Beer Buyer Ryne Schofstal

After a wonderful opening beer (Professor Fritz Briem’s 1809 Berliner Weisse) the dozen attendees who squeezed into Pastoral’s tiniest store were treated to three beers, one cider and four Cheddar cheeses that were each delicious and startlingly different from one another. The cheeses were:

* Prairie Breeze, a sweet, creamy cow’s milk number from Iowa.

* Chevre Noir, a deeply-flavored and -textured goat’s milk cheese from Quebec.

* Montgomery’s Farmhouse Cheddar, the gold-standard, Neal’s Yard clothbound from Somerset, England.

* Widmer 6-year Cheddar,  a fudgey, fruity American style from across the Cheddar curtain in Wisconsin.

The cider was a dry-ish tart apple example from Crispin, and it was paired with the Prairie Breeze.  Chevre Noir cuddled up to the Bierre de Garde (Brasserie Castelain, France).  For the Monty’s, Ryne went with Bear Republic’s classic west coast pale ale, Racer Five, and the Widmer was paired with Firestone Walker’s reserved Porter.  A good cross-section of beer styles was also part of the plan.

Not surprisingly they all played nicely together. As Ryne noted, cheese loves beer (and cider).  On paper, I might have looked to swap the beers of the last two pairings. I usually try shield British Cheddars from assertive American hop bombs. But after tasting them, I think the Racer 5 has enough restraint and balance so that it didn’t step on the Montgomery’s. Also, the fudgey texture of the Widmer complemented the roast in the Firestone Walker Porter. We crossed the pairings and tasted other combos and most of them worked very well.

Ryne, a culinary grad from the beery state of Pennsylvania, has been with Pastoral for just about a year. He plans to conduct similar tastings about twice a month, alternating from the Lakeview to the Loop (Lake Street) locations. Check the website for more details, and you can register for email notices. Pastoral began in 2004 with the Lakeview store and has grown to three Chicago locations including the French Market, at Ogilvie Transportation Center.

Victory Prima Pils is a multi-award winner.

Ah Pilsner, the most ubiquitous beer in the world!  For much of the 20^th Century, this single style was simply synonymous with beer in the United States, and in any other part of the world that did not have its own strong beer culture.

At its worst, Pilsner (or Pils, Pilsener, Pilz) is a pedestrian refresher. There are numerous anemic examples made on nearly every continent but Antarctica—and I hear there is a brewery opening there shortly. But when it is done well, Pilsner is a beautifully-balanced style as noted by David Miller in his 1990 brewing book Continental Pilsener:

“It is light without being insipid or bland; hoppy, yet smooth and mellow. It is simultaneously refreshing and immensely satisfying—two characteristics that may seem to be mutually exclusive and that are not, in my opinion, so successfully combined in any other beer style.”

Miller goes on to say that this balance, and the sublime understatement of Pilsner’s flavor profile have played a major role in making it the most successful  beer style in the world.  Of course there is much more to the story than that.

Numerous beer and brewing histories recount the parallels between 19^th century industrialization and the rise in popularity of golden lager beers. The advent of controllable gas-fired kilning allowed for lighter colored malts. Eventually refrigeration aided in a more precise production of lagers, which prefer a cool fermentation and cold aging. The newly-developed ability to isolate yeast strains was integral to producing clean-flavored beer where malt and hops need not share the stage with yeast flavors. Even the emergence of cheap glassware came into play. Dark ales tasted great from pewter and earthenware vessels, but clear, delicate drinking glasses were the perfect match for a bright golden Pilsner.

Fast forward to the 21^st century.  Belgian style beers and hoppy American IPAs are building a niche market from Tampa, Fla., to Naples, Italy, and all points in between. Yet we still have plenty of Pilsners.

Pilsner Urquell, from the Czech Republic, has long been considered the standard for the Bohemian sub-style.

