Beer and Fiction

I don’t just write about beer. I own two pencils: one for beer, one for fiction. I’ve worked on a couple of screenplays and I’ve just started a novel. Generally I write fiction in the morning before work and I write about food and beer in the evenings. What I’ve realised recently is that the two are not mutually exclusive.

When I write fiction I’m creating whole worlds: entire cities of characters; moods, tones, emotions; plot, drive, pace, desire; laughter, tears, sex, violence; places, colours, sounds, smells, temperatures; heroes, villains, lovers. And I do this all with the words that I order on the page.

A lot of my beer writing comes in the form of tasting notes. Sometimes I write these up for the blog, other times they stay in my notebook for my own reference and because I’m a beer geek. But writing tasting notes is not just an exercise in beer geekyness; it wakes up my creativity: when I smell and taste a beer I have to connect something real and physical with memories I have of flavours and experiences and then put words to them. And I think about potential food pairing too, matching flavours, ingredients, combinations, textures, temperatures, recipes.

Beer writing is me experiencing something tangible that is in front of me; fiction is created within me. Yet both beer and fiction have colours and flavours and textures and smells; both require me to think creatively to be able to describe what I experience – real world or story world; both describe the sensations of the senses; both need to be written well to be best understood; both have my own style. Both allow me to flex my bulging writing muscle.

(Please Note: I am not a washed up drunk wannabe screenwriter or novelist who uses the title of ‘Beer Writer’ to excuse myself, and I never write when I’ve had more than one beer – that’s a slippery downward slope! It is perhaps worth noting that some of the greatest writers of all time have been tremendous drunks: Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Truman Capote, William Faulkner…)

Bitterness

“Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.” Martin Luther King.

I’ve found myself more and more drawn towards getting a huge smack of bitterness in my beer drinking. The hop is an addictive little chap, calling me back for more and more. But when I was drinking a particularly gorgeous but aggressive American IPA last week it got me thinking…

The beer was Ruination IPA from Stone Brewing Company in San Diego. It’s incredible. The bottle announces it as ‘A liquid poem to the glory of the hop’; it’s more of an anthem. It scores over 100 in the International Bittering Units scale and that’s a lot (lager scores 5-15, a ‘standard’ IPA around 50).

It pours a sexy bronze colour with a large lacing head; it’s a great looking beer. The aroma is huge with fresh oranges, grapefruit, pineapple and pine - the nose is intoxicating on its own. Sweet malt hits the tongue first and this is bready and full of caramel, but it’s soon overtaken by the massive hops: oranges and grapefruit; juice, flesh and pith; a long, clingy-bitter, dry, zingy, zesty finish. It’s just so drinkable, gluggable, well balanced. An awesome beer, but certainly not for those who are aren’t hop-lovers; it’ll blow your socks off!

All that bitterness got my brain going. Now I’m certainly no scientist, but here’s my basic understanding, with a beer slant put on it.

As kids we hate that bitter twang at the back of our mouths, but we love sweetness. As our palates develop we acquire the taste for bitter flavours, such as citrus, coffee and dark chocolate. It is innately within us to avoid bitter tastes. To our distant ancestors bitterness (usually when tasted from a plant) was bad and it signaled the possibility of poison; if it tasted bitter we avoided it incase it harmed us.

So what happens when we drink an aggressively bitter beer? Our bodies innate response would be to throw out warning alarms to let us know of potential danger. The chemical mechanisms would say: ‘Watch out, that could be poisonous!’ and then the brain and body need to make a life-critical decision about whether it’s safe to continue or not. The trouble is that underneath the bitterness is a whole load of sweetness, and sweetness = good. So there’s even more chemicals and decisions flying around: it’s good/bad, life/death.

We take another sip to be sure. We experience it like this: sweet first on the tip of our tongue, brief but powerful, but then as the beer moves over the tongue it hits the bitter-taste receptors right at the back of the mouth and down the throat. The bitter area dominates that part of our palate (it’s the last thing we taste before we swallow) and so the bitterness stays around for the longest, especially in a strongly hopped beer.

