Grilled Garlic Beer Butter Lobster I needed a code word, a signal that it was too much. It was devised as a way to tell me that I needed to knock it down a few pegs. When I drink, I get a little less reserved and a little (a lot) more inappropriate. The people in… Read More
Grilled Stout Steak Sandwich with Charred Poblanos and Blue Cheese Sour Cream. My new favorite sandwich! Of all the things I love about this weird job I invented for myself, I have a favorite. A hands-down-favorite aspect of it all: the people. It sounds trite, saccharine, melodramatic, but it’s true. The people you meet in… Read More
Beer Cheese Burger with Onion Rings and Beer Pickled Jalapenos Don’t make this. I’m warning you. But here you are, still reading, contemplating making this. So let me tell you how this will go down. First, it’ll seem like a lot of steps, you’ll hesitate. Then you’ll realize that the jalapeños can be made weeks… Read More
Which slider recipes will come out on top: Crab Cake Sliders made with Kettle Brand Sea Salt and Vinegar Chips, paired with a pilsner, or Shrimp and Grits Sliders made with Kettle Brand Maple Bacon Chips paired with an IPA? I’m going to wager a bet that your weekend may be spent, in part, gathered around a… Read More
Three Cheese Jalapeno Skillet Beer Cheese Dip, made in a skillet, warm and bubbly I’ve hit a benchmark of sorts. A way of measuring if I’m actually becoming successful at this weird chosen profession that I, essentially, just made up. Money has never been much of a benchmark for me, other than in a “can… Read More
Easy Beer Cheese and Bacon Pull-apart Loaf I laughed so hard that it hurt. Coming back from the first night of brewery hopping, after a 7-hour drive up into the high desert of Oregon, I walked back to the hotel with my favorite travel companion laughing so hard I could hardly stand. Maybe the reason… Read More
Beer Doughnuts with IPA Lemon Curd Don’t invite me to dinner if you’re looking for a normal dinner conversation, it always gets weird. I brought my sister with me to a press dinner and we ended up telling the story of the time we accidentally killed a 300-pound pig. It was well after my parents moved… Read More
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
Grilled Street Corn with IPA Chipotle Cream + What’s The Deal With Gluten Free Beer? Beer’s main objective is to taste great. To gratify an urge, quell a thirst, satisfy the drinker with a balance of it’s necessary ingredients: water, hops, malt and yeast (and possibly a few not as necessary ingredients). But let’s say… Read More
Beer Cocktail: Raspberry Peach IPA Slushies This is how it starts, isn’t it? This is the siren sound that beckons to your non-beer friends, the ones who never even take a sip, the ones who opt for sparkling wine and drinks that end in -tini. It’s how we get you hooked. Because you can taste… 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
Strawberry Pineapple Pale Ale Cake with Whipped Cream Cheese Frosting This is the new beer-to-watch of 2016. Pineapples have been slowly sneaking their spiked heads into brew kettles for the past few years, closing the lead on grapefruit’s fruit-of-the-moment status. IPA’s are often the drug of choice for the pineapple craze, but the tentacles of… 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
Bacon and Beer Cheese Brussels Sprout Gratin I judged a beer competition last year with the primary assignment of the IPA category. A fantastic assignment under normal circumstances but this day, there were some logistical issues. Pound for pound I was the smallest judge and this was the biggest category, 35 beers in total, all… Read More
Beer Cocktail Recipe: Cucumber Basil IPA Cooler Citrus IPA’s will rule the summer of 2016, and with good reason. Ballast point, and their well-distributed Grapefruit Sculpin is often pointed to as the genesis of the grapefruit beer obsession when it fact it was more of a large scale manifestation of our growing love from the… 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
Sriracha Beer Mac N Cheese (15-minutes 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 an eerie but beautiful way that made it possible to shoot the macaroni I’d finish making by candlelight. It also… Read More