The Beer Judge Certification Program Identifies three sub-styles of Pilsner: German Pilsner, Bohemian Pilsener, and Classic American Pilsner. All three are described as crisp, clean and golden with a nice balance of bitterness and malt. They should also be highly carbonated.

For many years Pilsner Urquell has been the commercial standard, particularly when considering Bohemian Pilsner. There are other great Pilsners from the Czech Republic and Germany–the best ones probably from smaller breweries that do not send them around the world. Of course these days, those of us in the U.S. don’t have to look far to find a great Pilsner. Victory Brewing, Downington, Pa., has won accolades for its Victory Prima Pils. Rogue Ales, of Oregon makes  a couple of outstanding Pilsners, too.  In Chicago, Metropolitan’s Flywheel Bright Lager is a nice, clean beer, that is essentially a Pilsner. It is available in the bottle, and on tap across the market. Many brewpubs keep a Pilsner on tap. In Chicago this includes Haymarket Brewpub, with its well-balanced Speakerswagon Pilsner. Some European craft brewers send Pilsner to export, and among the big Munich brands, Spaten’s  is a nice offering, and it is widely available around the world.

A good Pilsner pairs easily with lots of different foods. That crisp bitterness and robust carbonation cut and lift hearty, spicy dishes. It also works pretty well with fish, salads and even desserts.  Numerous cheeses pair nicely with Pilsner. I would recommend chevre with peppercorns for a lighter, hoppier beer, and an aged American Cheddar or an Alpine cheese from Europe (or the stateside interpretations), for a sweeter, malty Pilsner. A really dry Pils can also work with a quality aged Gouda.

Attendees sample a bit of everything and choose a favorite food, a favorite beer and a favorite specified paring.  The annual offerings include some pretty serious beer cuisine that’s a far cry from the pedestrian pub grub that was long ago associated with brewpubs.

Since 1977, Chicago Beer Society has been organizing beer events for its members.

I was able to attend again this year and enjoyed it immensely.

I kicked things off with a sour soup and a steak and mushroom slider on a pretzel bun. This came from the combined team of the Chicago area Rock Bottom franchises.  The soup reminded me of a traditional Polish white borscht (sausage and boiled egg bits included), but the sour and pepper was totally amped up. The slider was just perfect. Two Brothers served an outstanding short rib dish cooked in a reduction of its Northwind Imperial Stout. It included manchego horseradish mashed potato, which was about as close as we got to a cheese and beer pairing at this year’s event.  Northwind was the pairing beer and it all came together very nicely.  I also got a huge kick from the mustard braised pork belly/chorizo  served by Haymarket Brewpub. That Fuji apple-carrot-jalapeno slaw made the whole thing.  I was also digging one of Haymarket’s bonus beers—the Hogbutcher Belgian IPA.

Speaking of bonus beers, Revolution Brewing poured Weegene London Porter, a second-runnings small beer  made from the mash of the Huegene Porter, which is itself a bigger spin on the brewery’s standard Eugene Porter.  With perfect body, a full roasted flavor, and a 4.7% ABV this was a delicious quaffer. I will give it a special Cheese and Cheers session beer nod. Wish I had a growler of it right now…hmm… a trip to the brewpub today, maybe? Also very much enjoyed the Juliet and the Grapefruit Sofie from Goose Island Beer Co.

Three Floyds Brewing, a Chicago brewery with a geographical issue, is a perennial fave at the Shoot Out. Since opening its pub around 4 or 5 years ago, the Castleburgers are a distant (but fond) memory. Floyds chef Mike Sheerin whipped up a bacon-infused lamb belly garnished with a wonderful sauce, bits of caramelized sweetness and cilantro. It played beautifully with Floyds’ Moloko Stout.

The award winner for the pairing went to an entry that had my attention as soon as I saw the program.  Revolution’s pastry chef Courtney Baldy brought ice cream. An ice cream pop on a stick, laced with Cherry Black Power stout and coated in malt chocolate. It was paired with that big, sweet barrel-aged stout, and together it was a symphony of sweetness roast, and bitterness.