Now, whatever it decides, the body is flooded with chemicals simultaneously. It gets a ‘Go’ signal from the sweetness, but a ‘Stop’ from the bitterness. On top of this, sweetness actually dramatises the sensation of bitterness. So a beer that has a high ABV will generally have a depth of sweetness which then impacts upon the sensation of the bitterness. Here’s what your brain might be deciphering: ‘If this is bitter - which it most certainly is - then it could be poison. Maybe I’ll take another sip to be sure. Wait a minute! It’s sweet too… and it tastes so good, so how can anything bad be so delicious?’ Again there is a flood of chemicals, a mass of decision making.

Yet we know that it’s alright. We bought it from the store. It’s made to be enjoyed. It’s just the body isn’t fine-tuned to think that way.

As I see it, we have a delicious beer which is intoxicating, strong, sweetly malt but bitterly hopped. It tastes mighty fine but the chemical mechanisms still aren’t convinced, they’re still on alert. So your brain is caught in between two ways of thinking: fight or flight (fight means drink and enjoy!). This double-trouble, dual thinking can surely only be a good thing for our enjoyment of the beer. We’re on high alert over the flavour, but we’re also alertly enjoying it because it is so full of flavour. The life-critical decision is to fight it, to drink that highly-hopped masterpiece and to enjoy every last sip, even if your brain is still having niggling doubts. It also gives us a burst of adrenaline and everyone loves a bit of that.

Drinking an exceptionally bitter IPA is like being on a roller-coaster: you love it, but your body is in a state of heightened arousal, worried for your death, which then increases your enjoyment even more, in a masochistic kind-of way. Maybe I love the smack of puckering bitterness, maybe I’m addicted to the thrill of it.

BrewDog’s IPA Adventure

The awesome guys at BrewDog are at it again, this time they’re going back to the origins of the IPA.

They’ve found a 200-year-old IPA recipe made with English malts and English hops, which they’ve brewed, placed in big oak casks and sent it to sea along with James, BrewDog’s Managing Director (it should be in safe hands as it’s his dad’s trawler - the one in the picture - and James himself used to be a captain!). When it returns it’ll be further conditioned in Champagne bottles and sold to celebrate their 2nd birthday.

IPAs are big business now and the style has developed massively from its simple origins (brewed strong and hopped heavily to survive the long sea journey from England to India). There are loads of IPAs being brewed in England and around the world, but they can hardly be associated with the beer that would’ve been tasted 200 years ago. IPA is now the name for a beer which is around 5-6% ABV; full of biscuity, caramel malts; has a load of tropical fruit flavours and a big hit of crisp hop bitterness at the end. The American C-hops have seen the style develop even further - first over there and now over here - with their zingy citrus flavours, pine and grapefruit. And these new style IPAs have been vamped-up into double and imperial monsters, testing the limits of bitterness and strength.

This BrewDog beer will be a huge rewind in the tradition of the style: it’ll be an Old IPA, the first that we’ll be able to taste as modern beer drinkers. It’s certainly a beer with a big story!

BrewDog are charting the adventure on their blog and the first update went on today (the original announcement is here). Keep following the blog, it’s a great one; funny, witty, intelligent and the videos are great!

And if you like this… Pete Brown did a similar thing last year when he recreated the original journey of an IPA and took a cask brewed in Burton-on-Trent, England, to Calcutta, India via sea. He’s writing the book about it now, which I can’t wait to read. He also has a tremendous blog that you should be reading (he's got all about his journey on there).

A Curious Brew

Kent has long been known for its beer, with the pointing white tops of the oast houses popping up throughout the countryside. It’s probably hops which Kent is most known for beer-wise. It was there, in the 15th century, when hops landed in Britain from Europe. They weren’t taken to kindly to begin, but growth soon spread and fast-forward over 500 years and the county is still growing them now. With the abundance of hops it’s no surprise that many breweries operate in Kent, ranging from the grandaddy of English brewing, Shepherd Naeme, down to the idyllic Swan on the Green brewpub in West Peckham, with other notable examples being Westerham, Hopdaemon and Ramsgate.

All this beer is a wonderful thing (and I say this as a born and bred Man of Kent) but recently the grapes of the county have been receiving their own recognition, particularly Chapel Down Winery, near Tenterden, which is rapidly gaining an excellent reputation, especially for their sparkling wine. I visited the winery (a very handsome place indeed) because I was told something pretty exciting about them… they brew their own beers too!

Chapel Down is the name of the winery; the beers are made under the name of Curious Brew. They have three beers so far - Cobb IPA, Admiral Porter and Brut – served in 330ml bottles. Their design is the first thing that points you towards their wine heritage, with a simple logo and a blurb of wine-like information on the back; it’s cool, classy. All three of the beers are truly excellent examples of their style, brewed exceptionally well.

