Roast Pork with Brown Ale Dinner and Beer Pairings

Brown Ale Roasted Pork Dinner with Craft Beer Pairings

Mary and I enjoy spending time cooking together so the kitchen has turned out to be a focal point in our house. We always cook from scratch – meaning it takes time – and it’s yummy. After our kids get home from school, we reconnect and talk about our days over dinner. We’re always looking for ideas for our river menu, and over the years we’ve come up with some incredible food and beer pairings. One of our all-time river favorites is a brown ale roasted pork loin recipe, with a brown ale sauce reduction that’s to die for.

We haven’t had that at home for a while, so I thought it would be nice to have for Mother’s Day. Once I got started with that as a base, I ended up planning a delicious beer paired dinner. Nothing like the creature comforts to make Mom happy. It wasn’t hard to do, and it was a lot of fun choosing beers and anticipating how everything was going to taste.

Here’s what was on the table Sunday night:

Apps – Assorted Cheeses, Wild-Game Summer Salami and Crackers; Beer – Alaskan IPA

Salad – Chopped Romaine w/Fruit & Herbal Balsamic Vinaigrette; Beer – Horal Geuze 2009

Dinner – Roast Pork Loin w/Brown Ale Chipotle Raspberry Cream Sauce, Rice Pilaf; Beer – Moose Drool Brown Ale (pork recipe adapted from The Best of American Beer & Food by Lucy Saunders)

Dessert – Chocolate Stout Cake w/Grand Marnier Ganache (recipe follows); Beer – Sierra Nevada 30th Anniversary Stout Fritz and Ken’s Ale

Chocolate Stout Cake

(adapted from the Great American Beer Cookbook by Candy Schermerhorn)

¼ cup cocoa powder (to dust baking pan with)
2 sticks butter
1 cup stout beer
2/3 cup (scant) Dutch-process dark cocoa powder
1 scant teaspoon salt
2 cups unbleached flour
2 cups sugar
1 ¼ teaspoon baking soda, sifted
2 extra large eggs
½ cup sour cream

• Heat oven to 350 degrees F
• Lightly dust a greased 9 ½-inch springform pan with cocoa powder.
• In a heavy saucepan or microwave oven, heat butter, beer and cocoa powder until butter melts. Cool.
• Sift dry ingredients together, add the beer-cocoa mixture, and beat thoroughly 1 minute on medium speed. Add eggs and sour cream and beat 2 minutes on medium.
• Pour batter into prepared pans and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until a pick inserted into the center comes out clean.
• Place pan on a wire rack, cool 10 minutes, remove the sides, and cool completely.
• Use a flexible spatula, spread the top of the cake with a thin layer of frosting (recipe follows) and cover the sides.
  Enjoy!

Unforgettably Chocolate Frosting – Grand Marnier Ganache

(adapted from the Great American Beer Cookbook by Candy Schermerhorn)

8 ounces high quality, extra-bitter chocolate, chopped – or semisweet chocolate chips
5 1/3 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/6 cup stout beer
2 cups powdered sugar
4 teaspoons liqueur – we like Grand Marnier (Amaretto, Frangelico, Kahlua) optional

• Melt chocolate and butter in heavy saucepan over medium heat. Whisk until just melted. Remove from heat.
• Combine cream and stout in a bowl and microwave for 45 to 60 seconds or until hot. Whisk into chocolate-butter mixture.
• Add powdered sugar, whisking until smooth.
• Add liqueur and whisk. Cool.

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