Micheladas Go Craft [Beer Cocktails]
I recently came across this article in GQ about an NYC restaurant’s Asian-influenced take on the Michelada, the classic Mexican salt-rimmed beer-based drink to beat the heat. It got me thinking and, after spending a week in Mexico where I had quite a few of the classic Micheladas, it hit me...this could be improved upon with some craft beer! If you’re looking for something to cool you off as the summer wanes (or just something to remind you of those warmer months once the weather cools down, especially here in New England) then this is the craft beer cocktail for you! I’ve taken the liberty of crafting up the original, and then developed a few of my own interpretations including one specifically meant for cooler autumn evenings.
Classic Craft Beer Michelada featuring Brooklyn Brewery Brooklyn Lager or New Belgium Shift Pale Lager
Salt on the rim
Juice of ¼ - ½ of a lime
A few dashes of Worcestershire Sauce
A few dashes of Cholula Hot Sauce (Tabasco Sauce will work as well)
Lime garnish
3-4 ice cubes
1 Brooklyn Lager or Shift Pale Lager
Now THAT’S bringing me back to my vacation in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico! Just, this time, the beer is a good bit better. The lager is crisp, cool and refreshing. By using a craft lager, such as New Belgium’s Shift Pale Lager or Brooklyn Brewery’s Brooklyn Lager, the whole concoction is just so much better. It provides the rest of the flavors a much stronger structure to stand on rather than the pale, macro lagers of Mexico that are just a liquid conveyance. The slight sweetness of the beer works with the Worcestershire Sauce while the lime really gives it that refreshing touch. The Tabasco Sauce? Well it’s there to make you sweat a little bit and really turn all your taste buds up. Trust me, this is the way micheladas were meant to be made!
Try it with your own local craft pale lager!
Thai Influenced Michelada featuring Baxter Summer Celsius Ale
Salt on the rim
A few dashes of Worcestershire Sauce
A few dashes of Sriracha Hot Sauce
2 slices of hot pepper
Lime garnish
1 slice of hot pepper for garnish
3-4 ice cubes
1 Baxter Celsius Summer Ale
Wooooooooooowee is that hot! The Sriracha Sauce and hot pepper really get this drink going! Even with the Sriracha and the Worcestershire Sauce, though, the citrus from this delicious summer ale’s lemon peel, lime peel, kaffir lime leaves and lemongrass really comes through, which is why there isn’t any lime juice needed. While the original version of the Michelada is from Mexico, with the lemongrass and kaffir lime, this one is much more Thai influenced. So, on a hot, sweltering day pour yourself one of these, enjoy some cold Thai leftovers and sweat your way through the heat with a deliciously chilled and iced craft beer drink.
A Witty Michelada featuring Boulevard Brewing Unfiltered Wheat Beer or Avery Brewing White Rascal Wit Beer
Salt on the rim
Juice of ¼ - ½ of a lime
A few dashes of Worcestershire Sauce
A few dashes of Cholula Hot Sauce (Tabasco Sauce will work as well)
Lime garnish
3-4 ice cubes
1 Boulevard Wheat Beer or Avery White Rascal
Wheat beers are no strangers to fruit garnishes, but it may never have been any more appropriate than in this case! As you tip these back you get quite significantly different experiences. With the Boulevard Wheat, a more restrained version of the style, there’s a bit of citrus and the clean, crisp dryness we always expect from a wheat beer. The Worcestershire Sauce really comes through to fill up the entire flavor experience. Conversely, with the Avery White Rascal, a more complex Belgian-style wit beer, the yeasty esters really serve to bring forward the citrus more than in other versions and, as a result, the savory Worcestershire is put in the background. The dry, minerally wheat is still there, further enhancing the lime juice. The Tabasco Sauce gives both a really great, tangy flavor with the heat at a nice, balanced level that just kind of sticks around for a while. When you combine how refreshing this drink is with the heat, you better make sure you have a couple of these wheat beers lying around!
Try it with your own local wheat beer!