Brut 5%
Lager fermented with French sparkling wine yeast and hopped with Saaz and Cascades. A pale amber colour with plenty of bubbles. Simple aroma with some apple and grain. It’s rich and full flavoured, creamy and incredibly light with a tickle of fizz. There’s loads of caramel and biscuit from the malt, then a crisp finish with apple fruitiness. It’s a fantastic lager, one of the best I’ve had in a long time.

Cobb IPA 5.6%
Brewed with rare Kent Cobbs and hopped at 4 different stages, it’s a light amber colour with a nose of tropical and citrus fruits. It’s a classic IPA in taste: creamy toffee malt underneath a big hop finish. There’s loads more tropical fruit inside with some papaya and melon. The sweetness is gorgeous and it’s all so well balanced. Fresh and refreshing.

Admiral Porter 5%
Matured in oak and unpasteurised. Black with a creamy head. Dark chocolate, smoke, wood and berries in the nose – a great aroma. It’s bitter from the roasted malts with coffee and dark chocolate, more smokiness, a berry sharpness and an underlying woody sweetness. Roasty and toasty, light and easy drinking: as porter’s go, this is a beauty.

The beers are also very food-friendly, in fact whatever flavours you can’t find in the Chapel Down wines you’ll be able to get out of these beers. Have the Brut where you would choose champagne – it’s perfect pre-meal or with a light fish starter. The Cobb IPA (with its underlying caramel sweetness – wait, you mean wine can’t achieve a caramel flavour?!) with more robust chicken or fish dinners, or when you would otherwise choose a light, zingy-fresh white – the inherent sweetness works perfectly with spice or Asian foods. And have the porter (which has roasted flavours… hold on, wine can’t do roasted either?!) with roast or barbeque meats or even a light chocolate dessert or post-meal instead of a port.

If you go down for some wine then be sure to pick up some beer too. You will hopefully be surprised by just how good they are – especially if you try them with your dinner.

Bye 2008 and Hi 2009!

I’ve had a good beer-year. I’ve drunk a lot of great stuff, I’ve learnt a lot about beer, my tastes have developed and my palate has matured and all of it has left me thirsty for more.

The best thing about beer is the memories which it helps to create. I can remember the worst beers I’ve drunk as fondly as the best; I remember days out specifically by the beers I tasted; I remember particular nights in the pub with friends where the beer was gulped between laughter and conversation; I remember being massively undercharged for a very expensive double IPA at the Pig’s Ear Beer Festival and it being beautiful; I remember the pork scratchings at the Great British Beer Festival; I remember finding two Greek craft beers on a tiny Ionian island; I remember ordering a beer and diet coke on holiday and receiving them together, in the same glass; I remember heated discussions about beer with beer lovers, excited ramblings, and lectures directed at my lager-loving chums; I remember all the times that I’ve told my girlfriend just how good my current beer is (and I remember how she always listens and how she always remembers what I say). I've also forgotton quite a lot of stuff too...

This isn’t a ‘Best Of’ kind of list; it’s a compilation of those beers which have stuck in my mind because they have been the most enjoyable and memorable throughout 2008.

Anything IPA from BrewDog. Punk IPA is the best IPA currently being brewed in Britain. And one of the best bottled beers available in the supermarket. Massive American C-hops and as juicy as a tropical fruit salad with a big backbone of maltiness. And Chaos Theory - a prototype beer that’s going into production for 2009 - an aggressive copper-coloured IPA with a sweet tropical fruit nose, a load of toffee and caramel malt and then a tidal wave of tangy hops to finish, with pineapple and grapefruit dominating. It’s so good because it’s so addictively moreish.

Anything black from BrewDog. The collaboration with Danish Beerhouse for their Coffee Imperial Stout is a brilliant beer: thick and creamy, rich and strong. Sweetly oaky flavours, some berry sweetness, loads of coffee and dark chocolate, smoke and leather and a hint of zesty citrus to finish. It made my day when I cracked open the first bottle of this. RipTide was the best ‘standard’ stout I drank all year (by standard I mean a stout that isn’t imperial, barrel-aged or which doesn’t have anything else in it, e.g. coffee). It’s liquid velvet – the beer equivalent of a big Californian Zinfandel. Then there’s Tokyo which is a glorious beast. And how could I leave out the Paradox beers. The Imperial Stout base is so drinkable, but when added to different whisky casks it grows into something altogether new and exciting.

