We’re throwing a party, and it’s going to be a good one. Beer & Nosh is teaming up with some of your favorite local food producers to put on a fun afternoon centered around collaborative food and beer.

Teaming up for this party:

Ryan Farr & the 4505 Meats Team –  Ryan will be bringing his usual butchering mastery and seasonal flavors to create a menu centered around beer and food pairings. Think of stuff like this, but with more beer, and a lager variety of meats to pick from.
Humphry Slocombe Ice Cream – Jake, the ice cream mastermind behind “secret breakfast” and foie gras ice cream sandwiches will be turning he skills toward making beer infused ice creams, based on the beers of…
Valley Brewing Co. – under the supervision of Brewmaster Steve Altamari, Valley brewing ferments a full lineup of traditional beers – as well as a beer-geek’s dream of barrel aging and sour projects.

To put this party together, the we all took a group field trip out to Stockton to visit Steve at his production brewery to find out just how he makes these brews, and pick a lineup that would be most food friendly.

Steve walked all of us through the brewing process, and let the chefs putting this meal together taste each part along the way.  We started with the malted barley:

And one of my favorites, Amarillo hops (they smell like apricots in beer!)

From there it was off to the fermenters to see where the beer was brewed, before ending up flowing out of Steve’s magic tap:

Then, there was much beer tasting.  It turns out Steve brews a huge numbers of beers. For the sake of being thorough, we tasted them all.

Ideas were coming faster than the beer – “pair this one with pork belly!” “Reduce this one into a sauce for chicken!” “Make this one into an ice cream!”

Then things got really exciting. Steve broke out his whiskey thief and started pulling samples from his barrels.  The variety was spectacular.   Some had just been put in the barrel a few days earlier and were just starting to take on the wood.  Others had been sitting in the barrel for months, and were really funky.

Finally, palettes fatigued and full of brett-laced beers, we settled into Steve’s makeshift break room to set our final beer menu. What we came up with is a really tap list that is accessible for the curious about craft beer, and exciting for the knowledgeable.  It represents the a wide span of beer styles, from traditional to experimental, malty to hoppy, cool and refreshing to rich and indulgent.

Luna Blanca – Central Valley Golden Ale
“Notoberfest” Bourbon Barrel Maibock Lager
Brandy Barrel Aged “Collaborative Evil” Belgian Strong Golden Ale
Olallieberry Sour
India Pale Ale
Bourbon Barrel Russian Imperial Stout
Valley Brew Skullsplitter Root Beer

Our beer menu set, Steve packed up some goodies for our chefs to play with, in finalizing the menu.

Sounds delicious doesn’t it?  Well, you should come.  RSVP here.

Tags: Humphry Slocombe, notoberfest, ryan farr, steve altamari, valley brewing

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 20th, 2009 at 7:05 pm and is filed under beer dinner. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.