolate cake, sorghum buttercream, Benne brittle.
Beer: Left Hand Milk Stout 5.2% abv
Yes!! Chocolate cake covered in chocolate. A sesame seed brittle on top and Left Hand Milk Stout served in coffee cups. I loved that detail. HM has such cool flare.
This cake was rich and balanced by a lovely sorghum buttercream filling. It was very reminiscent of a New England whoopie pie. Rich chocolate flavors, butter sesame brittle, and rich, bitter, chocolate-y beer.
When we realized we were in trouble with the lamb course, this surely sent us all over the edge. And we still had one more to go.
Taza is a local favorite of HM as it is with many local shops and restaurants. It's a natural fit for those shops and restaurants who keep it local and source ingredient from their area and local producers. I am personally not a huge fan of Taza Chocolate, but just for this once I didn't mind it. The cookies were soft, buttery, and had that perfect balance of salt by being topped with sea salt. Sweet and salty always works. The cookie dough covered up the flaws I normally find in Taza Chocolate.
The cocktail was a nice way to end the night. We were all so full and in full on food coma mode. The cocktail was soothing and settled our full bellies.
And there you have it. Hungry Mother's first beer dinner showcasing their favorite things with a combination of our favorite beers. From the details of the paper in the fired chicken course, to the mini mason jars filled with gorgeous tomato aspic, to the coffee cups filled with milk stout, they really knocked this one out of the park. For their first ever beer dinner, they really seemed to get it. Look for more events with BeerAdvocae and Hungry Mother in the future. I know I certainly can't wait to work with them again.
The idea that having a fun and a well received beer dinner without serving the most rare and geekiest of beers was made abundantly clear with the super fun fried chicken course. A successful event that proves we need to listen to ourselves more. Trust our own ideas and go with what we know works and what we love. It's up to you to come with us or not. As you can see, if you don't, you might be missing out on some really amazing food and some real good times.
(This is an older picture of the cake. Smoother bundt pan.)
I live for this cake and crave it on a regular basis. I make the best regular chocolate cake. Simple, no guffs about it super moist chocolate cake and chocolate frosting. But every once in a while I need a kick to the cake. I found this recipe ages ago. I don't even remember what I was looking for at the time I think it had to do with bourbon. It doesn't even matter now.
This recipe calls for bourbon two times. In the cake and in the glaze. I am all about it.
Mississippi Mud Cake With Bourbon Espresso Glaze Via Bon Appétit, July 1999
Ingredients:
Cake
2 cups all purpose flour 2 tsp. baking soda 1 tsp salt 1 cup unsalted butter, cut in to pieces 6 oz unsweetened chocolate or bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped 1/2 cup brewed espresso, or very strong coffee 1 1/2 cups sugar 1/2 cup bourbon (Buffalo Trace) 4 large eggs 2 tsp. vanilla extract
*Use a rounded bundt pan over the novelty pans. I used a novelty in this example of making the cake because it's all I had on hand, but I find that the smoother pan is better.
Mix flour, baking soda and salt in
medium bowl.
Combine butter, chocolate and brewed espresso in heavy
medium saucepan. Stir over low heat until chocolate and butter melt
(mixture may look curdled). Remove from heat. Add sugar and bourbon.
Whisk until sugar dissolves and mixture is smooth.
Using electric
mixer, beat eggs and vanilla in large bowl until blended. Gradually
beat in chocolate mixture. Add flour mixture and stir just until
blended.
Transfer batter to pan; smooth top.
Bake cake until tester
inserted near center comes out clean and cake begins to pull away from
sides of pan, about 45 minutes. Cool in pan on rack 15 minutes. Invert
cake onto rack; cool completely.
From the older images.
For glaze:
Stir butter, golden brown sugar and instant espresso powder in small
saucepan over medium heat until butter melts. Stir in cream. Simmer 1
minute. Remove from heat.
* I forgot to snap an image of the bourbon going in the glaze, but it is in there.