The Zhou B was a fine place for the event, while I have a sentimental attachment, and a better proximity to the former home at the Irish American Heritage Center, I would have nothing against a return to Bridgeport.

Several fellow CBSers remarked later in the evening that they were left yearning for another of those ice cream pops.  Certainly many of us were also left looking forward to next January. Or at least to the next Beer Society event, the Day of the Living Ales, scheduled for early March.

Normally I trend on the liberal side of this argument—I rarely begrudge a brewer or retailer the price of a good beer if there is some logic behind it. Mass-produced beer by definition costs less to make because there are efficiencies achieved. The last thing I want from the craft brewer is a reluctance to create something outstanding due to price point considerations.

Is it wrong for a beer (or a wine) to list for $599 on E-Bay?

On the other hand, I have little interest in overhyped, overpriced, artificially “rare” beers, and yet I can understand their appeal for certain beer enthusiasts and for the brewing companies who sell them. The wine article really speaks to the ideas of value, vs. hype, and finesse vs. boldness, themes that certainly have a familiar ring these days for craft beer fans.

Author Bill St. John notes that the 1982 red Bordeaux wines spawned an array of big fat, boozy reds that continue to hog the attention of the wine world.  While they should have their place, he argues, these brutes should not have crowded out so many other kinds of wine. But that is exactly what they have done. It might be argued that big, fat, hoppy, extreme beers cause similar migraines among some beer geeks.

But the pendulum swings.

Throughout the emergence of the extreme beer, there has been a small but steady interest in session beers, and regular beers. For wine?

“It is primarily a set of younger wine drinkers seeking lower-alcohol reds with greater finesse. But they are just coming into their own.”

Hmm… session wine?

About those big wines, St. John says:

“They are not what I believe better wine should be – about place, the very earth from which it comes.”

This illustrates one of the fundamental differences between wine and beer. Wine is all about agriculture, while beer is more like cooking. But recently, thanks to the expanded interest in (and understanding of) hops by beer consumers, there is an agricultural aspect to beer too. I see this in single hop pale ales and other beers with ingredients of specific origin.

Another continuing topic of debate in beer is whether or not brewers are too slavishly devoted to brewing along traditional style lines. I take a moderate view here—I love classics and weirdoes. Not sure if there is a wine correlation for this discussion.

For so long, especially in the U.S., beer was a lowest-common-denominator drink, while wine was prestigious and complicated. It is great to see the two moving closer to the center.  In the end, the best examples of both beer and wine, no matter how assertive or how subtle, should do two things. They should offer balanced, interesting flavors and stimulate sharing, conversation and camaraderie.

If an artificially-high price prevents casual enjoyment, everyone loses. But if overbearing price concerns keep a winemaker or a brewer from producing something truly spectacular, I would say we lose too.

Oh, and the cheese? Well if you want to pair a really nice moderately-priced cheese with an equally affordable wine or beer, you have plenty of options, especially from small Wisconsin cheesemakers, some of whom paid off their mortgages decades ago. How about a Carr Valley Creamery cheese with a beer from Stevens Point Brewery. You could just as easily match a really nice, barrel-aged American beer, (say something from The Lost Abbey),  with a special seasonally-released cheese that fetches a premium price. I’m thinking Rogue River Blue from Rogue Creamery.

As we wrapped up the tasting and note-taking for the pair we threw in a couple other beers to see how they might fair with the Point Reyes Blue–a Sam Adams Triple Bock (a big sweet thing that tastes like a cross between strong beer and maple syrup) and a Thomas Hardy’s Ale (a classic English Old Ale) both about 20 years of age. The heavy bodied, sweet Triple Bock tasted remarkably similar to when I first tasted this beer had some 16 or 17 years ago. It’s a beer with some quirky charms, and one that comes with a lot of sentiment for me. But it ran right over the cheese. Sure, that sweet flavor should have been a nice contrast to the angular acidity and salt of the blue cheese — I love drizzling honey on blue cheese. But the Triple Bock is so rich and so sweet, it leaves nothing in its wake.

