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7 Beer Styles Brewed with Food
  1. Craft Beer Muses

7 Beer Styles Brewed with Food

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Would you eat some chocolate with your stout? Savor fresh fruit while sipping saison? Quench the fire of hot peppers with a cool, crisp lager?

Of course you would. The increasing popularity of craft beer in the United States has led to a sharper focus on how beer is such a versatile beverage for pairing with food. A porter or stout, for instance, can be paired with the most decadent chocolate or the smokiest barbecue. The beer brings out hidden flavors in the food, and the food does the same for the beer.

But how about putting chocolate, fruit, or even hot peppers in your beer? That’s the most basic beer and food pairing, after all: beer styles brewed with food. Here are seven excellent American craft beer styles made with everyday foods you’ll find in your kitchen:

Beer brewed with fruitFruit

Aprihop |Dogfish Head Craft Brewery| Milton, DE

Like all goodIPAs, this beer is loaded with hops. On their own, hops can produce a citrus fruit taste and aroma, which is pumped up even further by the addition of apricots. Hops also add a biting bitterness to the taste, which prevents some people from enjoying IPAs. But here, the apricots provide a nice balance to the bitterness, making Aprihop easy for all to enjoy. Brewers have many seasonal options when brewingfruit and field beers, so be on the lookout for new offerings as the seasons change.

Try these other great craft beers brewed with fruit:

Coffee

Breakfast Stout |Founders Brewing Co.| Grand Rapids, MI

Depending on the malts used,coffee beers可以有一个丰富的咖啡香气和味道没有actual coffee added. So when coffee is actually part of the brewing process, the smells and tastes are turbocharged. Using Kona (Hawaii) and Sumatra (Indonesia) coffee, this beer is a roasty, milky, alcoholic espresso shot. The strong coffee taste is accompanied by chocolate, vanilla, cinnamon, nuts, and brown sugar.

Skip Starbucks with these beers brewed with coffee:

beer brewed with pumpkinPumpkin

Pumking |Southern Tier Brewing Co.| Lakewood, NY

Pumpkin beeris like pumpkin pie in a glass. Take a whiff and you won’t be sure if you should eat it or drink it—but do drink it. Take a sip and you’ll get allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla, clove, and of course, lots of pumpkin. You’ll often even get tastes of pie crust in there depending on a particular beer’s malt bill. But unlike most pumpkin-flavored beverages and foods, you won’t find any artificial or chemical flavors, as this beer is made from actual pumpkin puree. Released every August, it’s a great beer for crisp fall nights, and of course it goes perfectly with Thanksgiving dinner and dessert.

Want more pie? Try these:

Beer brewed with honeyHoney

Bees In The Trappe |Grimm Artisanal Ales| Brooklyn, NY

The eighth one-off beer made by these gypsy brewers features 360 pounds of honey from Gunter’s Honey in Berryville, Va., imparting a strong yet delicate sweetness. Malts and yeasts lend complementary flavors to thetripel stylebrew, like toasted bread, apricot, banana and cloves. Tea and crumpets has been replaced by beer and crumpets.

Get your honey fix with these other beers:

beer brewed with chocolate巧克力

Double Chocolate Stout |Rogue Ales| Newport, OR

A beer brewed with Dutch bittersweet chocolate should satisfy anyone with a sweet tooth, but Rogue Ales adds a strain of chocolate malt to put this beer into chocoholic territory. It’s a creamy, roasty, silky smooth chocolate milkshake in a glass, with a bit of espresso and burnt grains at the end.巧克力beersare surprisingly drinkable, and are a perfect dessert accompaniment—or substitute.

Craving more dessert? Try:

Salt and Coriander

Gose |Westbrook Brewing Co.| Mount Pleasant, SC

Salt and coriander are probably the last two ingredients you’d expect in beer, but they’re the main focus in a gose, a traditional German wheat beer. The style was developed 1,000 years ago near Leipzig, Germany, and became a nearly extinct brewing process after World War II. Luckily, it’s recently made a comeback in Germany, and American craft brewers are following suit.

Be warned: this beer is sour. If you don’t like it, you’ll think it tastes like ocean water. If you do like it, you’ll scour all the beer stores in your neighborhood for more. It’s just that good, and perfectly refreshing for summer.

Other great goses by U.S. craft brewers include:

Peppers

Bomb! |Prairie Artisan Ales| Tulsa, OK

The most adventurous beer on the list, Bomb! is animperial stoutwith a long list of edible ingredients: espresso beans, vanilla beans, chocolate and ancho chili pepper. Make no mistake; this is a big beer with intense flavors and an alcoholic punch of 13 percent ABV. But if it seems overwhelming, don’t worry. The coffee, vanilla, and chocolate flavors, while strong, are balanced and absolutely delicious.

The most controversial ingredient, the ancho chili pepper, is actually my favorite, and I’m not usually a fan of spiciness. It’s perfectly subtle, leaving a slight burn on the roof of your mouth after each sip. Take your time with this beer, sipping instead of drinking, to get the most out of the complexity. Also worth noting: as it warms up, the flavors change.

Test your tolerance with these spicy beers:

What are your favorite beer styles that feature food?

Eric Sturniolo is a freelance beer writer, produced screenwriter, dog lover and foodie living in Brooklyn, NY. A fan of “beercations” (and having friends in great beer cities), Eric enjoys the full repertoire of American craft beer. In NYC, he focuses on the best bars and restaurants for craft beer, as well as where find the best, rarest and most unique beers on tap. Learn more atWheresTheBeerny.com.

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