An Evening With Anheuser Busch

* WARNING * WARNING * WARNING*
****THIS MEAL WAS COMPED****

Why on earth Anheuser Bush doesn't market some of its experimental, gift pack, and microbrew beers is beyond me. Well, I do know the answer to that, The King of Beers is exactly that, the largest brewer of beer in the world. No doubt Budweiser and Busch has a huge stadium and NASCAR following. Regular Budweiser isn't my favorite, although their Light is OK. Obviously, their standard beer has widespread appeal, so why mess with that? You sell more Volkswagons than Ferraris.



Nevertheless Budweiser does, admittedly, have a 'standard American beer taste' which is a polite way of saying its light on flavor. In fact, I'm a big Tecate fan for everyday drinking, so that's not too far off the mark when you want to grab a quick, cold brew on a hot day. Whereas I roll with a beer snob crowd, the fact is the average guy just wants to get loaded on something drinkable and refreshing.

So, when a rep from Anheuser Busch contacted me about a beer and cheese pairing, I was a tad skeptical, but all over it like white on rice...which is an ingredient in Budweiser.

The event was held at the sleek Mondrian on Sunset Strip, so they knew how to throw a party in style. Let's face it, AB has plenty of money to throw around, and lucky for us! We were the first ones to arrive in a penthouse room that was set up with a banquet table full of beer and cheese.

So, while we were waiting for other food writers to arrive, we chatted with George Reisch , Jaques Haeringer, and Javier I Don't Know His Last Name. George and Javier are brewmasters, and Jaques turned out to be chef-owner of a restaurant we've eaten at many times, Washington DC-renowned L'Auberge Chez Francois, so it was a real cool coincidence to meet him.



George is what I would call a Beer Evangelist, so I can respect this guy. The tasting centered around five beers and five cheeses, with several accompaniments to make sure we didn't get too tanked. George led the evening with his passionate talk about beer and tasting beer, and while he represents AB, he clearly showed a passion for all beer.



Jaques positioned himself a the head of the table, which is his rightful place because he makes a great master of ceremonies. Quite a character, and very interesting to talk to.

So, that sets up the scene. There were about five couples who showed up, connecting to LA foodwriting in some fashion or another. I'll impart to you what I learned about tasting beer, because there is a technique brewmasters use.

Each beer came with a different style glass to reflects its particular flavor characteristic. You pour the beer into the middle of the glass to produce a head, he explained, because bottled beer has a higher carbon dioxide concentration than keg beer. This allows for the release of some of the gas, so you don't feel bloated while drinking. The prefered temperature to serve is between 40 and 50 degrees.

Fill the glass halfway, then tilt the glass at a 90 degree angle and roll. This helps dissipate the head a bit. Of course I got rambunctious and filled my glass all the way, cause I likes drinkin'. You sniff the glass, then take a drink, allowing it to roll over the tongue before swallowing. This allows you to enjoy the sweet notes on the tip of the tongue, then the bitter toward the end. Made sense to me!

Our first pairing was a Mt. Tam Triple Creme from Cowgirl Creamery and a Michelob Light. Yeah, I know, I was less than enthusiastic about this beer, but it actually was a good contrast to the mushroomy-creaminess of the Mt. Tam. Still. Michelob is not my usual preference, but in context it went well with the cheese. Well, the cheese enhanced the flavor of the Michelob.

Ok, onto round two. Now, I'm encapsulating this since there was much discussion, banter and nibbling between tastes. Jaques would regale us with some recipes and his energetic philosophy, and we'd hit them with questions. My first, pointed question to Javier has been dogging me since I started drinking.

Why rice?

Succinctly, Javier said during WWII there was a shortage of grain, so AB decided to use rice in its brewing process, and they’ve continued with it. I’m not a Budweiser enthusiast, so I’m not sure if the rice contributes to that or not, but he did say it has a very neutral flavor. That’s cool, they sell plenty of it, so it must work for some. As I said, my favorite everyday beer is Tecate.