Cains' Fine Raisin Beer. In the bottle this is a really good beer, malty and sweet and very easy drinking, but it qualifies for this list because of the Great British Beer Festival where it was on tap. It was the most memorable beer of the day, so easy drinking, clean and delicious.

Curious Brew’s Brut. Lager fermented with sparkling wine yeast and made at Chapel Down winery in Kent. It’s a pale amber with champagne-style bubbles; light but full flavoured; biscuity, creamy and clean; an apple sweetness comes through and the hop finish is crisp and smooth.

Badger’s Poacher’s Choice. This beer wasn’t one of the best that I’ve had this year, but it’s on the list because it made me smile from first sniff to last sip. It’s a moreishly fruity beer, giggle-inducing, full of creamy berry sweetness which was like blackberry crumble and blackcurrant chewy sweets. Intriguing and fun.

Stone’s Ruination IPA. A monstrous hop explosion and probably the freshest, juiciest tasting beer I’ve ever had. A mouthful of oranges and grapefruit and a brutal slap of bitterness.

Robinson's Chocolate Old Tom. A crazy-tasting beer rammed full of sweet milk chocolate. I had this after the Pig’s Ear Beer Festival and it was all I could taste the next day!

Fuller’s London Pride. Always will be on the list. My go-to beer and the beer I opened to celebrate finishing my Master’s (at 2.30 in the morning while I was watching baseball). Golden Pride out of the cask at the Jugged Hare was pretty special too.

And the ‘most interesting beer’…

BrewDog’s Storm. An 8% IPA aged in Islay whisky cask. The aroma was a punch of smoke, medicinal and harsh, although I thought I could detect the faintest suggestion of tropical fruit in there, as well as some oak. It’s a mindfuck. Insane. It’s so smoky and peaty from the barrel, then there’s a big hit of tangy hops and a long, earthy, woody, dusty, smoky finish. It’s intriguing in the same way as a car crash in that you can’t stop looking and going back for more. And it’s somehow moreish. I still haven’t really decided if I like it or not. The best thing about it is the way it makes me think and how it challenges what I thought I knew about beer, giving me flavours that I’ve never before experienced in a beer. I’ve got another bottle in the cupboard which I’ll try again soon.

While I’m at it here’s another category.

Best beer books…

To write stuff you need to read stuff. Looking up at my shelf I thought I’d give a nod to the books which have impressed me most this year.

First is Ben McFarland and Tom Sandham’s Good Beer Guide West Coast USA. This is like beer porn to my young eyes. I read about these glorious delights that await me but I cannot yet get to them – I become a beer voyeur; watching, waiting, reading, fantasizing. New Years Resolution – to save really really hard to be able to afford a trip myself.

Next are two older books, but ones which I have only read this year. These are Michael Jackson’s Beer Companion and Garrett Oliver’s The Brewmaster’s Table. Michael Jackson is simply the greatest beer writer ever (who sadly died in 2008). He can express his thoughts on beer in the most succinct and fabulous way, in a style which leaves me feeling awe at how he manages to place one word after another to create such perfect sentences. And Garrett Oliver, which I’ll admit that I’ve only read a few chapters of so far, but as soon as I started on the introduction I could feel myself easing into his big open arms with his fantastically simple, warm and effective prose and evocative writing skill – it’s a big old book and one I can’t wait to get totally lost in.

Bring on 2009 and all the beer it has to offer me.

Christmas Leftovers

Christmas Day is my favourite day of the year and Christmas dinner is my favourite meal of the year. My best food-day of the year is Boxing Day, when the piles of leftovers (which we were sickened to look at the day before) become glorious mountains of unlimited joy.

King is the Christmas Leftover Sandwich (I capitilise it because it deserves it). It needs bread, thick slices of turkey, stuffing, a sausage wrapped in bacon, a potato if you have any left and then something sweet and lubricating like a good chutney. That is food perfection. So far I’ve had five of these.

The leftover hash comes second on the hierarchy in my opinion: squishing all the uneaten veg together and then frying it until it’s crispy on the outside. What a delight.

This year I made main and dessert from leftovers.