Gradually add powdered sugar, whisking until
smooth. Mix in bourbon. Cool slightly.
Place cake atop rack on baking
sheet. Slowly drizzle glaze over cake, allowing glaze to run down sides
of cake and cover as much of cake as possible. Spoon any glaze
drippings from baking sheet over cake. Let stand 30 minutes. (Can be
prepared 2 days ahead. Cover with cake dome. Let stand at room
temperature.)
* I do not drizzle the glaze on the cake over a rack. I did that one time and wound up wasting a ton of glaze. I do it right on my cake container and let the glaze drizzle where it may. Once you do that, you get nice little pile ups that you can spread on your cake slice when you cut into the cake. Not the prettiest thing you can do, but tastier.
I had a real bad hankering for yellow cake with chocolate frosting. So I looked around the net and found some good recipes. One was for basic yellow cake, but I didn't have any milk, so I substituted the milk with heavy cream. I had a lot of cream left over from when I recently made a batch of ice cream. Then I found an awesome recipe for hot fudge frosting. It's every bit as good as it sounds. Let's jump into this recipe shall we?
Side Note: Look at how manky my vanilla bottle looks? That was a huge bottle from Costco. It only cost $7 bucks and has lasted me forever, but it's messy to use.
The recipe for this cake comes courtesy of Allrecipes.com.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour one 9 x 13 inch pan.
Cream together shortening and sugar. Beat in eggs and vanilla.
In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Add to
creamed mixture alternately with milk. Mix well. Pour batter into
prepared pan.
Bake for 45 minutes, or until cake tests done. Cool.
Start by creaming the shorting and sugar together. Beat in the eggs and vanilla.
I didn't mix my powders in a separate bowl. The recipe calls for that, but with my mixer, I just put the ingredients in one at a time. Some recipes are a very explicit that you follow it step by step. I generally recommend that, but since it's simple cake it's not necessary.
Flour, baking soda, salt (no picture of the salt), and heavy cream.
I mixed in the flour one cup at a time and added some cream in to the mix in parts as well. Keeps it blended well through out.
How to properly grease your cake pans. I am using two 9' rounds. There is only one real way to grease your pans. Soft butter or shortening and flour. Though I am a fan of cooking sprays with flour added. I use those mostly for intricate bundt pans.
Use a paper towel and get a good wipe of the shortening. That's what I used in this case. Coat the pans really well making sure to coat the sides of the pan and into the creases of the pan.
Take a small handful of flour and toss it into the greased pan. Lightly tap the flour around the pan to make sure it coats all of the greased areas including the sides. You can do this over your sink or trash can. Dump out the excess flour.
Take half of the batter and spread it into one of the cake pans. The batter will be thick based on using heavy cream. This is okay.
Make sure you have even amounts in both pans. I use a scale to make sure the batter weights the same in each. If you don't have a scale, make sure you eyeball it as accurately as you can.
Bake for around 45 minutes. Make sure you do a clean knife test before pulling out of the oven to cool. Once the cake is done. let it cool for around 15 minutes in the pan, and then remove from pan and cool on a rack upside down. The cake will be heavy, do not over handle or it will break apart.
Cream together the butter or margarine with the shortening.
Sift the cocoa with the confectioners' sugar and add to the creamed
mixture. Mix together adding 1 tablespoon at a time of milk to keep
mixture smooth. Don't add more than 1/4 cup of milk.
Add the hot fudge topping and the vanilla extract. Blend until smooth and creamy.
I had to double this recipe. So what you will see in my pictures is exactly this recipe but doubled. I will explain later why I doubled this recipe.
Cream together the butter and shortening.
Sift powdered sugar and cocoa powders together. I have a marvelous hand sifter. I simply tossed the powdered sugar in and the cocoa together and sifted it out onto a plate.
Mix in half of the sugar mixture with half of the milk and mix for a few seconds. And then repeat with the remaining milk and sugar. Some of the pictures came out blurry but I am putting them up just in case. The last picture is what you want your mixture to look like. A very thick butter cream.
