Drink Craft Beer, Eat Craft Cheese -Pre Memorial Day Beer and Cheese Tasting | Drink Craft Beer

Drink Craft Beer, Eat Craft Cheese -Pre Memorial Day Beer and Cheese Tasting

Finally, Spring has officially sprung! I don't know about you, but for us Spring means two things... Beer and BBQ. With Memorial Day weekend just around the corner we wanted to come up with something special. Sure we could give you lots of BBQ recipes and beer pairings (and don't think we won't soon), but for this special tasting we wanted to do something fresh and clean, in honor of Spring. With the success of our beer and chocolate tasting we learned something, you all like beer and food as much as we do! So we've come up with something new. On Saturday May 17th we'll be hosting a beer and cheese tasting at The Wine Gallery in Brookline on May 17th from 3-6pm.

Now, it wouldn't be a DrinkCraftBeer.com event if we just used any old cheese, so we've chosen 5 different goat cheeses from local cheesemaker Westfield Farms and paired them each with a different beer designed to enhance the flavor of both beer and cheese. Come try some great beer and cheese and bring some to your Memorial Day party. We guarantee you're friends will be impressed if you show up with any of these great pairings. But enough of us talking, on to the pairings!

Allagash Double and Westfield Farms Capri Chevre
This first cheese is a classic Chevre (plain goat cheese), very mild smooth and creamy. We needed a beer that was able to compliment the mild subtle flavor of this cheese without overwhelming it. The choice was clear to us, Allagash Double. The smooth malt notes of this beer pair perfectly with the cheese giving a very light and refreshing experience. We'd also suggest adding some fresh fruit along side this pairing.

Lost Abbey Red Barn Farmhouse Ale and Westfield Farms Garlic & Herb Capri Chevre
The plain Chevre with herbs added to it begged for a beer with a hint of spice. This farmhouse ale fit perfectly, slight hints of spice in the beer accentuate the fresh herbs in the cheese while the nice belgian funk of the yeast brings out the natural flavor of the cheese.

Bear Republic Racer 5 IPA and Westfield Farms Pepper Capri Chevre
It took us all of 5 seconds to decide what we wanted to pair with the this cheese, and that's before we'd even tasted it. Racer 5 is an all time favorite of ours and if you've never tried it it's worth coming to this event just for this beer. A fantastically hopped IPA, this used to be in bombers only but Bear Republic recently released this in 6 packs making it even more convenient for your spring grilling. Toss a couple 6 packs in a cooler and serve along with some Pepper Capri Chevre to impress your friends this Memorial Day. Make no mistake, this cheese packs a black peppery punch. The fantastic hop bitterness of Racer 5 cuts the heat, leaving the freshness of the cheese with a amazing peppery hoppy finish. We could go on and on about it, but just come try it for yourself.

Stoudt's Fat Dog Stout and Westfield Farms Hickory Smoked Capri Chevre
We'll be honest, we took a bit of a gamble with this one. We thought it would work, but we didn't know for sure. You run a risk when you pair two roasty flavors together that all you'll end up with is too much smoke. Well, the fact is our gamble paid off. The roastiness of the beer accentuated the smooth smoke flavor of the cheese without being overwhelming. When served to a group of friends everyone enjoyed this. Many agreed that it was like eating a camp fire... but in a good way! Not sure how eating a campfire can be a good thing? Come join us and we'll prove it to you.

Paulaner Salvator and Westfield Farms Classic Blue Chevre
Our hardest pairing by far, this cheese alone is simply amazing. We've eaten about 4 logs of this cheese since we first tried it, all in the name of science. OK that's a bold face lie, we just really like it so we keep buying more. This cheese uses the Roquefort strain of mold to create it's blue rind and it's simply incredible. A bitter but smooth pungent cheese, it balances itself out. It's flavor was so unique that it took us some time to really come up with something good enough to present to you. We think we've come up with a great pairing with Paulaner's Salvator Doppel Bock. The only thing we could see missing from this cheese was a bit of sweetness. The Salvator provides just that, a nice smooth malty sweetness without feeling heaving or overwhelming in any way.