The Thomas Hardy’s had the opposite problem. It’s a very nice beer, but very English. At nearly 12% ABV you might expect this beer to stand up to nearly any cheese, and it flirted with the Point Reyes.  But the Hardy’s is actually (ours was a 1991) is actually quite restrained, perhaps even delicate, at least for a beer of such strength. In the end, it’s lovely maltiness kind of got stepped on by the saltiness of the cheese. There is a cheese out there for these beers, but this just wasn’t it.

The takeaway from all this is that in pairing cheese and beer, it is pretty easy to find a good matches, but before you even try to put a pair together, think about intensity of flavor first.

Original Blue is the flagship of Point Reyes, a lovely family-owned company that morphed from progressive dairy farm to farmstead cheesemaker in the year 2000.  Original Blue has won numerous awards including, early this year, a gold medal Sofi award from the National Association for Specialty Food Trade (NASFT).   Hop Stoopid is a remarkable double IPA from Lagunitas, which began brewing in 1993 and has become well-known from coast to coast for its assertive beers.  Hop Stoopid weighs in at 8% alcohol and a ridiculous-sounding 102 IBUs of hops, but somehow manages to offer a lovely, balanced drinking experience. The company gives some possible explanation by divulging on the label that hop oils and extracts are used (rather than whole hops) in order to impart a cleaner hop flavor.

So let’s see if they have come to dance.

First the beer: Hop Stoopid comes in a 22-oz. bottle with a label that departs drastically from Lagunitas’ label graphic theme. Ours pours with a brassy color, a slight haze, and good carbonation, with a steady stream of bubbles, and a lasting white head. It presents a huge, amazing aroma of piney, citrusy hops and brown sugar malt.

The first sip explodes with a ton of malt flavor—sweet caramel, bakery flavors, and juicy fruit gum. That sweetness is punctuated, but not overwhelmed by all that hopiness—fruity, citrus, American hop flavors, and earthy bitterness, with a dry bitter finish. There are no medicinal, or solvent flavors that often come with overly hopped beers. After a few sips we don’t feel like we need to go to the dentist, if you know what I mean. The mouthfeel is full, but not thick, and the dry-ish finish maintains that balance of malt and hops. Nothing unpleasant here.

The cheese: I picked up the wedge from an upscale Dominick’s grocery store in Chicago. Original Blue is folded in a foil label, and ours came wrapped in shrink plastic. Just noticed that our pre-cut, wedge was slightly damaged in the busy open case at the store. The “nose” of the wedge is shmushed, and in some places there seems to be some post-packaging mold. You would not get these slight defects from a cut-to-order specialty store. That said, 95% of our wedge is in perfect condition.  It displays an ivory paste with specks or flecks of blue green underneath, and some blue green pin marks down the face of the wedge. The curd formation is visible at the back of the wedge. The curds must have been cut to the size of a pea. The aroma is lactic and cheesy enough that if it were a beer, it would smell like old hops.  As a cheese, fresh cream mingles with the acrid piquancy of the penicillin mold. Its smells like a blue. The flavor is a mix of cream, salt, and lemon chicken soup. It’s all caught up in a creamy, soft, texture, so delicate it melts in your mouth, and feels as if it would melt if you just breathed on it. That soft melting texture means that there is no thick coating left on the palate once the cheese is swallowed.

Beer and cheese: With a sip of Hop Stoopid after the bite of Original Blue, the flavors mingle nicely as the beer washes across the tongue. There is not much texture left from the cheese, but plenty of flavor. Those bright cheese flavors contrast with and accentuate the rich, malt flavor of the beer. Hoppy flavors jump in and complement the piquancy and lemony flavors of the cheese. The intensity is in nearly-perfect balance. Place the cheese and beer into the mouth together, and the already-moist cheese turns into liquid—a liquid with a bright, spicy flavors. The creaminess of the cheese and the complex malty flavors of the beer also dance nicely together. Like many blue cheeses, Original Blue has no rind. To add texture, we used a salty, sesame cracker and pecan halves. The pair stood up nicely to the accouterments, and the mingling flavors and textures were delicious.

