Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Try This At Home

Ingredients:

1 bottle (~12oz) Samichlaus doppelbock (the dark one - not the Helles). Samichlaus should be served like a fine port, barely below room temperature, and no cooler than 60F.










1 bar dark chocolate, preferably around 70%. Dagoba Conacado is 73%, and works beautifully.










Instructions:

1) Pour the Samichlaus into two small stemmed glasses - port, for instance, or small sherry. Reserve about a third of the bottle, keeping in mind that this beer is stronger than many wines.
2) Break up and arrange about half of the chocolate on a nice little plate.
3) Take a piece of chocolate and chew it a bit, allowing it to melt.
4) Have a sip of Samichlaus.

When it comes into contact with the chocolate, the Samichlaus will foam a little bit, creating an incredibly rich chocolate-malt mousse. Experiment with different proportions: this little adventure is as much about texture as it is about taste.


The fun of this pairing is that the characteristics of the ingredients go against type: the beer provides the sweetness and the chocolate cuts it. Perhaps there is a nuttiness that the chocolate draws out of the beer. Maybe, at least with the Conacado, there is a certain fruitiness, a skin-of-nectarine tang that, with its almost tannin-like mouthfeel, adds to the tawny port quality the Samichlaus already possesses.

But truly, this pairing is not about all that. A flute of Perrier-Jouët paired self-poured with a perfect strawberry is no less delicious; it is a scientific fact that Okhotnichya and zakuski will warm you even without a host to toast, but with these little indulgences no less than with the Samichlaus it is about having someone with whom to share.