Wednesday, August 27, 2008

A Belgian Answer to the French Dip

On to my next great food and beer pairing. Today at NYC's Ginger Man I found the Ommegang Rouge. This was the inspiration for me trekking to Whole Foods on the Bowery before heading to Blind Tiger before heading to Amtrak before heading to TJs before heading home....are you keeping up? good, because I'm not sure that I am! I had this at Ommegang's BCTC event almost a month ago. Today was the second time. I had ordered a portabello and goat cheese on multi-grain bread sandwich to go with it. I thought it would go well. I had no idea! When Nicole, my bartender, mentioned the word balsamic when I asked her impression of the beer, I had a revelation. Why not try dipping the sandwich into the beer? Of course, no one around me thought that this was a particularly natural thing to do. Then, I took it one step further and poured a bit of the beer over the sandwich. (This was when the level of beer in the glass became a bit too low to make the dipping inconspicuous.) Wow! The sharpness of the beer (yes, Nicole, somewhat like balsamic vinegar...don't we marinate mushrooms in balsamic?) went well with the sandwich, offsetting some of the sharpness of the goat cheese and complimenting nicely the earthiness of the mushroom. The crust and seeds of the multi-grain bread helped to carry away all of the various flavors, cleaning my palate for the next sip and bite. Another great, and unpredicted, beer and food pairing in NYC. Oh, and while I'm on the topic of the Ginger Man in NYC, I should drop a favorable note about an unsuspecting brew from Otter Creek. Yes, the Otter San, brewed with a sake yeast...trust me.

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