All told, this is a wonderful, amazing pair.  We found no reason to give it any less than Five out of Five stars. As mentioned, the geographic proximity of these two was serendipitous. That’s nice, but it is likely that you could just as easily take a great blue cheese from say, Center Point, Ore., or Faribault, Minn., and pair it with a balanced big hoppy beer from say, Colorado, Munster, Ind., or even Florida, in order to come up with a winner.

Saison De Lente was a big hit at our recent tasting.

The lineup included multi-award winners like Pleasant Ridge Reserve, and Cabot Clothbound Cheddar, style-standards like Rogue Creamery’s Caveman Blue and Allagash White, and upstarts like  Saison de Lente from the Brewery, and Cigar City’s Jai-Alai. In selecting wines we quizzed the cheesemakers and other experts on what varietals to pair with.

The occasion was the International Dairy Show, organized by International Dairy Foods Association., the Washington-based trade group representing companies like Dean Foods, Dannon, Nestle Ice Cream (Dreyer’s, Edy’s, and Ben and Jerry’s), and Sargento Cheese, as well as numerous local and regional dairy companies.  Managers from those companies walk the floor, where their suppliers (equipment, ingredients and packaging), display their own goods and services.

Many of these folks know a great deal about cheese, and like audiences anywhere, many among them are intrigued by the idea of putting complex flavors together to see what happens.

The wine and cheese pairings were well received. If I recall, the Clothbound Cheddar and Pinot Noir combo might have received the most nods.  I think a couple participants called it a 4.5 or 5 out of 5.  The beer pairing session drew a slightly larger crowd and maybe a few more oohs and ahhs. Belle Chevre’s Honey Breakfast Chevre, paired with Allagash White was a 5 of 5 consensus. Same for the Pleasant Ridge with Saison De Lente. I loved the Caveman with a Taylor LBV Port, but many of the participants found the cheese to be too salty. I thought it was spot on.

All-in-all it was really great to do these kinds of tastings for this kind of audience, and in this setting. It was also great catching up with the folks at the IDFA with whom I have had a long and pleasant relationship through my trade magazine activities covering the dairy business.

Speaking of events and cheese (and beer), on Saturday October 8, folks in Portland, Ore., will celebrate all things cheese with The Wedge. organized by the Oregon Cheese Guild, the farmer’s market-style event will be held in front of the Green Dragon Bistro & Brewpub, located at 928 SE 9th Ave. in Southeast Portland, between 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. There is a suggested donation of $5 which helps support to Oregon Cheese Guild. During the fest, SE 9th Avenue will be blocked off between Belmont and Yamhill to provide space for up to 35 cheesemakers, including Northwest participants from Fraga Farm Goat Cheese, Rivers Edge Chevre, Rogue Creamery, Tillamook Cheese, Tumalo Farms, Willamette Valley Cheese Company, and more. Rogue Ales, which never misses an opportunity to mix great cheese and great beer, is one of the event sponsors. Cheese and Cheers won’t be there this year, but perhaps in 2012.

For the Saturday night pairing I had stashed away a can of Belgian IPA from Brewery Vivant, Grand Rapids, Mich., and I selected the musically named Picolo, from Andante Dairy as the accompanist. Vivant is, among a recent batch of American Craft Brewers focusing primary on Belgian-style offerings (The Bruery, and Saint Somewhere come to mind).  Vivant was opened in late 2010 by Jason Spaulding, one of the founders of the successful New Holland Brewing Co., located just about 40 minutes from Grand Rapids.  Triomphe, one of the brewery’s year-round offerings, is a fine example of the Belgo-American style that emerged a few years ago—a balance of Belgian yeasty/malty sweetness and American hop bite.

