Note that these aren’t necessarily things that were opened/launched/published/forged from lava in 2011. Just things I experienced for the first time, or really came to appreciate last year.

Favorite beers!

Bristol Beer Factory Acer: There have been a lot of really delectable 4%-ish, hella hoppy golden ales released by British brewers in the past year, but this is my favorite, brewed with copious amounts of Sorachi Ace hops. Because of the weirdly complex nature of this Japanese varietal, and inevitable inconsistencies related to cask-conditioned beer, Acer is always a little bit different each time I have it – but it’s always bitingly bitter and thoroughly refreshing.

Mikkeller Nelson Sauvignon: I do hope we don’t see the last of this already rare brew, because it’s a jaw-dropper. Playing on the fruity aromatics of the Nelson Sauvin hop – so named because of its similarities to Sauvignon Blanc wines – Mikkeller has used champagne yeast and the wild fungus brettanomyces to produce even more vinous notes, then aged it in Austrian white wine barrels to drive the point home. The result is a real WTF of a beer that gleefully blurs the line between wine and beer. A few other beer geeks and I were left without words when we sampled it on a whim at BrewDog Camden.

BrewDog/Stone Bashah Highland Park and Black Raspberry Reserve: On paper, this collaboration between two of the most rambunctious breweries on the planet sounds like a train wreck, or at the very least, a “throw everything at the wall” type of ill-conceived experiment: a black IPA aged in whisky casks with copious amounts of berries. In actuality, it’s something far more than the sum of its parts, and unlike any other beer I’ve tasted, with fruity hops  and delicate tartness harmonizing beautifully with the richer, more mellow flavors of dark malts and whisky.

BrewDog Mr. Squirrel: I love this beer – and not just because I helped brew it. The game boys at BrewDog helped me put together this completely bonkers strong dark lager, made with 100% Sorachi Ace hops, four varieties of miso, and toasted walnuts. It turned out pretty much exactly how I’d hoped: lushly pork-friendly and multilayered with a full-on proteinaceous body, intense nuttiness, and a jab of salt and fragrant hops.

De Struise Pannepot: In November I went to Belgium, and it rekindled my love for Belgian beer. Pilgrimages to the Cantillon brewery and Delirium Cafe were almost too awesome for words, and completely by chance I found Westvleteren XII on the menu of a cafe. But none of the beer experiences I had were quite as marvelous as Pannepot, an offering as close to the Platonic ideal of a quadrupel as I think I’m ever going to find. It made Westvleteren taste like Leffe by comparison. This is one serious Belgian beer from a serious Belgian brewery.

Honorable mention goes to my collaborative smoked chilli weizenbock with Black Isle, Highland Smog; De Struise’s massively, dangerously complex imperial stout, Black Albert; Camden‘s Inner City Green and Summer Wine‘s Elbow, both hugely hoppy quaffers at under 4%; and just about anything from The Kernel and Marble.

Favorite restaurants!

The food at Racine never ceases to amaze me. I first visited three years ago, by chance – Laura and I wandered in because we were in the area and it has the same name as my hometown. But as soon as the first course arrived, I was enraptured by their deceptively complex French cooking – I say deceptively because dishes like their rabbit with mustard sauce, grouse with Armagnac, and chocolate terrine are presented in a straightforward, unassuming manner, but now that I know a bit more about classical French cookery, it’s obvious that these are really difficult, consummately skillful feats of cookery. I had the pleasure of meeting chef patron Henry Harris on my last visit there, and I couldn’t resist asking him how he makes one of his signature dishes: warm garlic and saffron mousse with mussels. I asked not only because that dish is one of the most magnificent things I’ve ever tasted (and easily one of my top five London dishes of all time), but because its intricacies seemed almost impossible to unravel. He answered with a justifiably annoyed shake of the head, followed by a coy smile and an explanation that was disconcertingly simple: the fundamentals of the dish aren’t hard to follow, but they are very hard to execute. And that’s what makes Racine special: every dish takes talent and practice, and it shows. And what’s more, they’ve got the service and the ambiance nailed, too – it’s one of the rare places you can go for both a romantic date or a pre-museum lunch with your hollering baby nephew and still have a lovely time.

More towards my end of the Piccadilly line, I’ve finally found a Korean restaurant that serves tteokbokki, pajeon, and bibimbap that taste just how I remember them from my trips to Seoul and Busan: Dotori. And it isn’t just the flavors that are authentic – it’s the prices, too. For some reason, Korean food in London has always struck me as unusually expensive; I don’t mind paying good money for good food, and I appreciate the economics of running an east Asian restaurant in London are a teensy bit different from running one in east Asia. But when it comes to to Korean, I just couldn’t shake memories of amazing meals eaten from anonymous street stalls for less than a fifth of what I typically have to pay here for a lower quality product. Dotori’s barbecue and banchan are excellent, and excellent value, and it’s nice knowing they’re only four tube stops away – actually, it’s nice knowing they exist at all.

In a similar vein, I’m a huge fan of Asakusa, which shines like a lighthouse in a sea of overly stylized, sexed-up, overblown and overpriced Japanese restaurants. Asakusa is an izakaya, and a proper one – the carpets are a weird red color, the walls plastered with handwritten menus and faded Japanese beer posters, and the food fantastic. Fancy it ain’t – you won’t find a foie gras roll here. But what you will find are Japanese pub classics cooked perfectly, things like karaage, soft shell crab tempura, dengaku nasu and grilled chicken skin. Healthy? Who cares? This is a place to relax and enjoy yourself with friends and family and a big bottle of Asahi.

If I love Racine, Dotori, and Asakusa for their straightforward authenticity, I love Spuntino because it’s the complete antithesis of it. Spuntino is neither here nor there; on the surface, it’s a meticulous pastiche of a Lower East Side cafe/diner, but the menu reads more like a mashup of arty American and northern Italian with flashes of modern British. Chilli popcorn and a remixed PBJ dessert bookend meals that may consist of chickpeas with squid and ink alongside sliders made with spiced mackerel or bone marrow-studded beef, all washed down with black filter coffee or classic cocktails – or are they classic? Maybe not, but they feel like it. It goes without saying that the food is delicious, but more importantly, it’s joyful and creative, made with an obvious love for its sources of inspiration, but also a willful irreverence that few restaurants have the confidence to pull off.

The Sweet Fanboy Vindication Award goes to The Fat Duck.

The Best Budget Cheeseburger in London Award goes to BrewDog Camden. (Burger Anarchy‘s words, not mine!)

The Style Over Substance (But the Substance is Pretty Damn Good) Award goes to Bob Bob Ricard.

The It’s Not Really a Restaurant, But It’s Still the Best Restaurant In Scotland Award goes to Yatai.

