Six years ago, there were only two establishments in Vancouver offering cask-conditioned ale (AKA Real Ale) on a weekly basis – Dix BBQ & Brewery on Thursdays and The Whip Restaurant & Gallery on Sundays. Craft beer was still very much a sub-culture confined to brewpubs and the rare establishment where a manager or owner happened to know a thing or two about a good brew. To get the word out about offerings and activities, I began publishing the CAMRA Vancouver newsletter on a weekly basis.
It was at that time that I also read Garrett Oliver’s seminal book on beer and food pairing, The Brewmasters Table. Oliver inspired me to delve deeper into appreciating beer and food together. I began encouraging others with a culinary appetite to join me. More than anything, I felt cultivating a Flemish sensibility for beer and food would also resonate with women, offering a more cultivated dining experience that mass-market lager could never offer.
As beer friendly chefs, like Mike Carter (when at Dix) and Lee Humphries (of FigMint at the time), made successful forays into this fledgling frontier, it created a bit of a stir that began drawing in novelty seekers from outside the tight circle of Vancouver Real Ale aficionados. Morris Anh of The Whip was also interested in exploring the affinities of beer and food. So to highlight their weekly program of rotating cask ale supplied by R&B Brewing, I suggested they host a multi-course dinner featuring firkins from different brewers. Thus, the Feast of Five Firkins was born.
The Feast was actually a challenging step for The Whip to take. Normally, a chef can taste a beer and create a dish to go with it. But if a brewer creates a special, one-off cask-conditioned ale, it can’t be sampled ahead of time. It requires a close relationship between chef and brewer to consistently create successful pairings. The Whip was also new to serving multi-course meals to the entire restaurant.
To their credit, The Whip rose to these challenges and created an award-winning event that has become an annual tradition which sells out each time. For this year’s Feast of Five Firkins, Chef Andre Tremblay created the following menu:
^ Three Chili Glazed Perch, wild rice cake, citrus sun-dried cranberry sorbet.
Pairing: Tofino Brewing Tuff Session Dry-Hopped Pale Ale
^ Dry-Rubbed Rabbit Loin, blackberry reduction, sweet potato purée, charred lobster mushrooms.
Pairing: Yaletown Brewing Brick and Beam IPA
^ Heirloom Tomato and Watercress Caprese Salad, lemon poppy seed Muscovy duck breast, Gruyère.
Pairing: Cannery Brewing Wildfire Black IPA
^ Seared Wild Boar Medallion, shank confit demi-glâce, caramelized winter squash, root ragoût.
Pairing: Storm Brewing Bourbon Barrel-Aged Wee Heavy
^ Fubá and Papaya Custard Cake, framboise sweet cream, ancho chili ice cream.
Pairing: R&B Brewing Kumquat Cream Ale
Aside from the excitement of anticipating the pairings, what makes the Feast a grand occasion is the ritual involved in presenting each course. Before the food is served, the brewer explains the ale they created and then ceremoniously taps their firkin.
^ Yaletown Brewing brewmaster, Iain Hill, taps his cask of Brick & Beam IPA.
The live ale is served, unfiltered and unpasteurized, directly from the cask as the next course is presented to the diners. This happens five times.
^ The Whip’s Rose Weir with the 2012 Feast of Five Firkins brewers.
And at the end, when the brewers and staff have been congratulated by all on a fine meal, the firkins are free to be drained by those who still have room left to indulge (and, perhaps, the next day off from work).
~ RG
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Great article Rick
Thanks to your important role developing the beer culture of Vancouver!