Beer and Food

South Africa is renowned for excellent food and award winning wines and here at Shongweni Brewery we certainly have a place in our cellar for the red, white and sparkling wines produced here. We love wine, especially a good red from the Cape with a lamb roast, or a cold crisp chardonnay with seafood, but it can’t do everything.

So many of our foods, and spices tend to distort the flavour of a wine so, when it comes to food then there is no comparison, real food cries out to be married with real beer.

Real beer is the rising star with both the international and local cuisine that we are all eating today. The range of flavours and aromas in beer is vast, at least it is if you move away from the global mass-market beers that seem to dominate so many aspects of our beer related life, and even with many of the traditionally wine-friendly foods we think that real beer shows far greater compatibility.

Real beer really can match with any food, be it a spicy Cape Malay curry, fresh Atlantic seafood, Bobotie, a mutton curry Bunny Chow from Durban, a Potjiekos over a camp-fire, or any of the international food styles such as Mexican, Thai, Indian, American or Middle Eastern.

Beers have the bitterness needed to cut through fat and oils, the malt delivers caramel flavours that match those in food, the natural carbonation refreshes your palate, and the sweetness of some beers counters the heat of spicy dishes. We love our East Coast Ale shared with friends at a braai where it compliments those smoked flavours and cuts through the marinades and sauces, or our Wheat Beer with seafood or a Bunny Chow.

But don’t take our word for it, try it out, and to help you we have provided a few ideas on matching beer and food.

East Coast Ale– What can we say about this beer, except that it was inspired by South Africa for South Africa, and finds its natural home at the most renowned South African example of social eating, the braai! Whether it is boerewors, the typical farmers sausage, braaivleis such as lamb, beef or pork, or even prawns on a skottlebraai then nothing beats the match with this beer. As our friends say ‘It is the beer to braai for’. Elsewhere in the kitchen we find that our East Coast Ale is great with white fish, such as Hake, or grilled chicken, salads and pasta also works well with this beer, in particular those dishes with creamy or cheese sauces.

Wheat Beer– Our Wheat beer goes well with pretty much all types of Germanic cooking from sausages and wurst to eisbein. The beer is lightly hopped and with its high carbonation and acidity we find it the perfect beer for oily fish - try the Sardines that fill the Indian Ocean during the winter Sardine run. But it also goes well with lighter fish such as the Cape Salmon that we regularly catch from the sea. The beer is especially great if it is served with a slice of lemon. Don’t like fish and sausages? No problem, Wheat Beer is perfect with those summer salads and is particularly good with the avocados that grow around our brewery.

Fruit Beer– Depending upon which of our seasonal fruit beers is available to you the match with food might vary. You might like to try our mild pineapple beer with pork or chicken or the mango beer with a dessert like chocolate or malva pudding, or if you are in the mood then it is a perfect accompaniment to Duck, Goose, Turkey or Chicken. If you have the strawberry beer then you might like to try it with any dessert from chocolate brownies to vanilla ice cream.

We like to have a fruit beer served chilled in a champagne glass as an aperitif, an ideal way to start your meal!

Durban Pale Aleis a stronger beer with fuller carbonation and being crammed with malt and hops, unsurprisingly it goes well with roasted meats such as beef, lamb and pork, particularly those cooked over a spit-braai. It also goes well with chicken, in fact any meat where the key is caramelization of food in cooking. The higher carbonation levels in DPA are great when you match this beer with the ubiquitous Indian cuisine found here in Durban, but it would go just as well with a spicy Cape Malay curry. We find it goes particularly well when sat around the camp-fire with a potjie on the go, maybe it is something to do with the wood smoke, or just the comforting warmth and flavour of this stronger beer especially on a winters evening high up in the Shongweni hills.

West Coast Ale– Inspired by the micro-breweries of the American West Coast who have created their own unique beer styles this beer goes well with American style barbeque spare ribs, in fact any kind of marinaded meat over coals. Here in KwaZulu-Natal this beer is great with those honey marinaded pork strips, but equally at home with the excellent samoosas and rotis you can pick up in the Victoria Street market.

Of course nobody wants a ‘beer belly’ but then you don’t have to have one. Moderation and balance are the key ingredients to enjoying great beer and great food. Many people choose wine over beer to accompany a meal but in terms of calories a glass of wine is about the same as a bottle of beer, its just that we think that the beer offers far more to compliment food.

Enjoy your beer with food, after all, excellent quality, craft-brewed beer, unlike some wines, really is an affordable luxury that can change the way that you appreciate food.