And the Better Than Tayyabs Award goes to Mirch Masala (try the fried fish – it’s the new lamb chop).

Favorite things to read!

I’ve written enough words now. Go read someone else’s!

Ideas in Food: Inspirational modernist cuisine from two of America’s most adventurous cooks.

The Fat Duck Cookbook: Dense, uncompromising, and endlessly useful.

Jonathan Gold: Still the best restaurant critic in the world. Don’t believe me? Just ask the Pulitzer Prize committee.

Cooking Issues: Advanced yet accessible experiments in food science.

Harold McGee on Food and Cooking: If you’ve ever asked yourself “why?” in the kitchen, this book probably has the answer.

It was two days ago when I finally returned to Belgo, and this time the only thing I truly enjoyed was the Rochefort 8 and the Delirium Nocturnum (served in proper glassware – nice). Maybe it’s because I went to a different branch. Maybe it was a mistake to order anything but the mussels. Maybe my tastes have changed. Or maybe the restaurant has simply gone downhill (I’ve read this is the case). It’s probably some combination of all of these factors. But it was an unjustifiably terrible meal, the kind that filled me with remorse as I looked back on it the morning after.

A “seasonal starter” of butternut squash and cumin soup tasted more of carrots than squash, and not even subtly of cumin, and the pumpkin seeds used as a garnish had been roasted either incompetently or not at all, leaving them chewy instead of crunchy. It had been poorly blended and strained, so there were little bits of tough bay leaf and celery fiber scattered throughout; but then again, these little tidbits of texture were all that prevented the soup from being actual baby food, so maybe they were in there on purpose. A disappointment, but I still had hope for the mains. This proved foolish. The rotisserie chicken with leek and mustard sauce was itself tender and moist, but it looked and tasted like it had been accidentally tipped into a vat of pure heavy cream. The obligatory fries were the highlight of the meal (except for the beer), but even they were a bit sad, inconsistently crispy and marred by staleness. To add insult to injury, even the mayo was gross, unusually gellified and firm.

It’s rare for me not to finish a plate of food at a restaurant. I don’t have a lot of money, so it seems like a waste. But even so, I felt no inclination to finish my bowl of beef carbonade à la flamande, and I gave up halfway through. According to the menu, the beef was stewed in gueuze, a kind of wild Belgian beer with a strong, tart, farmy sourdough character, but none of this flavor came through in the dish. The beef itself was dry and flaky, having lost most of its moisture in a braise that was either too short, too long, or too hot, and the dish was topped with some mushy onions and a trio of brown but essentially uncooked apple slices. The most exciting element of the dish were the whole prunes dotted here and there, which added much-needed elements of acidity and richness.

What’s really vexing about this dish is that it was my first time to try carbonade, and I was excited about it. As I understand it, it is both a classic Belgian dish and a classic beer-based recipe, which are fairly rare among London restaurants. It was disappointing not just because it was bad, but because I was looking forward to tasting something new, unique, and authentic. It failed on all counts to meet my expectations.

Of course, for all I know, the dish was authentic. Maybe those weird apples and that stringy beef are exactly how you’d get it in Brussels (maybe it isn’t even eaten in Brussels). I have always thought that authenticity is overrated, unimportant, and often meaningless, except for in the sense that certain dishes that are made according to the standards of their original form often taste better. For example, I find it endlessly and irrationally irksome to be served a bowl of ramen garnished with snow peas. This seems to be common practice in ramen shops outside Japan, but I hate it, and it’s not because it necessarily tastes bad – it just seems wrong and out of place. It’s like a big green flag announcing that the ramen won’t be as good as what I had back in Kyushu.

But to even discuss the authenticity of ramen, or carbonade, is problematic. Ramen, after all, could be considered an inauthentic spinoff from the noodle soups of Canton or Shanghai, a sort of Japanized Chinese food. Besides, ramen itself is diverse and complex; it has been said that no two bowls of ramen are alike, so who’s to say that snow peas aren’t a legitimate topping? When I was doing research at the Shinyokohama Ramen Museum, the curator told me that one reason ramen has become so popular is because the Japanese have felt free to experiment with it and change it over time; it isn’t made within the confines of a Japanese tradition (as soba and udon are), so variation and creative license are hallmarks of ramen culture rather than exceptions to it.

Flippant riffing on authenticity and tradition can be a wonderful thing. It has given us Hakata ramen, the California roll, the black IPA, and Paco Roncero’s “21st Century Tortilla,” to name a few. But it seems to me that to be successfully inauthentic, there must be good ideas or reasons behind fixing what ain’t broke. Introducing new ingredients to a dish or changing how they’re cooked only works if it’s a purposeful improvement – otherwise it will just seem lazy, inept, or ignorant. Adding snow peas to ramen may seem like a minor fault, but it does nothing to enhance the dish and thereby only seems unfamiliar and intrusive. By contrast, adding tomatoes and garlic bread to ramen may seem bizarre, unnecessary, and certainly inauthentic, but more than one Kyushu ramen shop is doing it, and it’s remarkably delicious. That’s because it’s premeditated and practiced; tossing tomatoes witlessly into any old bowl of noodles would not likely yield such successful results.

The carbonade issue is probably less a question of authenticity and more a question of culinary skill. But what if Belgo’s version is not only “correct” in terms of its ingredients and method, but also tastes just how it does in typical Flemish homes and restaurants? In that case, then I might conclude that I simply don’t like carbonade. But of course this is silly. One could hardly argue that McDonald’s makes “inauthentic” American cheeseburgers – in fact they probably set the standard, if such a thing exists – but I would beg you to reconsider if you told me you didn’t like cheeseburgers, having only tasted McDonald’s perfectly accurate and popular rendition of them. There are great burgers to be had, even though the majority of them are bad or boring; I imagine the same may be true of carbonade. It is certainly true of ramen, pizza, and beer, and you would be a hopeless fool to spurn any of those.

I suppose that when dealing with foods that are expected to match a sort of culturally recognized Platonic ideal (i.e. “traditional” foods), I would hope that restaurateurs do try to reproduce that ideal to the best of their ability, and only deviate from it in attempts to improve upon it, or to create an entirely new dish based on it. But as diners we should equally understand that good food and authentic food aren’t  the same thing. Regardless of whether or not Belgo’s carbonade is authentic, I wouldn’t say I dislike carbonade based on my experience with that dish, and I probably wouldn’t say I dislike carbonade even if I went to Bruges, ate it there, and once again didn’t like it. We should reserve judgment on any given food not until we’ve had the real deal, but until we’ve had a good version of the real deal. Never give up on food until you absolutely have to.

In response to comments graciously informing of new beer developments in Fukuoka, I have updated this article on September 23, 2009.