Cold Weather Michelada featuring Night Shift Brewing Viva Habenera Rye Habanero Ale
Salt on the rim
Juice of ¼ - ½ of a lime
A few dashes of Worcestershire Sauce
Lime garnish
1/2 of a 750 ml bottle of Night Shift Viva Haberera
OK, I’ll admit I like this drink to much to relegate it to warm weather only. That said, I think I need to change it up if I’m going to drink it during cold Northeast nights. So I’m taking out the ice and making a cocktail to sip on a bit more slowly. With the heat already a part of this one thanks to the guys over at Night Shift Brewing (and their addition of habanero peppers), I’m choosing to skip the hot sauce addition here, which really takes the heat down a notch. From the beginning you can smell the citrus in this combo much more than you can taste it, but a quick lick of the salt really brings it out! The almost-umami flavors of the Worcestershire Sauce go really well with the rye base of this beer giving you a smooth, malty and savory flavor that’s extremely different from the bright, clean and crisp flavors that the original version of this drink has. This is exactly why I chose not to put this one over ice...it’s not for a hot day like other Micheladas are. This one is to warm you up on a cold day.
Dark Michelada featuring Narragansett Porter
Salt on the rim
Juice of ¼ - ½ of a lime
A few dashes of Worcestershire Sauce
A few dashes of Cholula Hot Sauce (Tabasco Sauce will work as well)
Lime garnish
3-4 ice cubes
1 Narragansett Porter
And now for something COMPLETELY different! Dark beer in a Michelada? You may find yourself saying, “what?!” but bare with me here. The Worcestershire and dark malts in the Gansett Porter are natural friends, the savory sauce mixing so well with the smooth, chocolate character of the beer. And the heat? Well you’ve had mole sauce, right? This is basically the same thing. Chocolatey, rich, almost smoky and hot. The lime is probably where you’ll doubt me but, really, the citrus just brightens this whole deal right up. Honestly, I was a little doubtful of this myself, but this is a great way to enjoy a dark beer. Oh and, by the way, that salt on the rim? It does amazing things for the cocoa flavors...just like Taza Chocolated Salted Almond Mexicano chocolate. Yum!
Try it with your own local porter or stout! I bet the Stone Smoked Porter with Chipotle Peppers would work great.
What are your thoughts on the Michelada? Do you have any combinations that you think would work? Let us know in the comments below!
Farnum Hill Dooryard Cider Batch #1134 [Cider Review]
Farnum Hill Ciders come from Poverty Lane Orchards in Lebanon, NH (yes they are open to visitors Thursdays in the summer & nearly all week in the fall for visits, check website for details - and they do growler pours & pick your own!). The Dooryard Series of ciders means that this is part of a small batch of custom blend that they thought was really tasty & wanted to share, but didn't fit into one of their usual labels. I received a bottle from Batch #1134 from my brother (thanks Colin!) that got shuffled & hidden in my spare room and was found with great excitement earlier today. So, without any further wait - it's time to bust this bad boy open!
Pop! As soon as the cork comes out with a touch of force, a little cloud of misty apple-fresh moisture sprays out, reminiscent of when you first bite into a really fresh apple and break the skin. It pours a half to three-quarters inch head that quickly fizzles away to not even a ring around the glass, but just a steady pace of little bubbles and mini clusters running for the surface. Every time I come in for a sip I still get the apple cloud, almost an apple humidity if you will, that smells a bit dry and tannic with a number of different apple notes from dry to juicy. This makes sense since Farnum Hill mentions that many of their ciders have a tannic quality that not everyone expects due to the apples they use having a high level of tannins all the way through the fruit, not just the skin like a grape produces in red wines. The color is a rich brownish golden, like a deep mountain pond or river, and looks almost exactly like a rich lager.
The first sip comes in juicy and refreshing and, by the time it hits the middle of my tongue, we're in fairly dry territory. Somehow this is a dryness more similar to tea than champagne if that makes any sense. This batch of Dooryard has some sweetness but it never clings to your tongue or coats your mouth. Even though there isn't any ring of bubbles, just a slow steady pace of random bubbles from the bottom of the glass, it finishes like a far more active cider than it starts - lots of dryness over your whole mouth wiping out that sweet start you can still tasty on your lips. Yet it goes down far more smoothly than expected as you swallow. This is a bottle to share because each sip is like three different tastes! The way the dryness cleans out your mouth makes me think that this would be really good with a rich pork dish or any lamb as it would cut through and cleanse the palate without annihilating your enjoyment of either your cider or the meat. I know that there are many other offerings from Farnum Hill out there to try and hopefully a trip northeast of Boston will bring me there in the coming weeks to stock up on bottles and growler-fills to share with lucky friends.
