The Definitive Guide to Pairing Beer and Food

White wine with fish. Red with steak. Scotch after everything. Etc. Etc.

But what of the fella who craves some suds with his braised squab leg?

Here to upset the potential faux pas of ordering an IPA in the midst of Michelin-star greatness:

Food & Beer, a new book from the founders of Brooklyn’s Tørst & Luksus, the combination tavern/restaurant that pumps the country’s rarest brews through a flux capacitator.

The book’s goal? To teach you, intrepid beer orderer, how to act like you’ve been there before.

From the intro by Chef René Redzepi:

“For many people, beer, even if it is really good beer, isn’t considered an adequate pairing for fine dining. But since the domestic craft beer scene has been flourishing for at least forty years, and since European, especially Belgian, beers are now widely available, the problem lies not in the quality of beer but in our perception of it.

It’s one thing to have a moment of revelation. It’s another thing completely to open a bar and restaurant to test the hypothesis. And that’s what Daniel Burns and Jeppe Jarnit-Bjergsø have done.”

Tørst & Luksus is the collaborative endeavor of Daniel Burns and Jeppe Jarnit-Bjergsø, the former a restaurateur who’s worked with some of the world’s most celebrated culinary experts (David Chang, Heston Blumenthal et al.), the latter brewmaster at Denmark’s Evil Twin and formerly the beer director at Redzepi’s Noma.

More than just a cookbook — though it does offer detailed recipes — Food & Beer tells the story of an offbeat concept turned success story via a hearty friendship and a love of craft brews.

Divvying beers down into 10 categories — Bitter, Funky, Sweet, Earthy, Sour, Smoky, Tart, Spicy, Fruity and the ever-descriptive Tasty — the read breaks many of the rules with which the wine world has time and again suffocated the dinner table while encouraging intuition and creativity.

Ciders don’t have to be paired with apple crumble. Stouts go well with Pea Mint Flødeboller and Strawberry Butter Cookies. But so do other beers.

The framework is there, sure, but Burns and Jarnit-Bjergsø prefer you think of their book less as a manifesto, and more as a Choose Your Own Adventure.