Kyushu is known across Japan as a veritable Shangri-La of shochu, with distilleries galore and a glut of shops and bars well-stocked with the beloved spirit. But many foreigners may be unimpressed with such a wide selection of shochu when all they’re craving is a decent pale ale.

Fortunately, Fukuoka prefecture is not the beer wasteland it may appear to be upon first glance; you’ll just have to make a bit of extra effort and spend a bit of extra money to get your beer of choice into your gullet. Unlike most Western countries, bars and restaurants in Japan usually serve only one kind of beer – or, if they do serve more than one, all of them tend to be pale Pilsener-style lagers. Though there is currently a budding interest in craft beer throughout the country, imported and microbrewed beers are still in fairly low demand and are considered a specialty item, so expect to pay a bit more for them. The Sam Adams or Sam Smith’s you may have enjoyed back home as an everyday beer will most likely be twice as expensive here, so be prepared.

Now then, let’s enjoy beer in Fukuoka. Kanpai!

Beer Bars and Breweries

If you’re looking for beer diversity, your first stop should be Cotton Fields コットンフィールズ in Fukuoka City’s salaryman-packed nightlife district, Nakasu-Kawabata. Cotton Fields has only one beer on tap – Sapporo – but their bottle selection is truly formidable, with over 400 varieties of beer from around the world, including some rare gems like Aventinus Eisbock from Germany, Lion Stout from Sri Lanka, and Anchor Old Foghorn from the United States. Bottles run fairly steep at about ¥600-1200, but bear in mind they’re pretty much the only game in town for many of these beers. Cotton Fields is also well-known for their ribs, tacos, and (among Americans) controversial décor.

Your next best bets for beer will be Fukuoka’s English- or Irish-style pubs, especially if you’re craving a silky-smooth Guinness on tap. Draft Guinness may seem like a fairly common thing in Japan, but be warned that many bars advertising “draft” Guinness (nama 生 or tarunama 樽生) actually pour the stout from a bottle and then employ a contraption called the Guinness “Surger” that sends electromagnetic waves through the beer to froth it into a pathetic forgery of real nitro-tapped Guinness. These draft Guinness impostors are disturbingly common, and the Surgers are made to look like real taps – so bars can get away with charging draft prices for bottled beer. Beware!

Rest assured that your draft Guinness is the real McCoy at this sextet of charming pubs: Morris, The Craic and Porter, and The Three Kings in Fukuoka City; Ye Olde Little Monkey in Kurume; and Booties and Bravo! Public House in Kitakyushu.

In addition to Guinness, Morris offers Yebisu lager, Vedett White, and Old Speckled Hen on tap. They also have a respectable bottle list with the likes of Fuller’s, Hoegaarden, Sam Adams (Boston Lager), Grolsch, Bass, and Newcastle, and their happy hour is a fantastic bargain – only ¥590 for any draft beer, including Guinness or their tasty half-and-half (ordinarily ¥850 a pint). Just up the road in the entertainment district Oyafuko-dōri, The Craic and Porter’s Irish-American owner Mike has amassed the best draft selection in town: Kilkenny, John Smith, Paulaner Hefe-Weissbier, Heineken, Marston’s Pedrigee and a rotating Rogue beer in addition to the standard Guinness (¥650-850 per pint) are all available on tap here, plus a handful of special bottled brews. The Three Kings is Fukuoka’s newest player on the British pub scene, and the first to bring authentic, cask-conditioned real ale to the city. Rotating offerings such as Old Speckled Hen, Greene King IPA, and Abbot Ale (¥800 or ¥600 during happy hour) are all well-kept and properly hand-pumped for that soft real ale mouthfeel. They also pour a variety of ales on normal tap and operate a retail store in Maebaru.

Ye Olde Little Monkey, or “the Monkey,” as it is more commonly known, is perhaps the only UK-style pub in the Kurume area, so if you live in Chikugo and don’t want to truck it to Fukuoka for real draft Guinness, this is your bar. It’s near Nishitetsu Kurume Station but it’s easy to miss – look carefully for the painted hanging sign with two monkeys next to a car rental shop.

Up north in Kitakyushu, Booties is an easy-to-find Irish-style pub in Kokura with Guinness, Kilkenny, and Yebisu on tap, and they make a satisfying basket of fish and chips (complete with fake newspaper) with big hunks of blowfish in an herb-flecked batter. They also have a lengthy list of Irish whiskeys. Bravo! is a new pub run by an outgoing bartender named Oti, who trained under the owner of Booties before setting off to start his own bar in Kurosaki. Bravo!’s only draft beers are Guinness and Yebisu, but the menu also lists Hoegaarden, Bass, Heineken, Orval, and Chimay in bottles. Prices run fairly high, but there is a daily happy hour from 6:00-8:00, and Oti is sometimes willing to organize a trade if you get to know him and bring in a rare beer for him to sample.

A couple blocks away from Bravo! is a little bar called Daimaru, which has only two taps, but one of them rotates each month, usually with offerings from Belgium – in the past, they have had Belle-Vue Kriek and Orval. Also in Kitakyushu is Kokura Genghis Khan 小倉ジンギスカン, which pours two beers from the local Mojiko Retro Brewery (Mojikō Ji-bīru Kōbō 門司港地ビール工房) – a pilsener and a Hefeweizen – to wash down mouthfuls of fat-broiled lamb and vegetables. Other options for trying locally brewed beer can be found in Fukuoka at Suginoya 杉能舎 in Hawks Town, which offers a tasting set of all four of Hamachi Brewery’s excellent “Suginoya” beers, or at the award-winning Okura Brewery in Nakasu’s Hotel Okura, which specializes in wheat beers.

Back in Daimyō, two closeby restaurants feature surprisingly good bottle lists: Base Camp and Goo, just a few doors down from each other on the same road. Base Camp offers a large curry menu along with a few other Japanese homestyle Western dishes like omuraisu, with a decidedly non-homestyle Western beer list focusing on Belgium. Grimbergen, Delirium Tremens, and more are all available here for your drinking pleasure. Goo maintains an eclectic bottle selection of beers from around the world, like Franziskaner (Germany), Traquair (England), and Baltika (Russia) to accompany their eclectic tapas-like food. In Kurume, about a ten-minute walk away from the Monkey (see above) is another eatery worth checking out for beer: Brava, by all accounts an excellent Italian restaurant with bottled Guinness and a few Italian lagers.