Now for some craft beers. The next one was Harbin paired with Camembert, and this was a great combination. Harbin is a beer they market in China, and I have to say it holds it own against Tsing Tao. Harbin was an independent Chinese brewery that was purchased in 2004 by Anheuser Busch. I never had Harbin before, so I don’t know if there is a difference in flavor, but I imagine AB doesn’t mess with a good thing.

It was light, drinkable, and had the good Asian bite you find in many beers from that part of the world. The flavor of the Harbin cut the rich saltiness of the Camembert, which, by itself, would be a very rich flavor.

Next up, Stone Mill Pale Ale paired with Old Sport Cheddar. This is my new favorite cheese, I can tell you that. The pale ale had a hearty richness and mild sweetness. It is also certified organic, which is a good selling point for many people. I personally don’t care, I just like flavor. It had a nice hoppy flavor with overtones of caramel. Nothing too strong, certainly not as bold as Red Hook.

Now, the cheddar was a sharp kick in the teeth with nice grain and distributed salt crystals. It could almost be described as a premature parmesan. Not hard like parmesan, but it had a nice acrid bite that I love. By not being an overpowering beer, the pale ale was a nice contrast and good mellowing agent.



For the fourth tasting, we had a Jack’s Pumpkin Spice paired with a Wensleydale Cranberry. While I wasn’t a fan of the cheese, they did go well together. The beer was sweet without being overpowering, and the spices were mildly complex. I don’t think you could drink more than one or two, however, since it is a flavored beer and tends to get heavy after a few. Still, it was milder than many other seasonal or celebratory beers I’ve had, like Sierra Nevada Christmas Ale, which tastes like they threw a pine tree into the vat.

The last beer was my favorite, Michelob Porter. I notice the last year or so they’ve used the Michelob label to release some special brews, and this was a good one. It was paired with Oregonzola, which is a gorgonzola blue. This combination was a winner. The beer was chocolaty and smoky -very smoky- with a nice creamy head. It played off the bleu well, with the sharpness of the gorgonzola picking up the wave of smokiness.

So, you might have thought we got tanked by the end of the evening. Not really, we didn’t polish off all the beer (I know, that’s a foul in most households), and there was plenty of other food to absorb what we drank. It also lasted a little over three hours.

There was plenty of chatter and lots of information. One interesting note is that AB has refrigerators full of other beers from around the world, so that brewmasters can not only enjoy them, but come up with some new flavors. Clearly, most of these don’t reach market, AB is not known for its microbrew or craft beers, they stick with their core competency. I have to say, I was impressed with their array of flavors, but as George said, they have all the resources and expertise in the world, so naturally they could produce any beer they want to. Yeah, I hadn’t thought about that, you assume a company makes one particular kind of beer, they might be myopic, but the decision to only market drinkable lagers is based on money. Craft brews simply wouldn’t be as large of a profit center, which makes sense.

This wasn’t only selling Anheuser Busch products to food writers, although I just wrote a lengthy article about it, Jaques really did a good job throwing out recipes and pairing the flavors. Most of the brews I talked about will only be released as part of a gift pack, so its not like they’re preparing the public for a slew of new flavors.

Well, there you go. As I said, this was a free meal and free booze, so interpret that any way you want to. I’m not a fan of their regular beers except Bud Light, frankly the American default I go with is Miller because of its flavor characteristics, but AB does a fine job with producing alternate flavors. As I said, I really don’t drink American beers, except for some microbrews, so I go with Mexican for my everyday beer.



One last thing, they had a pile of hops on the table for us to check out. Hops, if you didn’t know, are in the same family Cannabacae, which includes marijuana. Yeah, I’ve smoked pot before, so there’s no need to freak out, but splitting open a hop smells exactly like marijuana. No, you can’t smoke them, but it was an interesting similarity I wasn’t prepared for. Ok, I tried to smoke one, but I just got drunk off it.