Andante is a renowned, small-scale artisan cheesemaking endeavor in Petaluma, Calif.  Andante’s sole proprietor, Soyoung Scanlan is a modern-day renaissance woman–a lifelong student and accomplished performer of serious music, with a severe education in food engineering and biochemistry. She learned to make cheese at California’s Goat’s Leap Dairy, and in 1999 she established Andante in the creamery that had previously housed the storied Laura Chenel goat cheese operation. Since a move to Petaluma  a few years back,  most of Andante’s cheeses are made from organic cow’s milk, carefully sourced from a local Jersey herd. A few others are made with mixed milk.

These are skillfully made cheeses, highly decorated and not easy to come by. Picolo is a triple crème bloomy rind number made with the Jersey milk and an addition of crème fraiche. This was my first serious tasting of an Andante cheese and it was simply amazing. The half that I didn’t eat on Saturday went back to Grant Park for the jazz fest on Sunday and I enjoyed it with Boulevard Brewing’s Dark Truth Stout. But, on with the tasting notes:

First the cheese: Picolo is made in a small cylinder that is slightly taller than its diameter. Mine is about two inches around and about 2.5 inches tall, and the label says it weighs four ounces. It has a wrinkly off white ivory rind that has texture of a steamed dumpling. There are bright white patches of mold. It is soft and yielding to the touch.

The aroma is impressive, evoking barnyard and body aromas, big sour milk notes, a hint of mushroom, maybe some coconut milk. I am also getting pistachio, stale beer and sourdough yeast. The paste is white, and uniformly fluffy. The rind is paper thin.

The flavor is big and bold, but balanced. Sharp acidity at first, with some lemon and asparagus, just a hint of salt and pistachio joining in.  This is to cheese as straight lambic is to beer.  You just want one nibble after another, as the layers of flavors reveal themselves.  The delicate texture (it tears when you pull it like a mozzarella) is a testament to the care that goes into the cheesemaking—the gentle handling of both cheese and curd.  Let’s also recognize the wholesalers and retailers (in my case Pastoral’s loop store) for delivering the cheese in optimum condition.

The Beer: Vivant packages its beer in 16 oz. cans. I love the bright, colorful graphics on the Triomphe can. The beer pours very nicely at about 55 degrees—rich copper with an orange hue, tight white head that dissipates, just a bit of carbonation releasing, and good clarity. The nose is very Belgian–anise, honey and herbs.  It has a medium mouthfeel with some creaminess and just a bit of carbonation prickle.

The flavor is very malt-forward with candy sugar and just a suggestion of vanilla and clove at the outset, while a firm bitter backbone follows closely behind. Some warming alcohol lingers on the finish, not unexpectedly, for a beer that comes in at more than 8% ABV.  It is a delicious beer at a campsite, or a month later at home.

After tasting the cheese and chasing with the beer, out come the rich caramel notes from the malt. A lemony flavor emerges from the cheese. The cheese yields and melts when washed in the beer and the flavors continue to re-emerge. More vanilla from the Belgian yeast, for instance. Not much of a clash here, this is a genuinely nice pair. I will give it a 4.5 out of 5.

If you aren’t visiting Michigan any time soon you might have a hard time getting a four-pack of Triomphe, but a brewery near you should offer a Belgian IPA or the more traditional, lower gravity Belgian Pale Ale. Picolo won’t be an easy find either, but Cowgirl Creamery makes an excellent line of similar cheeses that are sold across most of the country.

* How painful it was to miss the American Cheese Society conference this year.  Friends who went to Montreal say it was well worth the trip. Rogue Creamery’s wonderful Rogue River Blue took best of show in the competition. This wrapped cheese, which also took top prize in 2009, will be available in most areas by late September. Pair it with a big west coast IPA, maybe Lagunitas’ Maximus.  Of course the Russian Imperial Stout from neighboring Rogue Ales would do nicely too. Or, how about an Oregon Pinot Noir or Syrah? Syrah leaves were used for this year’s cheese. Next year’s conference is in Raleigh N.C. Hope to see some of ya there.