There are also a few state-of-the-art industrial breweries in the area. Hakata is home to the Asahi Beer Hakata Brewery アサヒビール博多工場, which offers 90-minute tours daily that include a 20-minute tasting session (three glass limit per visitor). From April through September there is also a beer garden serving fresh Asahi and a variety of red meat-based dishes; a two-hour nomihōdai is only ¥1650 and includes Asahi’s hard-to-find, easy-to-drink dark lager (food sold separately). In Tachiarai-machi, near Amagi, you can visit the Kirin Beer Park キリンビアパーク, a gigantic factory complex that includes brewery tours with free samples and a nearby restaurant called the Kirin Beer Farm pouring several varieties of terrifically fresh Kirin beer to accompany hearty homestyle dishes like ribs, Genghis Khan, and roast chicken. The complex also includes one of the largest cosmos fields in the country, which comes into bloom around late October. Slightly further afield in Hita (Just outside Fukuoka prefecture, in Oita), there is the sprawling Beer Forest Sapporo ビアフォレストサッポロ, Sapporo’s answer to Kirin’s Beer Park, offering free tours and tasting sessions, a Hita souvenir shop, a beer and barbecue garden, and a retro-style beer hall.

Bottle Shops

Within Fukuoka prefecture there are two bottle shops that should pretty much satisfy your beer demands: Hiromatsu Shōten ヒロマツ商店 in Kitakyushu and World Beer Hiroshima ワールドビール廣島 in Fukuoka City. Hiromatsu’s several beer coolers and shelves are packed with beers of all different styles from both Japan and abroad: Young’s Double Chocolate Stout (England), Delirium Tremens (Belgium), Unibroue Trois Pistoles (Canada), Negra Modelo (Mexico), and many more comprise a very comprehensive import selection. They also sell Samuel Adams’s 25% alcohol Utopias, 750ml bottles of Duvel, and magnum bottles of Chimay – perfect for parties. Hiromatsu also boasts what may be Kyushu’s best selection of Japanese craft beers (called ji-bīru 地ビール, “regional beer”), with offerings from Echigo (Niigata), Hitachino Nest (Ibaraki), Suginoya (Fukuoka), Ginga Kōgen (Tokyo), and Ezo (Hokkaido). The owner does not speak English, but he is very friendly and may be willing to order something special for you if you get to know him. He also runs a yakitori stand next door.

If Hiromatsu doesn’t stock what you’re looking for, chances are you’ll be able to find it at Hiroshima, which has an equally impressive and surprisingly different selection. While there are almost no Japanese beers and only a few North American beers at Hiroshima, Belgium, Germany, and England are all extremely well represented. They also have an entire wall of official brewery glassware and some random breweriana such as signage, posters, bottle openers, and bar towels for sale. Both Hiromatsu and Hiroshima are slightly off the beaten track, so if you’re looking to pick up a few rare brews while you’re out and about on your usual shopping route, try Alliq オーリック in Daimyō. Alliq’s name is a portmanteau of “all” and “liquor” and its selection of wines, shochu, and liquor is quite impressive. The beer cooler isn’t quite as large or exciting as those at Hiromatsu or Hiroshima, but it does stock some out-of-the-ordinary treats and its convenient location near central Tenjin makes it well worth a visit.

Department store basements are also good sources for good beer. Colet Izutsuya in Kokura has a small but consistent stock of Japanese craft beers and a few miscellaneous imports, and Iwataya in Daimyō usually stocks regional Kyushu brews and a handful of imports. Sometimes uncommon beers turn up in common places, so keep your eyes peeled while perusing the shelves of liquor stores, grocery stores, and even convenience stores. In the past year, certain branches of Lawson have sold Guinness, Hoegaarden, Corona (with a packet of lime juice!), and Yona Yona Ale from Nagano; am/pm has sold Suginoya Beer; and 7-Eleven has recently sold Coedo Beer from Saitama and Hideji Beer from Miyazaki. Special beers often turn up at convenience stores around holidays, especially New Year’s and Father’s Day. Costco stocks cases of Coopers ales from Australia, among other imports, and random branches of Red Cabbage, Maruwa, and Spina sometimes sell a Belgian or two. The imported food chain Kaldi (see article on foreign foods in Fukuoka) also sells a small amount of imported beer. And in Canal City, there is a Fukuoka souvenir store called The Hakata Gift Shop that offers beer from two of Fukuoka’s most famous microbreweries, Suginoya and Brewmaster.

Online Shops

The following are websites that sell imported and craft beers in Japan. Prices tend to be high, but shipping is often surprisingly cheap – sometimes free – and most offer beers that are otherwise unavailable in Fukuoka. Unfortunately only a couple of these sites are in English, but if you ask a friend who speaks Japanese for help, you’ll tap into a whole new world of beer!

Hiromatsu Shōten ヒロマツ商店
This is the online version of the Kitakyushu shop; inventory changes every now and then and the website sells beers that the actual store doesn’t stock, so check back often! To order, send an e-mail to info@hiromatsu.co.jp.

Beer Café Ueda ビアカフェウエダ
Based in Osaka, Beer Café Ueda is one of the most respected sources for imported beer in the country. The proprietor is dedicated to bringing the finest beers from Europe and America to Japan, which means the site often sells rare or exclusive items such as Anchor’s Our Special Ale and Dupont’s Avec Les Bon Voeux. Shipping is free if you spend over ¥6000 yen (a rather easy mark to reach), and they sometimes include free breweriana with large orders. Keep your eye out for limited beers and sale items!

Rakuten Ichiba 楽天市場
Rakuten Ichiba is something like Amazon.com, but with a greater focus on food and drink. Rakuten brings many different retailers together into one big online marketplace, including various liquor stores, breweries, and importers, so its beer selection is wide and varied. Weird katakana transliterations of beer names make searching difficult, but you can browse the entire list of beers as a broad department or by country or prefecture.

Ezo Beer 蝦夷麦酒
Ezo Beer is actually the Japanese label for Rogue Ales, brewed in Portland, Oregon. In addition to Rogue flagships like Chocolate Stout, Shakespeare Stout, St. Rogue Red, and Old Crustacean (sold as Choco Bear Beer, Brown Bear Rich Beer, Northern Fox Red Beer, and Phred’s Nightcap), Ezo also distributes for a few breweries from the Netherlands, Belgium, and Scotland. Shipping is expensive as they are located in Hokkaido, but it’s free if you buy two cases (48 bottles).

Tokyo Food Page (bento.com)
Bento.com is one of the best online English-language resources for learning about Japanese food, and it also offers a long, comprehensive list of online beer sources, with special attention to Japanese craft breweries.

