Taking a backseat

Actually, it's always the passenger seat for me, but what I’m getting at is a metaphorical backseat when it comes to cooking with beer. As much as I like experimenting with beer in the kitchen, what I really like is having someone else do the beer cookery. You know, someone who actually knows what they're doing. Recently I've been to a few of the places that do great things with beer and food, and I felt like sharing (and raving) about them. I guess this is a bit of a personal journey story for me too, as I revisit some of the places that inspired me to try my hand at cooking with beer.

Holgate Brewery – Woodend

It all started for me at the Keatings Hotel in Woodend, home of the Holgate Brewery. This as the first brewery that the husband and I visited and we both had epiphanies of different sorts. His was about the beer, or more accurate a beer, a beer called Big Reg - a Vienna lager, which was once bottled, but is now only a seasonal release (but will hopefully be bottled again!). My light bulb moment was more about the food. The menu is full of items that use the brewery’s own beers (and occasionally the by-products), and it goes way beyond the old standard of beer-battered fish.

Since that first time, we’ve tried to get back there to eat and drink whenever possible. It’s a bit of a drive, which does make the drinking part difficult for at least one person. However, we recently discovered it only takes an hour on the train and you can drink as much as you like, as long as you can stumble back to the train station.

Such is our love for this place and its warm pub atmosphere, fantastic brews and beery food, we decided to spend our first wedding anniversary there. Oh, did I not mention that you can actually stay there, right above the pub and brewery? You can’t beat that for convenience!

We had our anniversary dinner in the dining room, and I think all the dishes we ordered used beer in some way. We started with some beer bread to share, made with the wonderful Temptress Chocolate Porter. This is not the yeasty style bread (like the type I blogged about right at the start), but the quick and easy beer bread. It’s less elastic and more crumbly,  like a savory cake really. However it is still incredibly delicious, especially when served warm with the porter butter. On this occasion the bread had also been made using the spent grain from the day’s brew.

For my main, I chose from the specials board, as I could not go past a risotto made with squid ink and the Big Reg lager. The waitress made sure she warned me that it was black – I guess not everyone might realize that squid ink is really…inky. It came topped with basa goujons (that's food speak for 'fish bites' I think). The risotto itself was just right, with that little extra flavor that I find beer lends a dish, and the goujons were possibly the crispiest fish bites I have ever have. I swear you could have heard the crunch across the room.
The husband treated himself to the kangaroo marinated in ESB, which came on a tasty bed of salad. Now is confession time for me – it looked and smelled so good, I had to take a bite outta skippy. It would seem that after a few pints of Big Reg and ESB I am open to the concept of eating our national emblem. It was actually not as bloody as I expected – I found the flavor quite subtle although the texture was a little chewy.

As it was a special occasion, we both ordered desserts. Mine was the porter fruitcake, I think with crème anglaise (things are getting hazy by now), while the husband went with the chocolate beetroot cake with ganache. They were both decadent, without being too much. The perfect end to the meal.

Red Hill Brewery – Red Hill

The next chapter in my beer-food journey concerns Red Hill Brewery. Sitting about two hours out of Melbourne, with no public transport and limited accommodation options in the immediate area, it's almost impossible to get there without a designated driver. However, it’s well worth the journey for the food alone. It has more of a restaurant / café feeling, with a light airy bar area and a huge outdoor deck nestled among the trees. While I’ve had a multitude of fantastic meals there, there is one thing I always order without fail – the Welsh Rarebit.

This is a classic beer-food dish and on paper is not really that special – just fancy cheese on toast, right? Yeah, but the cheese, it has beer in it. Let me just make that clear for you….it’s CHEESE with BEER in it. There is more than beer – there’s mustard and paprika and leeks too. To top if off (or more accurately, bottom it off…but no one says that) they use fantastic local baked bread. This would have to be my ultimate comfort food. The cheese sauce is creamy and packed with tangy flavor and a little spicy bite. I think I raved about it so much on one visit that the lovely Karen Golding actually gave me the recipe. I have made it at home, but its not the same really. Maybe it’s something about sitting out on the big deck with a beer, relaxing with that feeling of ‘all is well in the world’.

The Local Taphouse – St Kilda

As far as both Holgate and Red Hill are, I think we have visited them both more than this iconic beer pub located in St Kilda. To get there either involves an hour on a tram, or someone willing to battle with traffic on Punt Road. It’s a shame though, because they put a lot of thought and beer into the food they serve. I only really discovered this when we attended an excellent Good Beer Week event there, and not only did every single course contain beer (and some amazing beers too), but they really bent over backwards to look after this non-red-meat eater (that was before the skippy incident, okay?). I was pretty blown away by it and was lucky enough to bend the ear of one of the owners. I discovered they are very passionate about beer food and educating their kitchen staff in the use of beer in cooking, and yet they don’t make an issue out of it.

