Food pairing
Beer with stuffed peppers
Sweet peppers roasted until collapsing around a rice or grain filling, mild and gently aromatic.
Roasted peppers become markedly sweeter and take on a light char at the edges, and the filling — usually rice with herbs, sometimes pine nuts or currants — is aromatic rather than assertive. The whole plate sits at low intensity.
That is the constraint. A big beer will simply bury it, and the useful answers are moderate in strength and carry some aromatic character of their own: something herbal, spiced or lightly fruity that will meet the filling rather than shout over it.
Stuffed peppers rules a lot of beer out, but several beers do the job it needs equally well. Pick between them on preference — the reasons matter more than the order. The attribute doing most of the work is sweetness.
What to drink
London brown ale — strong
Enough residual sweetness to stand up to the dish rather than being flattened by it.
Czech dark lager — strong
Enough residual sweetness to stand up to the dish rather than being flattened by it.
English porter — strong
Beer and dish carry similar weight, so neither flattens the other.
Dark mild — strong
Enough residual sweetness to stand up to the dish rather than being flattened by it.
Irish red ale — strong
Beer and dish carry similar weight, so neither flattens the other.
Munich Dunkel — strong
Beer and dish carry similar weight, so neither flattens the other.
Alcohol-free pale lager — strong
Beer and dish carry similar weight, so neither flattens the other.
Alcohol-free wheat beer — strong
Beer and dish carry similar weight, so neither flattens the other.
What not to drink
- American barley wine — Delicate food needs a beer that stays out of its way.
- American lager — Sweet food makes a drier drink taste harsher than it is.
- American wild ale — Sweet food makes a drier drink taste harsher than it is.