Local Brewery Listing

Asahi Beer Hakata Brewery アサヒビール博多工場
(see description above)
Fukuoka City Hakata-ku Takeshita 3-1-1
092-431-2701
Tours offered 9:30-15:00; closed around New Year’s and the second or third Wednesday of the month (call ahead to confirm)
Asahi Beer Garden
Fukuoka City Hakata-ku Takeshita 3-2-19
092-482-7887
11:30-22:00 (last order 21:30); closed around New Year’s

Bengala Mura ベンガラ村
Bengala Mura in Yame is a unique recreation and relaxation complex consisting of private hot spring baths, a swimming pool, a farmers market, green tea and herb gardens, a restaurant, and a microbrewery. It is a bit out of the way, but its beers are only available on-site, and the baths and gardens make this a unique place to unwind while quaffing fresh, tasty beer.
Yame City Miyano 100-Banchi
0943-24-3339
10:00-22:00; closed Monday

Sapporo New Kyushu Brewery/Beer Forest Sapporo サッポロビール新九州工場・ビアフォレストサッポロ
(see description above)
Ōita-ken Hita City Ōaza Takase 6979
0973-25-1100
Tours offered weekdays 9:45-16:00, weekends and holidays 8:45-16:00; closed every Wednesday in December and January and December 24-January 5
Restaurant open 10:00-22:00

K’s Brewing (Brewmaster) ケイズブルーイング（ブルーマスター）
K’s is perhaps the smallest brewery in Fukuoka, and their beers are few yet creative and flavorful. In addition to a standard pale ale they also brew a porter with coffee and a blonde ale with honey and kabosu (a lime-like citrus fruit) juice. Their beers are on tap at the brewery’s small bar in Befu, and their bottles are available at The Hakata Gift Shop in Canal City and occasionally at department stores.
Fukuoka City Jōnan-ku Befu 1-19-1
092-841-6336
12:00-18:00; closed Sundays and holidays

Okura Brewery (Hotel Okura) オークラブルワリー
(see description above)
Fukuoka City Hakata-ku Shimokawabata-machi 3-2
Hakata Riverain, Hotel Okura B1F
092-262-1172
11:30-14:30, 17:30-21:30; weekends and holidays open from 17:00

Kirin Beer Park キリンビアパーク
(see description above)
Asakura City Mada 3601-Banchi
0946-23-2132
Tours offered 9:30-17:00; closed Mondays or the following day if Monday is a holiday and around New Year’s
Kirin Beer Farm
Asakura City Mada 3205-7
0946-23-2993
11:00-22:00 (last order 21:30); closed December 31-January 1 and erratically throughout the year for maintenance (call to confirm)

Mojiko Retro Beer 門司港地ビール工房
At least for the time being, Mojiko brews just two beers, but in the past they have offered three along with a seasonal special. Their brews can only be found at Kokura Genghis Khan and at the brewery itself, which is worth a visit for its remarkably tasty pizzas and pleasant view of Shimonoseki across the Kanmon Strait.
Kitakyushu City Moji-ku Higashi Minato-machi 6-9
093-321-6885
11:00-22:00 (last order 21:15)

Hamachi Brewery (Suginoya) 浜地酒造（杉能舎）
Under the name “Suginoya,” Hamachi offers a pale ale, an amber ale, and a stout, plus seasonal releases. They are one of the more expensive breweries in the area (about ¥450-500 a bottle) but they are also consistently delicious. Suginiyoya is also notable for their sparkling sake and their non-alcoholic golden ale, called B-Drive. Their beers can be found on tap at their izakaya in Hawks Town (information below), at the brewery’s small restaurant, or in bottles at Hiromatsu Shōten, Iwataya, Alliq, and other random liquor stores and souvenir shops in the Fukuoka area. They occasionally turn up at conbinis as well.
Fukuoka City Nishi-ku Moto’oka 1442
092-806-1186
Open Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays only; 10:00-19:00

Bar, Restaurant, and Bottle Shop Directory

Fukuoka City

Alliq (Daimyō Shop)
Chūō-ku Daimyō 1-3-41
092-737-6240
14:00-02:00

Base Camp
Chūō-ku Daimyō 2-2-51
092-721-6044
Weekdays 11:00-15:00, 18:00-23:00 (last order 22:30); Sundays and holidays 11:00-15:00, 18:00-22:00 (last order 21:30); closed Monday and every second Sunday

California Cotton Fields
Hakata-ku Nakasu 4-2-15
Main Street Building B1F
092-271-5130
18:00-02:30

Costco
Kasuya-gun Hisayama-chō
Ōaza-Yamada Aza-Takayanagi 1152-1
092-931-9092
10:00-20:00; December 31-January 1 10:00-18:00
http://www.costco.co.jp/eng/whs_876.htm

The Craic and Porter
Chūō-ku Tenjin 3-5-15
http://craic.mine.nu/

Goo
Chūō-ku Daimyō 2-2-47
Ono Building 1F
092-741-9560
Lunch 12:00-15:00; dinner 17:00-24:00; Friday and Saturday dinner only, closed Sunday

The Hakata Gift Shop
Hakata-ku Sumiyoshi 1-2
Canal City B1F
092-263-2205
10:00-21:00

World Beer Hiroshima
Jōnan-ku Befu 2-9-1
092-821-6338
Hours erratic; call ahead to confirm

Iwataya
Chūō-ku Tenjin 2-5-35
092-721-1111
10:00-20:00

Morris
Chūō-ku Daimyō 2-1-4
Stage 1 Nishi-dōri 7F
092-771-4774
Monday-Thursday 17:00-01:00; Friday, Saturday, and days before holidays 17:00-0:300; Sunday 17:00-24:00

Suginoya
Chūō-ku Jigyōhama 2-2-1
Hawks Town Mall 1F (Map No. 128)
11:00-14:30, 17:00-22:00 (last order 21:30)

The Three Kings
Chūō-ku Daimyō 1-11-22
Metro Building 1F
092-403-3622
Monday-Thursday 17:00-00:00; Friday and Saturday 17:00-late; Sunday 17:00-22:00
http://www.avondrinks.com/pub.htm

Kurume City

Brava
Tenjin-machi 152-4
6th Tomitaya Building 1F
0942-34-3917
11:30-14:00, 17:30-22:00 weekdays; 11:30-14:30, 17:30-22:30 weekends

Ye Olde Little Monkey
Tenjin-machi 33-2
0942-35-0108
18:30-00:30

Kitakyushu City

Booties
Kokurakita-ku Kyō-machi 1-4-21
093-551-6160
17:00-02:00; Fridays, Saturdays, and days before holidays until 03:00; closed the first and third Tuesday of each month

Public House Bravo!
Yahatanishi-ku Kurosaki 4-1-2
093-642-1555
18:00-03:00

Colet Izutsuya
Kokurakita-ku Kyō-machi 3-1-1
093-514-1111
10:00-20:00

Daimaru
Kitakyushu City Yahatanishi-ku Kurosaki 4-6-1
093-631-8157
17:30-23:30

Hiromatsu Shōten
Yahatanishi-ku Kumanishi 1-5-1
093-641-3489

Kokura Genghis Khan
Kokurakita-ku Kyō-machi 3-7-14
093-531-6885
18:00~, closed erratically; call ahead to confirm opening hours

Wow, what a month it’s been. My entire August was gobbled up by the wedding – which was a rousing success, by the way! And now I can (hopefully) get my visa. Yaaaaay!

