Beer, pulque and a whole lotta seafood

For the past few weeks, I’ve been using Monday nights as an opportunity to do my weekly beer reviews. It has been pretty good so far. The only down side is that reviewing multiple beers can get expensive. I wish more breweries would bottle more of their beers in 22oz bombers as well as 6-packs but it is what it is. I plan on doing my weekly Beer in Review this week but at a later day this week.

Instead, I invited a few of my friends over and we had a very, very nice seafood dinner. The whole event was impromptu and as a result, I didn’t have the time to properly pair any beer with the food. Despite the lack of proper pairings, we did manage to throw back a couple of beers as well as a botle of pulque and mead. The dinner was a potluck and most of our guests prepared everything themselves.

I found a recipe for Ahi Poke that is pretty simple. I modified it somewhat based upon my own tastes but it worked out fine. Here’s the recipe:

• 2 cups of tuna (we went to the Asian market by our house and they sell them in packages in the seafood area. They’re not frozen but very, very cold), diced/dubed
• 1 red onion, diced
• 2 stalks (for lack of a better term) of green onion
• 3/4 cup soy sauce

• 3 tablespoons of sesame oil
• Sesame seeds for garnish
• 1 Thai pepper, chopped
• Salt
• Pepper

Cube the tuna and then place into a bowl. Dice the red onion, green onion, Thai pepper and mix with the tuna. Pour in the soy sauce, sesame oil and mix further. Salt and pepper to taste. I took some seaweed (conveniently placed right next to the tuna at the Asian market) and made a bed for the poke at the bottom of a bowl. I then plated the poke on top and added a few sesame seeds until I thought it looked right.

This dish was brought by our good friends Jason and Crystal. I requested this dish because, frankly, it’s damned good. Simply put, this is a steamed clam and mussel dish. He hasn’t divulged the broth he seamed the mussels in so the following ingredient list is purely speculation:

• Clams
• Mussels
• Kale
• Garlic
• White wine
• Bacon
• Blue cheese

As I said, this is purely speculation but it’s a mighty fine dish that keeps getting better as he refines his recipe.

This dish I kinda cheated on. The fish we picked up from the Asian market. What’s cool is that not only does the Asian market scale and clean your fish, they can fry it up for you as well. This practice just isn’t specific to this market, many Asian markets will do this. I did prepare the topping though and here’s the ingredients:

• 2 tomatoes, diced
• 1 yellow onion, diced
• 1 head of garlic, minced

Heat up your fry pan over medium-high heat. Add in about 2 tablespoons vegetable oil (we ran out of olive oil). Add onions and garlic and sauté until the onions are just starting to become transparent. Add the tomatoes and sweat until they are soft but not mushy. Add salt and pepper to taste. Place over the fish or you can serve this on the side.

My good friend Joey brought this dish. It’s a seafood linguini made with, just speculating, salmon, clams mussels and garnished with parsley and lemon. This was a rich and cheesy pasta dish with good flavor to it. Had this for lunch the next day, actually.

Pulque, Full Circle Brewing, 8.0% ABV

Pulque was the main reason I decided to have friends over. I picked up a bottle of it from Full Circle Brewing Company located in Fresno. I did a “Spotlight On” sometime ago that you can view here. The pulque pours out a gold in color, slightly hazy with noticeable yeast suspended in solution. They don’t filter over at Full Circle which adds to the “homebrewer” feel of the place. Because the pulque is more of an agave wine, it is still. The pulque has a very aromatic, agave aroma, think tequila but without the alcohol smell. The flavor is more of the same tequila flavor, just mellow and with a honey sweetness. There’s also none of the alcohol burning or flavor associated with the distilled spirit. Pulque is medium in body with slight alcohol warmth and still.

At 8% ABV, it’s a bit of a weak wine but even then, no one chugged the pulque and we all sipped it. In fact, I think people were very surprised by the pulque’s flavor so they babysat what they had to make it last longer. One couple even remarked on how refreshing the pulque was. I served it chilled.

17, Unibroue, 10% ABV

Unibroue is a brewery located in Quebec, Canada. I remember their bottles in BevMo as I think they have some of the most interesting labels. As with many breweries, Unibroue brews up a special beer on their anniversary. In the past, they’ve brewed up a Strong Pale Ale for their anniversary but this year, they’ve changed up and brewed a Belgian Dark Strong Ale. I only have a picture of the bottle and not the beer as we drank all of it because I remember to take a picture.

17 pours out a dark brown, hazy, with a lasting, off-white head. The aroma is a tantalizing mixture of sweet, yet complex malt aromas comprised of some Munich malt aroma, raisiny, dates and figs. No noticeable hop aroma. The flavor is very much like the aroma. The malt flavor is sweet, complex and ripe with dark fruit flavors such as raisins, dates and figs. I can also make out dark candi sugar flavors and slight alcohol notes. Hop flavor and bitterness was low. The body was medium-high with good carbonation with slight alcohol warming.

People enjoyed this beer as well and noted how smooth and sweet it was. When done correctly, the Belgian Dark Strong Ales are considered “dangerous” because they are able to hide their alcohol well.

To wrap up dinner, we munched on ice cream sandwiches. You had your choice of neopolitan or rocky road. By the time everyone had left it was well past midnight and nearing 1am. Everyone had a great time and we were entertained by some interesting conversation. As good as the food and drinks were, it’s really the people that make an event or get together memorable. We’re hoping to host/attend more of these types of dinner parties.

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