Cooking with wine is a commonly known culinary technique, but cooking with beer is rapidly overtaking this field. While cooking with beer is traditional in many countries – Ireland, Belgium, Germany – it has just started becoming popular in the U.S within the last generation. This is a likely result of the many new varieties and flavors of beer now available in this country. In this golden age of microbrews, where more and more innovative and flavorful beers are being made commercially available, it is easy to see that cooking with beer is a growing field of the culinary arts.

My father taught me how to cook – and taught me well. I can remember the day we had sauerkraut and polish sausages for dinner. This was the first time that he showed me how beer can be used to enhance a meal, by pouring half a bottle of Pale Ale into the sausage pan and covering it. The sizzling smell of sudden maltiness added to the savory aroma of a fine quality organic sausage was – almost – intoxicating. Actually, that was probably all of the alcohol evaporating within the first 2 seconds of being poured into the hot cast iron pan.

Cooking with beer is a concept that is getting more attention. Recently, on NPR.org, Brian Miller expounded upon the use of beers of quality for cooking purposes:

“The point of adding beer is to flavor the surface and the sauces or cooking liquids (as in a stew): the stronger the beer, the more flavorful the liquid. For example, adding a Budweiser would be like pouring in tap water.”

I agree with Brian’s basic principle, but I have found, through my experience, that even a fairly light beer adds considerably more flavor than tap water.

Case in point: it was thanksgiving, and, being the predominant meat eater in our household, I took it upon myself to provide an alternative to the tofurky the vegetarians demanded for the holiday. My good friend Oops the Clown took sympathy on my plight after giving me a ride in the pouring rain after my early morning tofurky mission, and bought us a turkey on Thanksgiving day (I don’t know where she found one!). Thawing was a bit of a rush job, but turned out fine – the real problem was during cooking that I had a pan but no cover for the bird. Some of you turkey rosters may know that this is a recipe for a dry as heck bird, especially considering that I was barbequing the mother.

Fortunately, Chris the tattooed man came over with Katzen the Tiger Lady and their son Felix, and Chris always brings a 12-pack to the party (did I mention that I work in the circus sideshow?). So, religiously, every ½ hour, as the bird was cooking, I opened up a Tecate that Chris brought over and poured it over the Turkey. After 4 hours, the bird had drunk more than anyone else had, and as a result was moist and flavorful even without a cover to keep the juices in. Even a light beer can add body and flavor to a dish, and in this case, beer truly saved the day.

While beer is primarily used to flavor meat dishes, it can also be used as a glaze over grilled veggies, as an admixture to BBQ sauce or to stew. For more ideas about cooking with beer, you might want to peruse Jay Harlow’s Beer Cuisine (1991 Harlow & Ratner), Stephen Beaumont’s Brewpub Cookbook (1998 Siris), or The Brewmaster’s Table – Discovering the Pleasures of Real Beer With Real Food (2003 HarperCollins).