But I’ve neglected the blog, and indeed, I’ve neglected the sort of activities for which the blog exists. A lack of both time and money has precluded extravagances in culinary tourism, not to mention any creative endeavors aside from making invitations and placecards. Even so, August has seen several newsworthy discoveries and exploits on the viking front. Before I recommence posting proper, here is a recap of the past four weeks’ more interesting items:

• August began with the Great British Beer Festival, where I sampled a dozen or so excellent and almost-excellent ales from around the UK and around the world. I also tried the East London specialty, jellied eels, which sound, look, and taste like something from a Roald Dahl story.But the real revelation was the selection of beers from Italy, of all places. Like the brewers of Japan and America, whose beer cultures aren’t mired in “traditions” like those of England, Belgium, and Germany, Italian brewers adopt a playful, experimental attitude and a love of the local. I am convinced that Italy is the next frontier in craft brewing. Consider the three bottles I picked up at the festival: Shangrila Fumé, a strong amber ale brewed with spices and peat-smoked whisky malts; Barley BB10, a barleywine made from the reduction of a prized local wine; and Verdi Imperial Stout, infused with the heat of chili peppers. I plan to crack these open soon and have them with Italian cheese – stay tuned for tasting notes.
  
• I am a professional food writer! I’ve now reviewed two restaurants and one pub for View London, and I will be writing more for them in the future.
• Speaking of restaurants, I’ve been to a few recently that I must recommend. Head to Abeno or Abeno Too for perfect Osaka-style okonomiyaki and miscellaneous izakaya fare that’s only slightly overpriced. Sakura and Tokyo Diner are also wonderfully Japanese, both embracing the whole universe of Japanese cooking from katsukarē to mentaiko. Tokyo Diner in particular is fantastic – modest yet superlative, and dirt cheap. Cans of Kirin and Asahi are only £1.90!A bit further into Chinatown is Leong’s Legends, a Taiwanese-Chinese joint where the service is brusque but the food is special. You must try the xiao long bao (soup dumplings), but let them cool a bit before tucking in or you’ll scald your mouth something awful. Finally, we were pleasantly surprised with Anatolian Flame, a place we hungrily stumbled into after viewing some flats in northwest London. The service was charming and the charcoal-grilled Turkish food was excellent, such as the relentlessly juicy and flavorful  lamb kebab with tomatoes served on a whole grilled eggplant with dill cream.
• I’m still going to the awesome, free life study sessions at Beach Blanket Babylon Shoreditch, and I wrote about it for a contest (which I lost) on Trazzler. If you’re in London and even a little bit arty, check it out. And if you’re not sure about the whole drawing thing, you can still enjoy a cocktail or two.
• I just finished reading Hops and Glory, a surprisingly non-geeky (alright, it’s a little geeky) book about the history of India Pale Ale. Author Pete Brown weaves meticulous historical research together with a spirited personal travelogue as he drags a keg of IPA on a journey from England to India that approximates the sea route along which the original ales were shipped. The book is peppered with sharp gastropolitical commentary and enlightening factoids, and in some places is actually suspenseful – not what I expected from a book about beer. Highly recommended to beer geeks, history buffs, or fans of good travel writing.

And now I’m off to the motherland for six weeks, where I will fork over nearly a grand to the British consulate in order to get my visa. Blogging shall continue while I’m there, and before long I’ll be able to post about trips around the UK and the rest of Europe!

Hold your judgement. If you are told ‘they are all this’ or ‘they do this’ or ‘their opinions are these’, withhold your judgement until all the facts are upon you. Because that land they call ‘India’ goes by a thousand names and is populated by millions, and if you think you have found two men the same amongst that multitude, then you are mistaken. It is merely a trick of the moonlight.

Zadie Smith, White Teeth

Independence Day has always been my favorite holiday. Here’s why:

1. Sunshine.
2. Pork.
3. Beer.
4. Fireworks.

Of course, just about any Japanese summer festival also features this same happy quartet. And Japanese festivals are fun, too, but they just aren’t the same. I like Independence Day partly out of nostalgia, but I also like it because it’s uniquely American. It’s a holiday I can call my own.

We Americans don’t have a lot we can call our own. Apple pie? Dutch. Hot dogs? Austrian. Mexican food? Mexican. Sure, we have jazz, Pixar, and Mr. T, and as for holidays, we have Labor Day,  Memorial Day, Martin Luther King Day, and a smattering of other minor holidays. But all of them are pretty lame. When was the last time you threw a party and lit sparklers for Washington’s Birthday?

So it’s nice have an American holiday that’s actually fun. Thanksgiving is fun, too, but it’s in November, a month that burdens the human soul with an inescapable air of doom and melancholy. Thanksgiving food is arguably better (and perhaps less ordinary), but Independence Day is no slouch when it comes to cookery: ribs, burgers, bratwurst, and potato salad are pretty stiff competition for turkey and stuffing.

When I lived in America, it was the specific customs of Independence Day that I enjoyed (like the food and the fireworks – the parade, never really excited me). Its Americanness was immaterial, extraneous, unnecessary – I just liked hanging out with my friends and family, stuffing myself and watching things explode in the sky. But now that I’m a minority in a strange, inscrutable island nation, the fact that the Fourth of July is a distinctly American celebration is suddenly crucial. I feel as though I must assert my culture against the indifferent shrugs of British hegemony!

It’s not like I’m some kind of patriot. Alright, maybe I am some kind of patriot, but I’m not the gun-totin’, Limbaugh-lovin’, “Never Forget” kind of patriot. This bit of Fry and Laurie pretty much sums up how I feel about that sort of thing:

I can’t even really say I’m proud of America, or proud to be American. I can’t take credit for the achievements of other Americans, and my nationality is mostly a geographical accident. I am also not proud of America in any political sense, although the Constitution is pretty brilliant, and this Obama character seems fairly capable. But if I’ve developed a certain affection for America, I think it is a direct consequence of my expatriation. For one thing, I’m just nostalgic for America – I miss it. I miss my friends and family, but I also miss very particular American things, like In-N-Out burgers, enormously wide roads, the LA skyline, honeycrisp apples, and cheap ska shows. So there’s that sort of homesick aspect to my patriotism, but then there’s also a defensive quality to it. America gets picked on a lot – rightly so, in most cases. But sometimes criticisms of American culture are provincially ignorant; I am reminded of those French girls I met who dismissed all American cheese as abhorrent yellow trash. (Then again, I suppose the fact that processed cheese is usually labeled “American cheese” doesn’t help our reputation.) When confronted with attitudes like that, my reaction is “Hey, wait a minute! America isn’t all bad!” But of course, what I’m really saying is “Hey, wait a minute! I like America!” or even “Don’t tread on me!”