A great example of their work is a dessert we were served at the most recent Barley’s Angels meeting. It was a stout panna cotta, with strawberries macerated in Framboise and a barley malt brittle. It was A-MAZ-ING. Every element was seriously good. I expected the panna cotta to have a heavy, bitter flavor to it, but there was no bitterness at all. The sweetness was off-set by the slight sourness of the strawberries…and the barley malt brittle? It was just plain good – crunchy caramelized sugar coated barley good.

There are a growing number of places who are using beer and by-products in their dishes now, popping up all over Australia. I can highly recommend all the places I’ve mentioned, but there are plenty of places still on my to do list as well. If you are into beer and food, you should definitely pay a visit to these or any of the other establishments who are exploring the uses of beer in the kitchen.

The Perfect Pair - Beer Pizza

Beer and pizza is a classic pairing, especially when having a quiet night in on the couch. Or when you’re hanging out with friends. Or…well, any occasion really. A good beer cuts through the tasty, oily, carby pizza and cleanses the palate of the strong flavours of garlic, tomato and cheese. They are such a great pairing, you can even put one into the other. Of course, I mean you can put beer into your pizza…not sure if it will work the other way around. You can try if you like.

I found the original basic recipe for pizza dough on Chris Badenoch's 'Cooking With Beer' blog and it's actually the recipe that started me on this whole cooking with beer journey. Don’t let that put you off because you think it might be difficult - I am no Masterchef. I’m proof that even the most amateur cook can make amazing pizza from scratch. So far this recipe has a 100% success rate – even when cooked on the BBQ.


The ‘BASE-ic’ ingredients…

300ml beer  - a good pale ale, malty amber or brown ale
7g dry yeast (one standard sachet)
500 g plain bread flour, plus some for working
A good pinch of sea salt and pepper (If you have small, girly fingers like me, use two pinches.)
3 tablespoons olive oil


How to make the magic happen…


This is quite similar to the beer bread recipe, as you are essentially making another kind of bread. So, just like in the beer bread recipe, you need to make sure the beer is warm and the yeast is awake and ready to get to work. You can do this by standing it in a bowl of warm water while you prepare the other ingredients.


If you have a mixer with dough hooks, you can use that. If you don’t, your hands will do the job just fine. So, in the bowl of your mixer, or just a large bowl, combine the flour, salt and pepper.

Once your beer has warmed up, you mix it with the dry yeast. Yes, there is already yeast in beer, but it needs a little help. Let’s call them…reinforcements. I find the best way is to tip the dry yeast into a mixing bowl or jug large enough to hold the full bottle of beer…plus a little more. When you pour the warmed beer in with the yeast, it might foam up a little, so you need a bit of space. Mix well, until the yeast has dissolved into the beer. It won’t look pretty, but that’s okay – it’s not for looking at.

Beer + yeast = not pretty.

If you are using a mixer, put it on the lowest speed and add the yeasty beer mix to the flour slowly. Follow this straight away with the olive oil. Once it starts to look combined, turn the mixer up to medium.

If you are using the hand method, make a well and pour the beer in with one hand while stirring it in with your other hand. Drizzle the olive oil over and continue to mix with your hand. Either way, the dough should end up smooth and elastic.

On a floured surface, tip the dough out and give it a gentle knead to make sure everything is well combined and work the gluten slightly. Form the dough into a ball and place into a greased bowl before covering with cling film and placing in a warm place to prove. If you’re not sure if your have a warm spot it can sit safely, try turning your oven on to the lowest temperature and placing the bowl inside. You need to leave it for one hour minimum. If you can, leave it for up to three hours.

Ready for proving

As soon as you take the bowl out of the oven (or wherever you put it to prove) turn your oven up as high as it will go. If you use pizza stones, make sure they are in there.

Your dough should have doubled in size by now. Knock it back, tip out onto your floured surface and knead gently. Divide it up depending on the number and size of pizzas you are making. (It should make four medium pizzas.)

...all proved and ready to knock back.

Roll the bases out to the size you want. You may need to dust them with flour to prevent sticking. If you are using pizza trays, transfer the bases onto them and top with whatever you like. The options are pretty much limitless – just try not to overload. The best pizzas have 3 -5 toppings. Put them in the oven once it has reached critical mass – it should only take 10-15 or so minutes until they are done (depending on how good your oven is. Mine is…not so good.)

Mix and match toppings

 

If you use pizza stones…please let me know the easiest way to transfer a topped pizza to the hot stone in the oven. I’m still experimenting with this and it’s still messy and difficult.

