Buffalo Beer Cheese Bites + What is Wet Hop Beer This time of year there is an obsession among the beer crowd, an almost singular obsession that takes over. It’s not pumpkin ales, which seem to be more of an obligation brewers take on mid-summer to compete in an oversaturated fall market. It’ not even… Read More
I had a camera in my face and a man four-inches shorter than me asking questions he should know the answers to. This is mid-day TV, I suppose. This is a cooking segment on a Los Angeles NBC station. This is a person unable to let a millisecond of silence creep across your screen. Your… Read More
Beer Battered Cod Po’ Boy Sliders Island beer feels different. The patio is always full of people who don’t just know the beer, they know the story. They know the owners, the jobs they held before the lure of the frustration of brewing on a tiny system in the middle of an ocean pulled them… Read More
Beer Chili Party Dogs I had a brief 3-year stint as a vegetarian, a decision that made my cooking both better and impossible, but I ultimately wasn’t able to commit. Rules have never really been for me, and I’m an all-in, or all-out type of person. It started when my parents decided to move us all… Read More
I’ve made no secret of my love for grilling. Once the weather breaks and I’m able to do so without the threat of rain, grilling becomes my go-to cooking method. I’ve even moved my Char-Broil grill across three states because I wasn’t able to part with it. Four years and three moves later it still grills… Read More
Honey Stout Glazed Bacon Wrapped Asparagus Sometimes, I wonder how long it’ll last. I sat at dinner a few weeks ago, with someone who’s quickly become a great friend, and talked about the rough years we’ve had, similar in ways, and how we keep that hurtful past close to the vest. How those years help… Read More
Crispy Oven Baked Beer Battered Onion Rings Last year, on the east side of Portland, I came across a line of people wrapped around a small bar waiting to get inside. Of course, I went to investigate. I asked one of the guys in line what was going on, “Bell’s is here.” That’s all he… Read More
Grilled Beer and Brown Sugar Wings Food people mark the seasons in a different way. Sure, plant people mark it by what to plant when, and what to prune, what to seed. Fashion people pin the crap out of new wardrobes. The acting crowd doesn’t have weather seasons, they have “pilot season,” “award season,” “I… Read More
Grilled Garlic Beer Flatbread It’s stopped raining for two days. So, obviously, the grill needs to come to life. There is something beautifully primal about cooking over open flames, even if those open flames are produced by propane our ancestors didn’t have access to. The fire, smoke, heat much higher than your oven is able… Read More
Beer Brined Rotisserie Spiced Chicken Legs I spent a few years resenting chicken. Not chicken in general, beer can chicken. Mostly because when people found out that I cooked with beer for a living, that was the first recipe they thought of. “Like….beer can chicken?” Um, yeah. Or Beer Brined Duck with Stout Pomegranate Sauce… Read More
Buttermilk and Beer Beignets I have this detrimental habit of undercutting my price, or doing work for free, in exchange for a plane ticket and a hotel reservation. Last year I nearly committed to writing an entire menu just for the opportunity to go to Uganda for the weekend. The timing ended up being too… Read More
Porter Caramelized Onion and Brie Dip I have what people now refer to as a “creative brain” and what used to just be called “a behavior problem.” It’s done well over the years to lead me down some fascinating rabbit holes and land me in a job that makes me more grateful than I have… Read More
Southwest Beer Cheese Dip We talk a lot of pairing beer and food. About the sensory experiences of flavors, textures and ingredients that compliment each other. We’ve known since the accidental and unfortunate childhood pairing of toothpaste and orange juice that some flavors are a combative train wreck once they comingle in our mouth. We… Read More
Bacon Beer Cheese Stromboli, just 30 minutes to make the best football food ever. I’m sitting in my kitchen on a phone interview with a reporter from Bloomberg answering questions about the buyouts. You know the ones, the ABI, Miller-Coors, Constellation, Big Bad Macro Beer comin’ in and buying up OUR beer. The ones that… Read More
Porter Caramelized Onion, Roasted Tomato and Goat Cheese Bites Best Beer Trends of 2015 Grapefruit: Grapefruit became the new bacon in 2015 making its way into nearly all styles of beer from IPA’s to sours. The tart-sour-slightly-sweet ingredient pairs perfectly with hops making it no surprise that brewers became fascinated with the citrusy addition. I… Read More
Sriracha Beer Mac N Cheese (15-mintues Stove Top) These photos were taken at the beginning of a power outage that lasted two days. Luckily, the light from my window was filtering through breaking storm clouds in a eerie but beautiful way that made it possible to shoot the macaroni I’d finish making by candle light.… Read More
Stout Braised Pork and Black Bean Empanadas The first thing you notice about the owners of Bogota Beer Company is how much they care. About each other, about the people who work for them, about the brand and every detail of it. It conveys so strong, the minute they picked me up from an airport… Read More
Crispy Honey Porter Sticky Chicken Wings This was version 6 of this recipe. Usually, it doesn’t take me that long to get a recipe right. More often than not, I get it on the first try, maybe a few small tweeks, but this one took some trail and a lot of error. None of the… Read More