So as I trawled the world wide web for Fourth of July celebrations in London, I was thrilled to discover an event that will let me celebrate American cultural autonomy, indulge in one of my favorite American specialties, and subvert certain misconceptions about said specialty all at the same time! I’m talking about beer, people. American beer. The White Horse, an airy, elegant, ale-centric pub in Parsons Green, is having an American beer festival this weekend, coinciding with Independence Day. They boast the largest selection of American draft beer ever seen in the UK – and while some pubs would be satisfied to fill their lineup with any number of InBev-distributed, mass-produced lagers, the White Horse has corralled an impressive lot of craft beers from across the USA. Some of the featured breweries are Stone, Flying Dog, Victory, Sierra Nevada, Goose Island, and Dogfish Head.

These are some of America’s finest breweries, and it’s exciting to have them represented in England not only because their beer is delicious, but because it provides an opportunity for Londoners to glimpse the innovation and diversity that have become hallmarks of American craft brewing. Like American cheese and American politics, American beer is misunderestimated abroad – few people are aware that the United States produces anything but Bud, Miller, and Coors. I see this festival as an exposition of beer that has the potential to change perceptions about American gastronomy, at least in some small way. I also see it as a chance to drink dangerous amounts of Stone Smoked Porter with Vanilla Beans… mmm.

American Beer Festival at The White Horse
3 July – 5 July 2009

1-3 Parsons Green
London
SW6 4UL
020 7736 2115

It was a productive spring, art-wise. I have been working on some cleanup animation for a London studio, I did some storyboarding for a friend (to be featured in my next post), and I also made some concept art for an idea for a video game that originally came to me five and a half years ago. On top of all of this, the swanky and stylish Shoreditch bar Beach Blanket Babylon has been hosting life drawing sessions every Tuesday… for FREE! For an out-of-work amateur illustrator like myself, this is fantastic. It’s quite professional, too – the crowd isn’t just a bunch of yuppies sipping mojitos, gabbing loudly and attempting the occasional doodle (as I feared it would be). Nope, it’s just like a proper art class, with all the earnest, brow-furrowing geeks that entails. It just happens to be in a bar.

The models have been great, too. So far three sessions have featured three very different body types – and the instructor said that next week it will be a pregnant woman! Crazy!

Another awesome way to practice drawing is to take advantage of London’s many free museums. Here are a couple sketches from the Wellcome Collection, a fascinating museum of art and artifacts related to medicine:

This glass flask struck me as very cartoonish.

And these wax busts display unusual folding of the flesh at the back of the head; apparently, this was one way that psychiatrists diagnosed people with learning disabilities back in the day. Neat, huh?

In London, Mexican food is scarce, and often so inauthentic that the descriptor “Mexican” itself must be called into question. I don’t really care about authenticity that much, and I don’t know enough about “real” Mexican cuisine to be all that rankled by the relative dearth of it here. Besides, I try to take a when-in-Rome attitude to eating wherever I go. I’m quite happy to subsist on British food, not to mention the countless other cuisines that color the London foodscape like dots in a pointillist painting. Happily distracted by Punjabi curries, English roasts, and Alpine cheeses (to name a few), I’ve sort of forgotten about Mexican food. That’s not to say I don’t sometimes crave it – it’s just that I’ve never really sought it out because I figured I wouldn’t find anything that special here. Of course, that’s not a very good attitude to have, but somewhere along the line I subconsciously decided that searching London for dishes like huaraches, carnitas, and mole poblano would be a frustrating and ultimately pointless endeavor.

I’m probably right, to a certain extent. Mainly because there just ain’t that many Mexicans in the UK, certain south-of-the-border specialties available in the United States aren’t likely to find their way across the pond any time soon. That’s what I assumed about horchata, my very favorite Mexican beverage. But what I failed to consider is that horchata is not strictly Mexican. It’s originally Spanish.

London is full of Spaniards and their delectable produce, so why I never thought I’d find horchata here is beyond me. In fact, finding it took no effort at all – I simply happened upon it while out perusing the pewter tankards and skinny ties at Portobello Market. There it was, written on the window of a place called Café Garcia: “HORCHATA,” in between “CORTADA” and “CHURROS.” I was so excited I think I may have jumped in the air a little.

Unhesitatingly I rushed in and ordered one, along with a coffee for Laura and a marshmallowy torta spiked with some kind of liqueur that tasted like vanilla-flavored house paint. The horchata came in a somewhat disappointingly tiny bottle, but that disappointment promptly disappeared when I realized that this was no ordinary horchata: it was horchata… de chufa!

Chufas, apparently called “tiger nuts” (?) in English, are hard little starchy tubers that are used mainly to produce two things: carp bait and horchata. Horchata de chufa is prized for its delicate, nutty, and fruity flavor, but in America (and presumably in Mexico), it is the rarest kind. Until now I had never tried it, and in my head it became a sort of Holy Grail. It did not disappoint. Sweet and refreshing, the horchata de chufa tasted starchy like a potato, fruity like an apple, and nutty like an almond. It reminded me of jicama, a lovely vegetable that I haven’t had in years. It was less cinnamony than the horchatas I was used to – but that’s probably for the best, as too much spice would interfere with that lovely, subtle chufa flavor.

It makes me wonder what else I’ve been missing. Sometimes in my dogged hunts for specific foods causes me to overlook all the other delicious options around me. Often, the places I just stumble upon are more satisfying than the places I seek out.

Cafe Garcia
246 Portobello Road
Notting Hill
London
W11 1LL
020 7221 6119

In my mind, there are two kinds of burgers. First there are what I would call “burger joint” burgers, burgers that are basic and uncomplicated, without a lot of fussy toppings or hoo-hah over ingredients. The Californian chain In-N-Out makes a textbook example of a good burger joint burger; secret menu aside, it’s just nice, juicy beef that’s gone just a bit black on the griddle, fresh vegetables, special sauce, and plastic cheese melted intimately into the patty’s every dimple and crevasse. Back in Los Angeles, In-N-Out was my old standard, but I especially loved Pasadena’s Pie ‘N’ Burger (good pie there, too) and Westwood’s Apple Pan (which also has good pie). Of course, my all-time favorite burger joint is probably the venerable and perpetually crowded Kewpee’s, a Racine institution beloved for its simple yet mystifyingly delicious cheeseburgers and bemoaned for its crappy six o’clock closing time.