Enjoy your fresh pizza. It’s well worth making the effort if you have the time to prepare the dough. I swear you will think twice before heading to your local pizza shop next time.

Herb & garlic pizza.

BBQ baked pizzas - yum!

…and obviously, pair with a good craft beer. That goes without saying…but I’ll say it anyway.

Dough Re Mi - Basic Beer Bread

Let’s start at the very beginning…a very good place to start!

Bread is one of those basic items of food that are universal…the staff of life and all that. I recently learned that the production of bread and beer was intertwined in ancient Egypt. Early forms of beer may have been made using bread as an ingredient, so it seems fitting to reverse that and make bread from beer. I have to confess that I’ve never made non-beer bread before. I’d heard many-a-horror story about bread making attempts ending in brick-like loaves that would be better put to use as a building material or weapon. It kind of put me off – all that work for nothing? Crazy. However, after making some incredible pizza dough with beer as an ingredient, I decided to give beer bread a bash.

Turns out, it’s not actually that hard, and is not a lot of work either. It does take time though, so you do need to plan ahead. Also, it’s not like perfect bakery bread…it might be better!

What you need, if you want to knead…

500g of flour. That’s 450g for the bread and 50g for working, I always use bread-making flour for this, as it contains a higher percentage of gluten. Use white, wholemeal, multigrain, rye – whatever you fancy.

1 x 330ml bottle of beer – let’s start with a pale ale. Later you can experiment with darker beers or hoppier beers to see how it changes the end product.

1 teaspoon salt

1 sachet of dry yeast

There's a beer in there.

What to do, to make your dough…

Make sure your beer is warm. Definitely don’t use one straight out of the fridge. Even if you have one at room temperature, it could probably do with a little warming to wake the yeasties up…those lazy bastards! Much like me, they like to hibernate if it’s too cold. You can do this pretty easily by sitting the bottle in a jug or bowl of warm water for a few minutes.

Combine the flour, salt and yeast together in a large mixing bowl. Give it a quick stir to make sure everything is evenly distributed and make a well in the centre. Pour the beer in and begin mixing with your hand until it is well combined.

(Note: If you have a mixer with a dough hook, you can use this instead. It doesn’t make a whole lot of difference to the end product. Using a ‘hands on’ approach will give you a better feel for when the dough is ready for kneading, but is messy. Not everyone will be a fan of dough-fingers.) 

Once combined, tip your dough onto a floured surface and knead until it begins to feel smooth and elastic. If you’ve never kneaded before, what you trying to do is work the protein molecules and create the bonds that become gluten. So, begin by pushing the dough out in one direction with the heals of your hands. When it is stretched out, fold in half and then turn the dough 45 degrees anti-clockwise and repeat the action. Keep working it this way until it feels silky and elastic. (Elastic means when you stretch it out, it springs back...much like elastic.) It’s the gluten that creates the elasticity, so when the dough has this feeling, you know that the protein has bonded.

When you are happy with your kneaded dough, form it into a ball, place it in an oiled bowl, cover and place into a warm place to let rise for at least one hour. This is called proving. It gives time for the yeast to work and make the dough swell up, which makes the bread fluffy. It should double in size in this time. Once it has proved, punch down mixture the mixture, give a quick, gentle knead to redistribute the ‘air’ in it evenly. Put it back in the bowl, recover and put it back to bed.  Let rise again for at least 2 hours.

Wholemeal dough, ready to prove.

 

When you are ready to bake, pre-heat oven to 230C.

Form the dough into a rough loaf shape – depending on what your idea of a loaf shape is. I usually go with a kind of elongated oval…kind of like a football with a puncture. You could probably do a round loaf too. Or smaller loves. Or try something fancy (but if it doesn’t work, don’t blame me). Slash the top (you can do a few diagonal cuts, or one long on down the middle), and dust lightly with flour. Place in the oven. Also throw in a couple of ice cubes in an oven-proof dish, or spray the sides of the oven with water. Something about steam makes your crust…crustier.

White loaf, ready for the oven.

 

Bake for 25-30min or until the crust is golden brown.  The loaf should sound hollow when you knock on it. Let stand for at least 15 minutes before slicing.

A lot of non-beer drinkers would probably find it hard to come to terms with the thought of adding beer to bread, however a good quality craft pale ale (such as the Kooinda Pale Ale or Beechworth Pale Ale from Bridge Road Brewers) will add subtle hop flavours that won't overpower the overall taste, but add an extra dimension that is really quite tasty.

 

Once you feel happy with your product and confident in your bread-making skills, start experimenting. Use different beers. Add herbs, cheese, seeds, fruit or berries. Make different shapes, and smaller loaves or rolls. 

The finished product - wholemeal.

The finished product - white.