The Smart Girl's Guide to Beer

Beer: that's the yellow carbonated beverage your guy has stashed in the fridge, right? A yeasty, bland liquid to be drunk during televised sporting events and backyard barbecues. Sometimes you order a low-carb one in the bar when you're feeling too virtuous to have a white wine spritzer.

Well, be prepared to change your mind about beer. There is such a wide variety of beers available now, from imports to microbrews, that there is simply no good excuse to drink something tasteless and boring from a brown bottle ever again. We'll teach you how to tell the difference between different types of beer, and how to choose one you'll like, and also what kinds of beer go with different foods (yes, you can match beer to food just like you do with wine!)

Barley and Malt and Hops, Oh My!

Beer is a beverage made from fermented grains. Probably discovered accidentally, as most alcoholic drinks were long ago, by our ancestors as they discovered they left a tub of grapes or a barrel of apples or a crock of wheat forgotten in some corner and returned some days or weeks or even months later to discover an intoxicating brew made by Mother Nature and time (and fermentation).

Those happy accidents were probably followed by centuries of research and development, old school style, and now of course the manufacture of alcoholic drinks is a science, an art and a profitable business enterprise.

Because grains are relatively easy to grow and harvest, beer is an economical beverage to make. Its cost is relative to the ingredients used and the process involved. You can buy cheap beer that tastes great and expensive beer that tastes awful, because most people have diverging tastes when it comes to what they like in their drinks. The best way to discover your own tastes is to try a wide sampling of what's out there.

Do you like sweeter drinks? You'll like a beer with more malt in it (like an IPA, which stands for India Pale Ale, or a regular Ale—Bass Ale and Harpoon are good examples). These are sometimes called "amber" or "red" too. If you prefer a dry taste, more hops is for you, and you find this in a Pilsner or a Lager. This is the sort of "Budweiser" style of beer, but there are many more varieties available that are perhaps more exemplary examples, like Stella Artois. The sharp, crisp, slightly bitter taste is referred to as "hoppy." One English style is known as "Bitter" and an "ESB" is known as an "Extra Special Bitter" and is especially dry, hoppy and delicately-flavored. Lighter beers are refreshing, and wheat beers (made in Germany or Belgium, mostly) fall into this category. Summer ales like those made by various microbreweries (or small companies that manufacture beer in small batches) are often made to be served with a slice of lime or lemon. Mexican beer also fits this category and many of us have enjoyed a nice cold Corono or Dos Equis with a slice of lemon.

Darker beers are fuller-bodied and flavorful, often with complex flavors. These include Porter, Stout and Nut-Brown Ales. Samuel Adams in Massachusetts makes a number of specialty beers in this group, like Cream Stout, Honey Porter, and Scotch Ale, all of which are excellent. Saranac (from New York State) also makes a good selection and you can get a 12-pack sampler with their Black Forest, Black and Tan, Amber and others. Samuel Smith's from England makes a Taddy Porter, a Nut-Brown Aleand an Oatmeal Stout. The darker beers are usually on the bitter side, but some are sweetened with added special ingredients like molasses, chocolate, or fruit (or sometimes vegetables, like the Pumpkin Ales you see in the autumn). These can be quite filling, so where you might have 3 Lagers or Pilsners in an evening, you might only want 1 or 2 bottles of Stout. The alcohol content, however, is about the same.

If you go to a bar or restaurant that has a large microbrew selection, don't be shy about asking your server to describe them (the menu sometimes does this for you, too). If you go to an actual microbrewery (most of which have restaurants in them), the servers are trained to know how to help you choose something you'll like. Let them handle the terminology, because the strange names might make it hard to guess what something is like—if the "Red Devil Brew" sounds good, ask them, "what's it like?" If they say "rich and full-bodied," get more information because that's pretty standard. If they say "malty" it's on the sweeter side, "hoppy" means bitter and dry. Many beers are flavored with fruit—be sure to ask if the beer you want to order is made with real fruit, or with syrup. Fresh fruit makes all the difference. Microbrews tend to use real fruit, but fruit beers sold in the supermarket or package store are probably made with syrup. It's a sign of a sophisticated beer drinker if you say "no thanks" to a fruit beer made with syrup.

Beer and Food

Let's face it, some people don't like wine. And many aren't that interested in learning enough about it to be able to pair the perfect wine with the appropriate food. Wine has many subtleties and complexities in its flavors–but it may surprise you to know that beer does, too! Beer can be carefully selected to complement a meal, but one nice thing about it is that, while it is possible to select a wine that is all wrong for a chosen meal (an oaky chardonnay with pot roast, for example), beer is usually a much more flexible fit. The only rule is, that beer and wine do not mix well together. So if you decide to serve beer for a dinner, stick to beer the whole time. There are microbreweries that host elaborate dinners where they feature several beers, one with each course, like John Harvard's in Cambridge, Massachusetts. So you can feature more than one. Here are some ideas.

Beer goes well with strongly-flavored, hearty meals, like chili, soups and stews, beef dishes, and spicy cuisine like Mexican or Brazilian food. But you can also select beers that will complement most anything, just as you carefully select the different herbs and spices you season your dishes with. One simple rule is: bitter, hoppy beers for spicy or hot food, and mellow, malty beers for savory dishes. Say you're having a few friends over for a casual, hearty autumn meal. You're serving an appetizer of smoked salmon, with a main dish of beef brisket, roasted potatoes and fresh greens, followed by a cheese course (all the rage now, instead of dessert!)with fresh fruit. Start with a nice light, hoppy beer to pair with the salmon, like Stella Artois, or Harpoon IPA, or Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. With the main course, serve something a bit darker and heartier: a stout, like Guinness (available in pub draught cans which can be poured into glasses) or maybe one of the seasonal Octoberfest brews available in the fall. With the cheese and fruit course, you can select something unusual, like a fruit beer (Samuel Adams Cherry Wheat, or a pumpkin ale), or something mellow like Boddington's Ale, or Old Speckled Hen (these are English ales available in pub draught cans–these contain a little widget that makes them foam like they are being served with a tap–great innovation). You can also serve something stronger with this last course when you've all retired to comfy chairs, like single malt scotch or whisky, which pairs well with beer.

Here are some simple menu ideas with suggestions for beer accompaniment:

Turkey chili, fields greens salad, crusty bread and Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale.

Pot roast with potatoes and carrots, steamed brussels sprouts and Guinness Stout.

Baked flounder, asparagus with cheese sauce, and rice pilaf with Bass Ale.

Barbecued pork loin with fresh tomato, basil and mozzarella salad, with Magic Hat No. 9, or Samuel Adams Cream Stout.

Grilled steak with steamed broccoli, baked potatoes, and tossed salad with Samuel Smith's Taddy Porter.

Baked rosemary chicken, garlic mashed potatoes, and spinach salad with Old Speckled Hen.

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