Win A Pair of Tickets to Mass Brewers Fest
We here at Drink Craft Beer are all about promoting local craft beer. Being based in Massachusetts, we're obviously excited to be heading to the Massachusetts Brewers Guild "3rd Annual Mass Brewers Fest" on Friday, August 24th to support some local craft beer from our state.
We're going to do one better, though...we're going to potentially get you into the Mass Brewers Fest as well for free! We're giving away a pair of tickets to one lucky winner from Massachusetts for a night of mixing and mingling with MA Brewery owners, reps and 2,000 of your friends at the 3rd Annual Mass Brewers Guild Fest!
They'll have live music by Three Day Threshold, more than 100 styles of local beer to sample from around Massachusetts and food available for purchase.
How to Win
All you have to do to win is tweet out the following before Midnight on Sunday, August 19th:
"I want 2 free tickets to the @MABrewersGuild Mass Brewers Fest from @DrinkCraftBeer - http://t.co/w9lYmAuS"
Details
What: Mass Brewers Fest - put on by the Massachusetts Brewers Guild
When: Friday, August 24 from 6-9:30pm
Where: The World Trade Center Head House Concourse (200 Seaport Blvd. Boston, MA)
For More Info: Go to the Mass Brewers Fest page
Fine Print
- Contest closes at Midnight EDT August 19th
- You must be 21+ to enter
- Winner will be chosen at random
What's the best gateway craft beer? [Questions]
Chances are if you're reading this site you already drink craft beer, and many of your friends do as well. I'd also bet that wasn't always the case and someone probably introduced you to craft beer or you've introduced someone else. I discovered Sam Adam's and Sierra Nevada during college, it wasn't long after that I began seeking out more and more craft beer.
There's still a lot of people out there that think they don't like craft beer or just haven't tried it. I'm a strong believer that the right beer can convert almost anyone into a craft beer fan. With that in mind we wanted to get your feedback on the best gateway beers.
Let us know what you think the best gateway craft beer is, we'll compile a list of them and publish a top 5 list next week based on the results. Give us your responses in the comments section below or tweet us with #gatewaycraftbeer.
Be sure to list a specific beer as well as why you think it's a good fit.
Look forward to all of your responses!
Bell's Two Hearted Ale Review [Beer Reviews]
Bell's Two Hearted Ale has been one of my favorite beers for a long time. It's one of those beers that I've been meaning to review for years but somehow it just never happened. Well I say somehow, but what I really mean is I always end up drinking all of it before I get a chance to take a good picture. You see Bell's isn't available in Boston where we're based, a travesty if you ask me. As a result we only get to try it if we travel to a state that has it. Recently a good friend of ours was kind enough to bring some of from D.C. (thanks John) and so I finally got the chance to sing the praises of this perfect IPA.
OK, so maybe perfect is a strong word, but the first time I tried this beer that was my thought, there was nothing I wanted to change about it. I think one of the things I like most is the simplicity. Bell's Two Hearted is exclusivity made with Centennial hops. No fancy new strains or blends here just a pure expression of what Centennial hops can bring to the table. As soon as you pour this beer the aroma fills the air around you with notes of grapefruit and pine. The first sip is crisp and sharp with all the aroma following directly into the flavor of the beer. Citrusy grapefruit notes give way to piney bitterness that somehow manages to be insanely refreshing despite the 7% abv. I was actually shocked that this beer was 7% when I first looked it up as it just drinks so much easier than that. Additionally, while the hops are undoubtedly a huge part of this beer they never feel overpowering and are balanced out by the malt.
I used to wonder if my love of this beer was due to the fact that it was hard for me to get but, having had it many many times now, I can confidently say that's not the case. For those lucky enough to get Bell's let me express my jealousy now. For those who don't, seek this out if you're traveling.
