Cooks use beer in a variety of recipes
Thursday is St. Patrick’s Day — one of the biggest beer-drinking days of the year, when an estimated 1 percent of annual beer consumption takes place.
But drinking isn’t the only thing you can do with beer, you can cook with it, too. There’s Welsh rarebit, for example, and beer-battered everything.
And maybe it pretty much ends there.
Or maybe not.
"Essentially, in any recipe that calls for wine, you can substitute beer," said Jim Hodge, a local amateur brewer and beer judge.
David Joy, chef of J.C. Wooloughan’s at J.W. Marriott, sees the parallel. The restaurant uses a beer batter for its fried cod, but also serves beef marinated in Guinness.
Joy said the dish is stewlike and contains beef flap meat and stew-cut carrots, onions and potatoes. He marinates the beef cubes for a day, then cooks them, adds the sauteed vegetables, garlic, some diced tomatoes and tomato paste, beef stock and fresh thyme, salt and pepper.
"From there we just go through the process until it’s about three-quarters of the way done before I thicken it with a basic cornstarch slurry," he said. The beer, he said, "gives it not only a different texture but also a different flavor. You can taste it, but it’s not dominant, where it overtakes the whole meal.
"Some people, when they cook beef bourguignon, they put in a red wine. This is the same process. It adds and gives a different type of flavor for the whole dish."
In the batter, Joy said, the beer acts as a leavening agent. He likes to use Killian’s Red in his beer batter, but at Main Street Station, executive chef Ben Gries said the kitchen at the Triple 7 Restaurant and Microbrewery uses some of its own draft (the recipe follows). Gries said the type of beer used depends on the season, with a stout more likely to be used during the winter.
They also sometimes run a special of steaks marinated for up to three days in their High Roller Gold. The marinade, he said, is simply olive oil, salt and pepper and the beer.
Don Kem, chef at the Boulder Dam Brewing Co. in Boulder City, said he prepares bratwurst cooked in beer by first browning the sausages, then simmering them in one of the brewpub’s beers — the stout if it’s available, the amber if it’s not. The stout, he said, brings out the flavor of the bratwurst.
He also uses beer in barbecue.
"Take a cheap barbecue sauce, add seasonings, onions and a pitcher of beer," Kem said. He mixes it with pulled pork, which is served on a bun or in a quesadilla.
Hodge said he does quite a bit of cooking with beer, mainly as a marinade on milder meats such as chicken or pork. He’ll marinate beef in a porter, stout or brown ale. He said he also uses beer in stir-fry recipes.
"People have this concept in general that beer is like Budweiser or Miller Lite or Coors," he said. "But clearly the beer universe is much larger than that.
"There’s a lot you can do with almost any style of beer."
MAIN STREET STATION BEER BATTER
2 cups flour, plus additional flour for dredging
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 cups beer
Salt, to taste
1 egg
Whisk flour, baking powder and beer. Whisk in salt and egg until well blended. Refrigerate until chilled.
To use, dredge fish, shrimp or whatever you choose in flour, dip in the batter and cook in a deep-fryer.
— Recipe from chef Ben Gries
BEER PANCAKES
2 eggs, beaten
2 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 12-ounce beers
Mix the eggs and dry ingredients in a bowl, add oil, pour in one of the beers and mix. Slowly add the second beer, a little at a time, until the batter gets to the right consistency. This will take more or less half of the second beer.
You’re ready to cook … and you know what to do with the leftover beer.
Serves 4.
Note: Hodge said he would stay away from really hoppy pale ales, such as Sierra Nevada Pale Ale or New Belgium Ranger, and that malt-dominated beers would be best. Commercial beers he’d recommend would be New Belgium’s Fat Tire or Abbey Ales, Stone Brewing’s Arrogant Bastard and Dogfish Head’s Raison D’Etre. "I’m tempted to add Deschutte’s Black Butte Porter to this list because it has a big chocolate malt flavor, but I’m afraid that this beer is so dark, the pancakes will have an unnatural color," he said. "Of course, the less adventuresome can play it safe and go with something in the Bud/Miller/Coors ilk."
— Recipe from Craig Sprout, via Jim Hodge
WELSH RABBIT
(Or Rarebit)
1 cup beer
2 teaspoons dry mustard
¼ teaspoon cayenne
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1½ cups grated cheddar cheese
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Salt, to taste
4 to 6 tomato slices
8 to 12 slices (½ inch thick) toasted French or Italian bread
Preheat broiler. Place the beer, mustard, cayenne and Worcestershire sauce in a saucepan and heat on medium until boiling. Slowly whisk in the cheese, making sure each addition is melted before adding the next. Add the butter and whisk until smooth. Season with salt, to taste, and set aside.
Place the tomato slices on the rack of a broiler pan and broil for 1 minute, or until lightly browned.
To serve, place the toast slices in the bottom of an ovenproof gratin dish or in individual gratin dishes. Pour the cheese over the toast and then top with the tomato slices. Place under the broiler and broil until the cheese is bubbly and brown. Serve immediately.
Note: The components of this dish can be prepared up to a few hours in advance and kept at room temperature. Reheat the cheese until hot, whisking until it is smooth, before the final broiling.
Serves 4 to 6.
— Recipe from Chowning’s Tavern, Colonial Williamsburg
RAISIN BEER BREAD
2 cups beer
1 15-ounce package raisins
5 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1¼ cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1½ teaspoons ground nutmeg
3 eggs, well beaten
2½ cups grated American cheese (10 ounces)
2 cups chopped walnuts
Heat beer to boiling point and pour over raisins; let stand until cool and raisins are plumped. Mix flour with sugar, baking soda, salt and nutmeg. Stir in beer with raisins, eggs, grated cheese and walnuts. Mix well. Spoon batter into 2 greased 9-by-5-by-3-inch loaf pans. Bake in a moderate oven (350 degrees) for 45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in center of loaf comes out clean. Serve warm or cold, plain or with butter, cream cheese, marmalade or cheddar spread.
Makes 2 large loaves.
Note: Batter also can be baked in muffin pans, but reduce baking time by 10 minutes. Makes about 48 muffins.
— Recipe from the Beer Institute
SHRIMP IN BEER BATTER
3 pounds shrimp in shell
2 cups warm beer
2½ cups flour
2 teaspoons paprika
Dash of Tabasco
Dash of Worcestershire sauce
Peel and split shrimp, leaving tails intact. Mix all remaining ingredients together. Roll shrimp in additional flour, salt and pepper. Dip into beer batter and fry in deep hot fat for 2-3 minutes.
Serves 6 to 8.
— Recipe from the Beer Institute
PRAIRIE BEER CAKE
1 cup shortening
2 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
2 eggs, well-beaten
3 cups sifted flour
½ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon allspice
½ teaspoon cloves
2 cups beer
1 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
2 cups finely chopped dates or prunes
Cream shortening until soft in a large bowl; gradually add sugar, creaming until light and fluffy. Add eggs and beat well.
Sift together flour, salt, soda and spices; reserve about 2 tablespoons and beat remainder into batter. Slowly add beer (it may foam while beating) and blend thoroughly. Toss nuts and fruits with reserved flour mixture to coat lightly. Fold into batter, blending thoroughly.
Pour batter into a greased and floured 10-inch tube pan. Bake in a preheated oven at 350 degrees for 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until cake tester comes out clean. Cool in pan for 10 minutes and carefully turn out of pan to cool completely. Cover and refrigerate overnight. Serve plain, dusted with confectioners’ sugar or with a lemon glaze.
Serves 8 to 10
— Recipe from the Beer Institute
Contact reporter Heidi Knapp Rinella at hrinella@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0474.