* Visited Michigan again in July– the nearly annual camping trip with the kids in beautiful Ludington State Park. We dined outdoors at the Jamesport Brewing Co., (now a guild member), as we have in the past. Went to Meijer and picked up Triomphe, a Belgian IPA from Brewery Vivant, a relative newcomer to the booming Grand Rapids beer community. Met sis and brother-in-law at New Holland Pub on the return trip. Michigan’s local-loyal consumers have made it the Oregon of the Midwest when it comes to craft beer. More than 80 breweries now in The Great Lake State.  

* Nice beer dinner coming up next Wednesday (Aug. 31) at Marion Street Cheese Market, featuring Chicago’s 5 Rabbit Brewing. We paired the Latin-style wit with a wonderful California cheese in early July. Can’t wait to taste some more food pairings with 5 Rabbit beers. Reservations might still be available.

Okay. I feel better. Kids are back in school a week from Tuesday, so maybe I’ll get more regular.  The summer passed like a wisp of a cloud over Wrigley Field!

I like to tell them (whether they seek my advice or not), that the best way to learn more is to taste and read.  Those who already know about cheese hear about Michael Jackson (“…but I do love beer!”), and the beer geeks get an earful on Max McCalman:  “He’s the Michael Jackson of the artisan cheese world,” I tell them.

Seeing that it is now the middle of July, I should avoid calling this a Summer Reading List, but hey, I live in Chicago, where every year we expect summer to last until Thanksgiving, and that the Cubs will finally get back to the World Series. Call it what you will, but here is a list of some of my favorite books on beer and cheese:

1. Mastering Cheese, Lessons in Connoisseurship from a Matre Fromager; Max McCalman and David Gibbons, (2009). Reading this one takes me back to when I first encountered Michael Jackson’s works on beer some 15 years ago. Upon reading Mastering Cheese, beer writer Randy Mosher said it was the most informative and interesting book he had read lately on any topic. Filled with great, up-to-date information and gorgeous photos, McCalman’s books will turn you into a cheese geek, and look great on your coffee table. Cheese, a Connoisseur’s Guide to the World’s Best, (2005) by the same authors, is a must-have A to Z reference to 200 great cheeses.
2. The Great Beers of Belgium; Michael Jackson (1993). Sure, anyone new to beer might want to start with something more fundamental. And yes, there are fresher guides to beer Belgium than Jackson’s (last update in 1998), but this title has The Master writing about the beers he may have loved the most. It absolutely transports the reader, and has inspired geeks worldwide to transport themselves to a small European country they might have otherwise overlooked. Sadly, with Jackson’s passing in 2007, his tremendous body of work is now finite. A 30-year career produced plenty to pick from starting with The New World Guide to Beer (1977) and concluding with Beer: Eyewitness Companions (2007). The Beer Hunter BBC Series, which aired in 1989, is available (although not widely) on DVD, and on VHS, and there is no better way to get your feet wet (or should I say your moustache) than with the six-part series.
3. Tasting Beer, An Insider’s Guide to the World’s Greatest Drink, Randy Mosher (2009). Mosher’s comprehensive book now serves as the most useful primer on what beer is all about. Thoroughly researched and a pleasure to read, Tasting Beer is a great starting point for cheeseheads who want to understand beer as we know it in the 21^st century.  Mosher is now describing a beer world that Jackson helped create, and he does an excellent job of it.
4. The Atlas of American Artisan Cheese, Jeffrey P. Roberts (2007). These kinds of books are out-of-date almost as soon as they are in print, but there are so many good stories here that it remains a must-have for anyone interested in American artisan cheese and its parallels with craft beer. Roberts discovered more than 340 artisan cheese makers in the U.S., and those are just the ones for which there was enough information to fill a page in this lovely book. Atlas Includes a few style-specific beer pairing suggestions.
5. Travels with Barley, A Journey Through Beer Culture in America, Ken Wells. Published in 2004, Travels anticipates craft beer’s transition from a geeky niche to a keystone of current pop culture. Wells, a Wall Street Journal reporter, took a literal trip along the full length of the Mississippi River looking for the perfect beer joint and the essence of American beer. Along the way he discovered craft beer, and hung out with craft beer gurus at events in Portland, Ore., and Houston. Wells comes close to finding what might be the best beer joint in America, but concludes that a beer joint “can pop up anywhere.” He also finds that as complex and interesting as beer can be, the cold can of PBR on a fishing trip with your father has lost none of its significance. The salient point is this: A real reporter, who was not the slightest bit a beer geek at the outset of the story, could not dismiss craft beer as part of the larger picture of beer culture. The fact that Wells actually became a beer geek, shows how significantly the American beerscape has changed in the last 30 years.
6. Cheesemonger: A Life on the Wedge, Gordon Edgar (2010). This is a fun book for anyone who likes to buy artisan cheese, and essential for those who sell it. Edgar is a product of the San Francisco politico—punk scene who got into cheese while working as an owner-employee at a food co-op. Of course he fell in love with cheese. Edgar is very funny. Be warned that you will be chortling in public if you read this one on the bus or the train.
7. Ambitious Brew, the Story of American Beer, Maureen Ogle (2006). Ogle is a true historian who loves subjects that perspire with folklore (she has also written books about Key West, and the history of household plumbing). Ambitious Brew offers detailed research and thorough presentation, and it’s fun to read.
8. The Brewmaster’s Table, Garret Oliver, (2003). This is the only book I know of  that looks at the spectrum of pairing possibilities for beer and fine food. It’s a hefty read, at times the pace is slow, and It also leans heavily toward European beer (and slightly toward beer snobbery). But Brewmaster’s Table is packed with great information and insights. It even has some brief references to cheese and beer.
9. The Complete Joy of Home Brewing, Charlie Papazian (Third Edition 2003). Yes, there are other books and authors who might offer a deeper technical guide to home brewing. Sure, home brewers should read those, and the excellent “style books” published by the Brewers Association. That said, I also think every home brewer ought to go back and read the Old Testament. If not, one would risk approaching home brewing the way one might approach mastering the intricacies of rust removal.
10. The All American Cheese and Wine Book, Laura Werlin (2003). My friend Jeff Roberts recommended this book, knowing that I plan to write a book about beer and cheese. Werlin lived for some time in wine country, and is also immersed in the artisan cheese community. She knows the material. The loving images presented by Werlin and photog Andy Ryan made me yearn for the salty tang of cheese and the crisp acidity of wine—this beer guy bought a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc for the occasion. Werlin covers the wine and cheese basics very nicely, and then she offers step-by-step instructions, charts, and other insights on pairing, plus a bunch of great recipes for cheese-based dishes that go with wine, and profiles of wine makers and cheese makers. This makes a super birthday present.
11. American Curds and Ale, David Phillips (2012)?  This book has to be written.  I have a proposal, an outline, and a table of contents completed, plus more than a dozen of the 100+ pairings that would go into the book.  Literary agents and publishers have been contacted, but I am still looking for one or the other to run with the proposal.  If you, dear readers, know of someone in this arena who might help, please drop me a line at david@cheeseandcheers.com.

Sincere apologies to the authors and publishers of the many other great topical books that did not get proper mention here.  Names that readers can Google include Janet Fletcher, Ray Daniels, Stan Hieronymous, Liz Thorpe, Jeff Sparrow, Lew Bryson, Tim Webb, Phil Markowski, and Sam Calagione (for a book that chronicles the launch of Dogfish Head Brewery). –Cheers!