Jul 072008
 

The Session logoThe Session is a monthly event for the beer blogging community which was started by Stan Hieronymus at Appellation Beer. On the first Friday of each month, all participating bloggers write about a predetermined topic. Each month a different blog is chosen to host The Session, choose the topic, and post a roundup of all the responses received. This month’s Session is being hosted by Rob DeNunzio of Pfiff! – head over there to see this Session in its entirety! For more info on The Session, check out the Brookston Beer Bulletin’s nice archive page.

Sorry to be posting late with this month’s Session – my wisdom tooth adventure took more out of me than I anticipated, and throwing a holiday in the mix didn’t help any. However, I am a firm believer in “better late than never”, so here’s my belated contribution.

This month’s topic is “drinking anti-seasonally”. Sure, there are certain beer styles that just go well with different seasons – light, refreshing lagers and citrusy wheat beers for summertime, or imperial stouts and sweet, heavy Belgians as the weather cools. You could say there is often a natural pairing of weather and beverage – an icy winter’s night just begs for the warming sensation of a high-alcohol big beer, sipped slowly by a raging fire, while a day of exhausting yardwork under a hot sun deserves a light, ice-cold gulper that won’t go to your head. Enjoying a seasonally-appropriate beverage can accentuate the best of both the weather and the beer, but I don’t think there is anything wrong with coloring outside the lines from time to time.

After all, the weather is but one variable I use when deciding what the perfect beer for the moment would be. Am I eating a barbecue dinner, or enjoying a rich chocolate cake for dessert? Am I sitting on the couch enjoying a Saturday-afternoon ballgame, or am I having a nightcap before heading up to bed? Am I on a brewery tour with the opportunity to try a rare stout, or am I staring at a cooler full of Corona at the beach? All of these things and more come into play, and if my refrigerator contained every brand of beer available, I can guarantee I would be drinking a wide variety of different styles throughout a given season.

I liken beer’s “proper seasons” to wine’s “proper pairings” – red wine is to be paired with beef, white with fish and poultry. But who is to tell me I can’t enjoy a nice spicy shiraz with some blackened catfish, or a crisp pinot grigio with a steak? Such pairing guidelines are meant to be just that – a suggestion, a basic default option which will work, but not a set-in-stone regulation that cannot be broken.

That being said, when I brew I do like to plan around the seasons. I enjoy looking at the calendar and planning what I (and my guests) will be enjoying in the coming months. Perhaps I will brew a barleywine in July to enjoy next February. Or, I might want that pumpkin ale I’m dreaming of to be in bottles by Thanksgiving.

I guess it all comes down to personal choice, and I’m thrilled to have so many styles and options to choose from. If worrying that our beer is the wrong style for the season is the worst we have to deal with, I think we’re doing just fine.

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