And last but not least, add the vanilla and hot fudge and whip this sucker on high speed. You should have a nice and smooth frosting.
On frosting a cake, I happen to be awful at frosting a cake. I get the job done, but it's never fancy or pretty. I will understand if you have a better method for frosting a cake.
Why I needed more frosting than the recipe called for. Sadly my oven was uneven. So when I baked my cakes, the one that sat on the top rack wasn't cooked all the way through. It passed the clean knife test, but when I came in to the kitchen to check on their cooling, it had collapsed in the pan. So I had to whip up more cake. I decided since I had one layer, and the recipe yields me two cakes, I would make a triple decker cake. It's a freaking monster cake.
Just to give you an idea of just how big this cake is. This is my portable cake carrier, but I use it for storage. These are kind of odd pictures but it shows you that the cake goes to the very top. Nearly too big for the damn thing.
And there you have it. Heavy Cream Yellow Cake with Hot Fudge Frosting.
My husband is Todd Alström, the co-founder and co-owner of BeerAdvocate.com. He celebrated his 40th birthday on Jan. 10. That is what inspired the London trip I have recently blogged about.
Thanks to the efforts of the head chef Brent D. Mimeault, and the owner and personal friend David Ciccolo, we successfully pulled off a wonderful party for Todd.
Todd had no idea because the party was after his birthday. We tricked him with a fake ploy of a forgotten wallet in a drunken moment to come back to the bar and pick it up. Low and behold, his friends lay in wait to completely catch him off guard.
It was inspired by two great friends. Kate Baker and Suzanne Schalow of Cambridge Commons. Kate recently celebrated her birthday with a huge surprise party thrown for her by Suzanne. When people had found out about Todd's big iconic 40th, they were disapointed that they were not able to share his birthday with him.
In talking to David, we decided the best course of action was to "Bring Belgium to Todd." Todd really wanted to go back to Belgium for his birthday, but sadly we were just not able to afford it this time around. London was signifcantly cheaper so we went there instead.
The Publick House being the most well known Belgian Beer Bar in the US at this point, was the ideal location.
This was the menu for Todd's party. I sadly did not take pictures of this glorious spread, but I thought the menu should displayed.
We also had two very delicious homemade cakes. A Ghiradelli chocolate pudding cake with white frosting, and a peanut-butter cake with milk chocolate frosting. These cakes were made by our good friend Honah Lee.
That is the milk chocolate and peanut-butter cake. "Old Balls" is my loving pet name for my "old" husband.
This is a massive post about all the things I have taken pictures of recently but didn't do a step by step preparation pictorial for. Basically it's just pictures of awesome things I have made and felt like sharing. Let's jump in shall we?
Click the images to enlarge.
Homemade Cinnamon Rolls with Cream Cheese Frosting.
Brownies. Regular and Puffy Applesauce Brownies.
Pizza. Peppers and Pepperoni, Cheese and Mushrooms.
Deep Dish.
My Famous Honey, Buttermilk White Loaf.
Truffles. Dark Souls: Espresso and Bittersweet chocolate truffles rolled in unsweetened cocoa powder. Ghetto Fabulous: Courvoisier, Semisweet chocolate, rolled in powdered sugar.
German Chocolate Cake.
Turkish Coffee Pudding With Khalua Whipped Cream.
Cookies. Pecan Sandies.
Chocolate Chip with dried cranberries and almond extract.
Sugar and Snickerdoodles.
Chocolate Chip and Pecan.
Spaghetti and Meat Sauce. And yes I make it so big I have to cook it in a wok.
Pies. Bourbon Apple
Sweet Potato Pie with Streusel topping and Caramel Drizzle.
Mississippi Mud Cake with Bourbon Espresso Glaze.
Pumpkin Pie with Toffee and Walnut topping.
Fig Jam and Mascarpone Cookies.
Double Layer 7 Layer Bars.
Okay this post is big enough now. I hope you enjoyed scrolling through some of my past baking and cooking experiences.
Recent Comments