Christmas Risotto (aka Turkey, Stilton and Cranberry Risotto)

There is always always always turkey and stilton in the fridge in the days after Christmas. This is a good thing. The addition of cranberries is for a festive sweetness which perfectly eases through the richness of the cheese and rice.

This serves 2

• Chicken or vegetable stock – 1 pint, maybe a little more
• 1 large white onion, finely chopped
• 1 clove of garlic, finely chopped
• Arborio rice – 150-175g, more if you’re ravishingly hungry
• White wine – a splosh if you have it, it isn’t essential
• Turkey – cooked and chopped/torn into small pieces
• Stilton, or any blue cheese – 100g, or so
• Dried cranberries – a handful, chopped
• Peas – a handful per person
• Butter and olive oil – a knob and a drizzle
• Sage and/or rosemary leaves, finely chopped (no woody stalk)
• Sea salt and black pepper

In a deep pan, sweat the onion and garlic in butter and oil until soft, then add the sage and/or rosemary leaves and stir through for a minute. Add the rice and coat in the sweet buttery-oil juices.

In another pan you will want your stock slowly warming. Add the turkey to the stock. When the rice starts to snap, crackle and pop add the wine. If you are not adding wine then go straight to the stock, adding a ladle-full at a time and being careful to keep the turkey from falling onto the rice (we add that later, you see). Keep adding the stock, bit by bit, as the rice sucks it all up. After 10 minutes add the peas and cranberries. Add more stock until the rice is cooked (it should be soft but still have an ever-so-slight nutty ‘bite’ in the middle).

Add the cheese (and some more butter, if you like) and the turkey from the stock and cover the pan, leaving it to rest for a minute or two, in this time the cheese will melt and ooze its wonderfulness throughout. Adjust the seasoning and serve in a deep bowl with more blue cheese crumbled over the top.

I would serve Innis & Gunn Triple Matured with this, like I did with Christmas dinner, as the creaminess in the dish would work well with the buttery oak in the bottle, while the sweet bites of cranberry would compliment the beer’s sweetness. If you want something different then try Cains Fine Raisin Beer for a strong malty backbone with a kick of sweetness, or maybe a bottle of Old Crafty Hen which is oaky, rich, vinous with dried fruit sweetness and a hoppy, palate-cleansing swipe to finish.

Main course done, on to dessert and…


Christmas Pudding Ice-Cream



There’s always pudding left and there’s always cream in the fridge, plus I always keep a few cans of condensed milk ready for whenever I want to make ice cream. This is a joyfully fun recipe and the perfect way to use up any leftover pudding.

An ice-cream maker is one of the best kitchen appliances there is, it goes from nought-to-frozen in just 30 minutes, and those minutes are spent huddled around the mixing bowl, mesmerised by the unending twirls of joy and the gradual thickening of the cream. As the churn finishes, it takes all the willpower in the world not to plunge a spoon straight in and finish off the whole lot, especially as it has that just-beginning-to-soften texture that is simply irresistible. If you haven’t got an ice-cream machine then go and get one in the sales.

This makes about a litre but can easily be increased with more cream and condensed milk.

• Leftover Christmas pud
• A pint of double cream
• A can of condensed milk
• A splash of brandy (50ml, or so)

This recipe is so easy. Mix the cream and condensed milk, add a slash of brandy and drop in chunks of Christmas Pud and then churn in an ice-cream machine. Done.

Do you want a beer with this?! If you do then you’ll need something big and strong, rich and full of flavour. An Imperial Stout would work, preferably a barrel aged one. Brakspear’s Triple is another possibility or maybe a bottle of Guinness Foreign Extra. Dare I suggest that you’d be better off enjoying the ice-cream and then opening a beer? Some dishes just don’t need a beer to go with them.

And that’s how I dealt with the Christmas Day leftovers this year.

Christmas Beer: The Results

The BrewDog Coffee Imperial Stout was one of the very best beers I’ve had this year. Seriously good. Thick and luscious, rich and strong and big on the roasted coffee bitterness. It was the perfect start to the day, and just so happened to work perfectly with milk chocolate pennies.

As billed, the Bad Pixie came next as was the perfect follow-on from the big stout – light, zingy, refreshing. Next was a bottle of Cantillon Kriek 100% Lambic. Electric red with a sharply sour nose of citrus, lemons, leather, cleaning chemicals and just a welcome whiff of cherry. The flavour was just the same, all big and sharp but tongue-smacking and drinkable – perfect for getting the tastebuds going. Curious Brew’s Brut landed just before the starter and it was fantastic: light and delicate, as quaffable as they come; a real treat of a beer.

