Bale Breaker Recipes: Quarantine Cooking

Bale Breaker’s Social Media Manager, Sara G, is confined at home in Seattle. To get through this time, and to find any excuse to go out and grab more beer, she’s cooking up Bale Breaker recipes that you can follow along with at home.

Like many of you, I’ve been spending more time than usual at home over the past few months. I’ve been a remote employee with Bale Breaker for nearly a year now, so being quarantined wasn’t as huge of an adjustment for me as it was for so many of my friends, family, and coworkers – but I did have to nix my biweekly trips across the mountains from Seattle to Yakima. I’m missing that hop-scented paradise, and in an attempt to feel like I’m still hanging out in the brewery every other week, I’ve thrown myself into a new Bale Breaker-centric hobby: figuring out how to cook with beer. 

First up: LEOTA MAE LOAF 

Bread felt like the obvious place to start, especially as my Instagram feed slowly transformed from travel and outdoor adventure shots to non-stop #foodporn photos of everyone’s homemade sourdough. I’m not much of a baker, and with yeast becoming a HOT commodity at the grocery store, I was thrilled to find out that you can substitute beer in place of yeast and still come up with a tasty bread – no decades-old starter needed! Recipe adapted from I Am Baker. 

Ingredients:

• 3 cups flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 2 tsp salt
• 1 (12oz) can Leota Mae IPA
• 1 stick unsalted butter, cold 

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Spray a 9x5” loaf pan down (she calls for a glass or light colored pan which I did not have – and it was just fine! Use whatever you’ve got, it’s a pandemic)
2. Mix together the flour, baking powder, and salt. (My baking powder was expired… again, it’s a pandemic! It worked just fine).
3. Pour the beer into the dry ingredients. Stir to combine – the batter will be thick.
4. Pour the batter into your loaf pan.
5. Cut the stick of butter into tbsp-sized slices and place on top of the raw batter evenly.
6. Bake for 35-45 minutes – mine was done right at 35 mins.
7. Allow to cool on the counter for 5 minutes until all of the butter is soaked back up into the bread. 

I had very little faith in my ability to make this bread. Like I said, I rarely bake, plus I had expired baking powder, the wrong pan, and salted butter vs. the recommended unsalted. And while adding the butter to the batter before baking, I felt a little gluttonous with all that butter. But lo and behold, once it all soaked in, I must admit, the butter did a great job of balancing the bitterness of the Leota Mae. Sure, it didn’t exactly look like the Instagram-ready sourdough of my dreams, but it tasted delicious! 

 

Next, in my journey: FIELD 41 BEER CAN CHICKEN 

This was definitely the recipe I was most excited to try. Is there anything that makes you feel more accomplished on a weekday evening than cooking a whole chicken? Beer can chicken is a classic, easy way to get a moist, flavorful bird relatively quickly. I was a little nervous about the bitterness level of an IPA (which, when coupled with heat, would likely increase), and I didn’t want to have to use a full stick of butter like I did in my beer bread recipe to balance those flavors. So, I turned to Field 41 Pale Ale to save the day. Recipe from Food Network. 

Ingredients:

• 2 tbsp smoked paprika
• 2 tbsp salt
• 2 tbsp onion powder
• 1 tbsp cayenne pepper
• 1 tbsp cumin
• 2 tsp thyme
• 2 tsp oregano
• 2 tsp pepper
• 2 tsp garlic powder
• 4lb chicken, washed and dried
• Vegetable oil
• 1 (12oz) can Field 41 Pale Ale

 Directions:

1. Mix the spices together into a rub.
2. Preheat your grill to medium-high heat.
3. Rub the chicken and its cavity down with the oil. Cover the entire chicken with the spice rub – including the cavity.
4. Pour out ¼ of the beer (and by pour out, we all agree I mean “drink”). Put the chicken right on top of the beer can, so it’s sitting upright.
5. Place the chicken in the center of the hot grill, making sure to keep it from sitting directly on the flame.
6. Close the grill and cook for 1 to 1½ hrs, or until a thermometer reads 165°F – mine went for about an hour and 20 mins. Once cooked, cover loosely with foil and let rest for 10 minutes before carving. 

This was truly insane. The skin crisped up perfectly and the spice rub was a perfect balance of spicy and smoky, while the beer kept the inside extremely juicy and tender. An easy, low-effort way to make a perfect chicken!

And Finally: CHIPOTLE CASKMATES CHICKEN

I realized I had a tiny bit of our Jameson Caskmates Topcutter IPA Edition left, and just knew I had to make something with that. So, in came Chrissy Teigen’s Chipotle-Honey chicken. This is from her cookbook, Cravings, but I found a copy of the recipe I used online here. 

Recipe:

• 5oz canned chipotle chiles in adobo
• 1 ½ cup barbecue sauce
• ½ cup light brown sugar
• ¼ cup Jameson Caskmates Topcutter IPA Edition
• 20 garlic cloves
• 4 large bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs.
• 4 bone-in, skin-on chicken drumsticks.
• 4 tbsp honey
• 1 large firm mango, pitted and diced
• ½ firm avocado, diced
• 3 tbsp red onion, finely diced
• ¼ c cilantro leaves
• Limes, salt and pepper

Directions:

• In a blender or food processor, combine the chipotles, barbecue sauce, brown sugar, whiskey, garlic, and the juice of 1 lime. Process until smooth. (Yes, you will be thinking – wait, TWENTY garlic cloves?! Just go with it).
• Season the chicken generously with salt and pepper, then marinade with 2 cups of the chipotle sauce. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours and up to 1 day.
• Preheat the oven to 375°F.
• Remove the chicken from the marinade and transfer to a foil lined baking sheet.
• Bake until almost cooked through and the edges are beginning to char, about 35 minutes. Remove from the oven and brush with the remaining sauce, drizzle with the honey, and return to the oven until cooked through, about 10 minutes.
• Meanwhile, mix together the mango, avocado, onion, cilantro, lime zest and lime juice from ½ lime, and salt and pepper to taste. Top the chicken with the salsa and enjoy!

This chicken turned out great – despite the fact that I accidentally added all the marinade to the chicken rather than the recommended 2 cups (I blame the Caskmates)! The whiskey perfectly complemented the smokiness of the chipotles, and the mango salsa cooled everything down a bit. I paired mine with a Clarity Rarity (the citrus notes in that Hazy IPA went with this chicken perfectly), but if I were to have it again, I’d serve it with a Mango IPA – and lucky for you, you can buy that on our webstore right now!

This Memorial Day, I encourage you to incorporate beer into your barbecuing. Be sure to tag us @balebreaker and let us know if you try any of these recipes, or if there’s any other way you’ve used our beer in your cooking! 

Posted May 22, 2020