Beer with Food - Served with a twist
An invitation from Camra gave Susan Nowak the opportunity to reinterpret some old pub stalwarts.
Beer and food is, of course, an extremely serious (if not sobering) matter and one we all support with gusto - but sometimes you have to lighten things up a bit. Anyway, that was my thinking when I put together a menu for the Campaign for Real Ale's (Camra) awards lunch at Whitbread's famous former brewery in the City. Following the sophistication and the touch of French je ne sais quoi, that was brought to the occasion by Michelin-starred chef Jean-Christophe Novelli 12 months earlier, I thought we would go "back to basics" and give diners a bit of a laugh at the same time.
So I had fun designing "Camra's pub-grub beer banquet" - a skit on all the clichéd bar dishes that adorn pub menus nationwide. If there was a slightly more serious message at an event attended by many brewers and licensees, it was to demonstrate that beer dishes with a bit of glitz can be created quite easily in a pub. The first course was that much maligned and boring starter commonly seen on menus as chef's pâté. That generally means an indifferent chicken liver spread whose only contact with the "chef" was when he took delivery from the supplier. My interpretation was a wild mushroom and mild terrine; a rich mix of edible fungi studded with baby carrots and generous splash of Moorhouse's delectable Black Cat, full of roasted fruit and liquorice flavours.
With golden loaves of beer bread, it went down a treat. The main course was simply flagged up as "steak and ale pudding". Not the usual beef in beer - I went for a combination of pheasant and venison marinated in Theakston's beautifully complex, full bodied Old Peculier, then steamed with chestnuts in a succulent suet-crust pastry. Just the sort of dish to warm pub diners in February.
The veggie alternative was actually a cider dish - a pudding packed with Mediterranean and root vegetables steamed in Dunkerton's Black Fox organic cider, served on a sweet red pepper and tomato sauce. Dessert was - what else? - Death by Chocolate. But in this case an intense dark chocolate pyramid (cunningly concocted by head chef Kevin Hayter in which was concealed a Turkish delight surprise), flavoured with Pitfield's Victorian recipe London Porter on a cherry beer sauce shot through with white chocolate.
None of the dishes were accompanied by the beer used in the cooking. Partners for each course were selected from the 2005 Great British Beer Festival winners, including supreme champion Crouch Vale Brewers Gold. The beer's citrus sharpness cutting across the gamey main course. I trust that all this helps with your New Year's resolution to make beer and food a winning combination in your pub in 2006.