The headline act - the star with top billing and the best action scene - was Innis & Gunn’s Triple Matured, and it was the perfect partner to the turkey. I was delighted with how well this pairing went. The buttery richness of the oak, the big fruitiness, the slight sharpness, an earthy, spicy quality all combined stunningly well. The food enhanced the beer; the beer enhanced the food. That’s what a good match-up should do.

I finished the afternoon opening more presents, so I decided to open a little package of my own from the beer cupboard: Fuller’s Brewer’s Reserve. Bottle number 11255. A deep russet brown with thick head. Big buttery nose with boozy oranges and sweet candy. Loads of toffee and bready malt inside, then oak comes and adds a woody sweetness. The whisky warms throughout, surrounded by plenty of fruit and a hint of cherry brandy. There’s hops at the end too, more fruits and more orange. Gorgeous and I think it’s going to get better and better over the years.

There was more in the evening, but to tell you the truth I don’t remember exactly what. I know there was a can (shock! A can?!) of Mild in there and I’m pretty sure I met with my old friend Sam Smith… It was a good day.

Beer for Christmas

If ever there was a day when it’s acceptable to open a beer with breakfast and drink through until bedtime, then it’s Christmas Day. A day of infinite giving, kindness and fun. A day of presents, laughter and too much food. A day to indulge in a lot of great beers.

But what beers?!

This year I’ll be drinking some of the beers that I’ve loved in 2008. I’ll have them spread out over the day, leading me up to dinner and then taking me into the night. I want different types of beers at different times. Something special to start the day, something gluggable and quenching while I cook, something light before I eat to get my taste buds tingling, something rich and dark while I settle down after dinner. And sharing is good – don’t be a beer scrooge because you’ll only regret it in the end. Plus, you’ll be able to drink twice the variety, should you want to.

Last year’s Christmas went like this… Samuel Smith’s Oatmeal Stout for breakfast, Fuller’s Discovery pre-dinner and with the starter, Kwak with the turkey and McEwan’s Champion with the pudding. I can’t remember what saw me through the rest of the day.

This year will go something like this…

To start, and to take the blunt edges off of Christmas Eve’s hangover (it’s inevitable) I’m starting with breakfast. Beer Geek’s Breakfast by Mikkeller, BrewDog’s Riptide or their Coffee Imperial Stout. I’m bypassing the coffee and have a dark, strong beer instead. Plus, beer is food.

Something lighter will need to follow or I’ll be sozzled by dinner time. It’ll be another BrewDog I think. I’ve still got some of their prototype beers around and the Bad Pixie will be perfect. Light, biscuity grain finished with a tang of juniper and lemon – an elegant G&T finish to a beer.

I’ll probably be in the kitchen when I start and finish this and it’ll be followed by another light beer, something to have on the side as I baste the bird or chop the veggies. Maybe a lambic to give me a smack of bittersweetness: there’s nothing like a lambic to limber up your taste buds.

I’ll be approaching the table when the next bottle is cracked open. I’m starting the meal with a glass of Curious Brew’s Brut. A champagne-style beer brewed a short drive from my house in Kent. It’s a gorgeous beer, all creamy and light, and it leads perfectly into the turkey.

The main course is the big choice. The one which I’ve had to think hardest about. It’s a tough one as there’s so much flavour on the plate: meat, crispy potatoes, sweetly-earthy veg, salty pig-stuff, herby stuffing, a rich gravy. The beer has to be strong enough to stand up to it all, but not so strong that it overwhelms. You need dark fruits, but not too dark and bitter, and certainly not chocolatey. Some sharpness is very welcome to ease through the richness of it all. My choice will be Innis & Gunn’s Triple Matured. It’s full of flavour, there’s buttery oak and tangy autumn fruits (perfect partners to turkey), there’s also something vegetal about it and even a hint of spice. It’s a deep copper colour and at 7.7% ABV it stands tall. The mouthfeel is smooth, the finish long and the fruit will cut the richness nicely. I think it’ll be a great pairing. Plus it’s a limited edition beer, so something special for the feast.

