The Classic Cookie That You Should Be Pairing With Beer
Typically, we'd pair beer with barbecue chips or other snacks like sea-salt-covered edamame, pretzels and peanuts. So imagine our surprise when we learned there's a classic cookie that pairs perfectly with beer. We got this tip from Rich Higgins, a master cicerone, certified sommelier, and a former brewmaster.
"One of my favorite dessert pairings is just a classic chocolate chip cookie paired with a barleywine (bonus points for a bourbon-barrel-aged version)," he said. "North Coast Brewing's Old Stock Ale or Firestone Walker's bourbon-barrel-aged Sucaba are favorites of mine." The notes in these beers complement all the sweet flavors found in the cookies. Higgins elaborated, "The beers' deep toffee malts and vanilla-coconut bourbon flavors find perfect harmony with the cookie's brown sugar and brown-butter-y goodness."
Neither of those beers, or any barleywine for that matter, is low in alcohol. Each has an alcohol by volume (ABV) over 10%, but Higgins notes that it is that warm booziness that contrasts with the sweetness of the cookie to really lengthen the finish and enhance the overall tasting experience.
Incorporate a splash of the same beer into the cookie dough to create a perfectly harmonious pairing
Rich Higgins has completely sold us on this pairing. Thus, the next time we bake chocolate chip cookies, like our decadent brown butter chocolate chip cookies recipe, we'll be sure to reach for a barleywine instead of a cold glass of milk. The beer's intense flavors will help slice through the richness in brown butter cookies. We imagine dipping the cookies in the barleywine would be fun and make for a delicious pairing too.
To further elevate your beer and cookies pairing experience, try baking chocolate chip cookies using beer. After all, beer is the unexpected ingredient for richer chocolate cookies. Simply mix a few teaspoons of stout or barleywine into your cookie dough, like how you would stir in vanilla extract otherwise. Additionally, you can add a savory spin to your cookies by adding miso or using salty ingredients like pretzels as a mix-in or topping. This way, it'll be like you're pairing beer with a salty snack (or a sweet and salty snack).
After baking your delicious cookies, be sure to pair them with the exact beer you had used to make the dough with. Then, enjoy all the intense, complex, and rich flavors in the cookie and thank us and Higgins later.