Last year I had a beer with the Christmas pudding, but to be honest I was so full from the food that it was all a bit of a struggle. This year I’ll save the next beer for afterwards, and this’ll be a good one. I’ve got a few bottles of Fuller’s Brewer’s Reserve in the cupboard so that’s on the ‘maybe’ list along with a few vintages or an imperial stout. I want something that I can sip, something big and strong and interesting. Something to perfectly finish off my favourite meal of the year.

Then I’ll need to start chilling the beers for the evening… I’ve got plenty lined up, but have no idea what’ll actually get drunk. It’s inevitable that a big BrewDog IPA will be in there, a Chaos Theory or a Hardcore. And I doubt I’ll last the day without at least one American beer. Maybe santa will even bring me some more, to make my choice even wider and more exciting!

I love Christmas.

Harder, Faster, Bigger, Better… Double my IPA!

Our tastes change and develop. And because taste is subjective, everyone is different. My favourite cheese used to be a mature cheddar, now I want the mouldiest, stinkiest, creamiest blue I can find. A few years ago a sprinkle of curry powder was too much, now I want whole chillis, freshly ground spices and I want my mouth to tingle. I started drinking my coffee with ½ a heap of granules plus two of sugar, now it’s no sugar and three times the coffee. Booze too: Malibu and coke is now bourbon and ice; beer was lager; white wine was mixed with lemonade; Guinness started with a dash of blackcurrant to soften the roast bitterness…

But what is common about all these?!

The more we have them, the more we want them as we ‘acquire’ the taste. These acquired tastes are for those things which are unnatural to our palettes: spicy foods, dark chocolate, salty oysters. To begin we have sweet chilli sauce, milk or white chocolate, fish fingers…

But tastes change.

I got into beer by drinking lager-pop. I’d have bitter shandies. I eased into Guinness, with a shot of blackcurrant cordial. I started on ales by having smoother, sweeter dark beers, and for the last few years it has been these dark beers that I have regularly leaned towards. I love them for their richness, the sweetness, the flavour of the grain, the taste of autumn fruit, dried fruit, caramel, chocolate or coffee. I preferred them for their relative lack of hop bitterness. And I was always searching for bigger and stronger beers, winter warmer’s, barley wines, Belgian triple’s, anything black and imperial. I was a malt monster.

But my taste is changing.

It seems there are two growing divisions in the beer world. These aren’t divisions away from each other, rather two interweaving and developing trends. Both are towards the extremes of flavour; one is for IPAs and the other for stouts. These new imperial or double IPAs are mega-hopped and massively bitter; the imperial stouts are thick, strong beasts, often aged in some-kind-of barrel to impart bourbon/oak characteristics. You just have to look on Beer Advocate at the best rated beers in the world right now to see this, and the trend seems to be growing. It started in America as they brought older styles to modern drinking.

We all know the history of IPA, which was shipped from England to India with added strength and hops to stop it going off on the boat trip. While (imperial) stouts have a similar-ish background, being brewed in London in the 18th century and transported to Russian Czars. For this reason it had to be extra-strong and well-hopped to survive the distance and the extreme cold. The styles have been around ever since, but it’s only in the last years that they have become the phenomenas that they are. Any why? Because tastes change.

In beer, the change has come as drinkers want ‘more’. More booze, more grain, more hops, more character, more flavour, more extremes, more history, more age, more more more. It’s the IPAs which have really piqued my interest of late. IPAs never really did it for me. That was until I tried BrewDog’s Punk IPA (available in Tesco’s – a perfect modern IPA) and their Chaos Theory (simply amazing and currently available on their website, but hurry!). After these the malt monster in me transformed into a hop-headed thrill-seeker.

The bitterness in these beer is high, but that’s what makes them so awesome. They have a supreme drinkability which makes you want to go back for more and more. In the mouth you get the sweet caramel grain then the hops flood in and ambush your palate, making the saliva glands gush, as the tropical fruits, citrus and pine flavours come through. It’s intoxicating what a few extra hops can do to you. For me, they work because the beer develops in layers: massive malt (it has to be massive to attain the extra higher ABVs) followed by the wave of juicy hops. The reason the ‘best beers’ are the ‘best beers’ is because they are so well balanced. It’s easy to go extreme on a beer, but it’s surely much harder to make it good. The same applies to food. Look at the top chefs in the world and their food – it challenges what we think we know about eating and food combinations, but it works because of the chef’s skill and supreme palate make it work.

I find it fascinating how our taste buds change, especially with stronger flavours. Blue cheese, slippery-salty oysters and coffee are foods which take some getting used to. The same applies to stronger, bigger beers. And the limits are always being pushed. Sam Adams’ Utopia is brewed at around 27% (it’s a beer!). Your ‘standard’ imperial stout now comes in at around 10% and if it isn’t aged in a bourbon barrel for extra complexity then why bother? And where a mass-produced lager may have 5-20 IBUs (International Bitterness Units – the scale of measuring a beer’s bitterness) and English bitter 20-40 IBUs, there are some double IPAs which measure in at 120 IBUs and beyond! That’s enough to make your taste buds explode!!

Barrel-aged stouts are incredibly exciting and complex and they are brilliant to sit down with on a cold night, swirl around a snifter and sip for while. It’s sophisticated, it’s smooth, rich in flavour, it’ll make you think about the world, think about the barrel it came from, the history that it has. But a double IPA is like a rollercoaster ride with ups and downs and twists and turns. It’s fresh, fun, intoxicating and exciting. It makes you want more and more as your taste for it develops. Who knows where it’ll go from here!

Fish Finger Sandwich

I love sandwiches, they are maybe my favourite food group. And this is perhaps the best sandwich in the world. Although I do love peanut butter and jam, or a hot sausage sandwich, Christmas dinner leftover sandwich, ice cream sandwich…

Did you know that over 1 million fish fingers are eaten daily in Britain? And over 100 packs are sold in the UK each minute? In a poll in 1993, Captain Bird’s Eye came second in a list of the most recognised captains. Captain Cook was first. I don’t know which captain I would name first, but I know which one is my favourite, for without him we wouldn’t have fish fingers, potato waffles and chicken dippers, plus some other captain would’ve found the rest of the world eventually anyway.

Whether it is day or night, if I am happy or sad, alone or with friends, drunk or sober – these are when I want a fish finger sandwich. It is just the simplest thing to make, but the combination in textures between the fluffy bread, crunchy golden crumb and soft, hot fish is unbeatable.

A fish finger sandwich technically only needs bread and the fingers (at least 4 per 2 slices of bread) to qualify it as such. The bread can, of course, be brown or white, freshly baked or shop bought. The fish finger can be any brand you like, and you could even make your own but this feels completely frivilous. At university, my housemate and I used to marvel at the supermarket value options because each finger cost just 2p, although the actual ‘fish’ content is a little hazy and the texture a little cardboardy, so look towards the big name brands – don’t spare any expense here! The choice of condiment is yours too: Red, brown, spicy, sweet, creamy, anything you like. And the addition of some ‘green stuff’ is discretionary (adding cucumber would be a crime, but some crisp iceberg lettuce is fine). And a slice of plastic cheese is often very welcome.

My perfect fish finger sandwich goes a little something like this…

· 2 thick slices of white bread
· 4 fish fingers, at least
· Butter, for the bread
· Ketchup, mayonnaise and sweet chilli sauce, a little of each
· Optional extras, depending on how I/you feel – crisp iceberg lettuce and a slice of cheese (burger cheese of course)

Grill the fish fingers until crispy and golden and the sweet juices begin to leak through the crumbed shell. Butter the bread and spread with as much of whatever condiment-combo you want. When the fingers are cooked, and still piping hot, place them lovingly on the bread, but be careful not to burn your fingers in greedy anticipation. Lay the other slice of bread on top, and press it together. This press is almost essential and I would state (without scientific backing) that it makes everything taste better – incidentally, this 'pressing rule' applies to any and all sandwiches. Cut in half and eat immediately, so that the butter melts and mixes with the sauce, driping out naughtily.

Should you want dessert, I suggest a Twix or 3 or 4 Jaffa Cakes.

With food that is eaten with the fingers, you need beer from the bottle. Your favourite bottled variety is best, something light and crisp. There really is no ‘ideal’ beer to go with a fish finger sandwich and to be honest it may be a little unnecessary drinking booze with a child-like dinner, but I would expressly suggest Anchor’s Liberty Ale or their Steam Beer. Or look towards some British beers, Meantime’s Pilsner is a winner, as is Whitstable Bay’s Pilsner or BrewDog's Physics. A glass of orange squash might be the most appropriate drink.