The other kind of burger is the gourmet burger. These burgers are complicated, fancy, and often as tasty and flavorful as they are pretentious and difficult to eat, all gussied up with exotic toppings or ingredients. Sometimes gourmet burgers are pretty simple, but they achieve “gourmet” status by using things like aged cheddar from Vermont, aged beef from Scotland or Japan, and ciabatta buns from some local bakery. Others just pile on the fixins: avocados, artisanal bacon, blue cheeses, washed-rind cheeses, weird aiolis, relishes and chutneys, greens and microgreens, pestos, wasabi, herb and spice blends, Spanish and Italian charcuterie, pineapple, ostrich, buffalo, moose, and roasted peppers are the stuff of gourmet burgers. Lately, chefs in Tokyo and New York have been upping the ante by using ridiculously luxurious ingredients like foie gras, black truffles, and gold leaf to make burgers so posh they’re more like absurdist objects of social commentary than actual food.

If I sound cynical about gourmet burgers, it’s because I am. Too often gourmet burger chefs seem to use exciting ingredients as nothing more than razzle dazzle to distract from the fact that they fundamentally do not know how to cook a burger – which is surprisingly difficult. I myself will own up to being a terrible burger chef. My burgers always turn out too dry, or else they are so moist they just fall apart; I have a tendency to choose the wrong bun and cheese; and my topping-to-meat ratio is usually off. The only thing I’m good at is making sauces for my burgers, but that’s cheating. There is a certain alchemy to a good burger that I don’t understand, and that’s part of why I really love I good burger joint burger. I think the secret is in the way the textures come together; the supple meat, the gooey cheese, the crisp lettuce and onions and the crunchy-soft lightly toasted bun have to strike a harmony that’s difficult to orchestrate. Good ingredients are important, but skilled preparation is probably more so.

Many gourmet burger restaurants neglect to master the basics of good burger making, and without the basics, no amount of month-old Aussie beef or chipotle salsa will redeem you. The other day I was in Camden with time to kill before a ska show; I was looking for the BYOB Latin American restaurant Guanabana, but I couldn’t find it and eventually stumbled upon Haché, a posh burger restaurant that’s had quite a lot of good buzz. Most reviews I read claimed it was one of the best burgers in London if not the best. This review on TimeOut caught my eye in particular:

What surprised me was the number of rather glam foreigners, including an American couple who we got chatting to. Turned out they were local but the guy, a self-confessed burgerholic was ecstatic about Hache, saying they served the best burgers he’s had anywhere.

Here in England, American endorsements don’t mean much to me, except for when it comes to Mexican food and burgers – I just think Americans have a better frame of reference to judge them by than most Brits. But after eating at Haché, I thought: what a sad, unobserved life this “burgerholic” must have lead back in the States if he never found any burgers better than the unbelievably pretentious offerings at this pathetic wannabe of a restaurant.

I ordered the “All-Day Breakfast Burger,” which is topped with a portobello mushroom, back bacon, and a fried egg. A clever, tasty-sounding idea, I thought. But the beef – the “finest aged 100% prime Scotch hachéd steak” – was dry! This is completely unacceptable. A good burger should be lusciously fatty and juicy even when well-done; mine was medium and it was frankly no juicier than a squeezed-out sponge, and I expected a lot more flavor from the “prime Scotch steak” it was made from.

The toppings didn’t help matters. The mushroom was a nice accent (it was far more moist and flavorful than the actual patty), and the egg was perfectly cooked so that the yolk was creamy but not too runny. But the bacon – usually a sort of Band-Aid for blandness – only made things worse. It was terribly undercooked, all tough and chewy and not even a little bit crispy. The ciabatta roll it was on was soft yet sturdy, but toasting it would have added a much-needed extra dimension of texture.

Service was good and I can’t complain about the vaguely arty bistro-like atmosphere, but what matters is the burger. And for all the pomp and pride in its marketing, the burger was a dire disappointment.

But I’m not anti-gourmet burger in general. When a gourmet burger is good, it’s really good – I like them just as much as any good burger joint burger. In New York, I had an awesome lamb merguez burger at BLT, drippingly juicy and flavorful, scented with cumin and nicely offset by a mint-cilantro cucumber relish. And here in London, there is perhaps no chain restaurant I enjoy more than GBK – Gourmet Burger Kitchen.

GBK also boasts high-quality beef – “Aberdeen-Angus Scotch beef,” no less – but they actually make good burgers out of it rather than just using it for bragging rights. Many of their burgers are old standards, like the pesto burger, the avocado bacon burger, the Cajun burger, etc., but you don’t need to get too fancy or different to make a great burger. In-N-Out and Pie ‘N’ Burger use basically the exact same formula, but both shops’ end products are delicious and unique in their own subtle way.

My favorite burger at GBK is the relatively simple, very delicious garlic mayo burger. The robust beef throbs with moisture and flavor, matched by a cool, creamy mayo that seethes with the hot, delicious stink of raw garlic. It’s the kind of burger that leaves you wanting more even as you finish your meal feeling unhealthily stuffed – and the smell comes out of your pores for hours afterwards. Sadly, I’ve yet to find a good burger joint burger in London – there must be one out there somewhere – but for now I am quite content befouling my breath and expanding my ass at GBK, truly gourmet not only in name.

My recent “Viking Five” was quite a difficult one to narrow down, and to be honest there are a few other styles that are probably just as good with food as the ones I chose. Hefeweizens come to mind, as do witbiers, tripels, oatmeal stouts, altbiers, and pilsners. But if I had to choose just one candidate for honorable mention, it would probably have to be porter.

The humble porter is often overshadowed by its mutant commie cousin, Baltic porter, and by its stocky younger brother, stout, a style derivative of porter in form as well as name: stouts started off as “stout porters” back in the day. Don’t get me wrong, I love stouts, and they’re good with food, too – especially desserts and red meat – but porters, which are just a shade lighter in color and flavor, cover more ground than stouts. Here’s a Venn diagram to illustrate, because hey, I can’t remember the last time I made a Venn diagram, so why the hell not?

I don’t drink a lot of porters, partly because I’m a sucker for the up-front bitter chocolate and coffee flavors of many stouts, but also because there is something of a dearth of porters on the market. In America, they are increasingly common, but even though London is the birthplace of the style, they are notably hard to find here.

So it didn’t really dawn on me that porters are awesome with food until I chanced upon a porter at – where else? – the Market Porter in Borough Market. The Market Porter is a haven for ale aficionados, with at least a baker’s dozen of casked beers to choose from at any given time. Most of these beers come from British microbreweries and encompass a range of obscure styles, like dark milds, real lagers, oyster stouts, and fruit beers. The clientele, mostly suits taking long lunches, culinary tourists, and CAMRA members, are jovial and unpretentious, as are the beer-savvy barkeeps. The inside is austere and plastered with ale paraphrenalia, while the façade, though cluttered with smokers, is impressively decked out with pretty flowers and ivies hanging from the second floor.

It’s a great pub in and of itself, but its location in Borough Market is what really makes it a personal favorite. You can grab a pint in a plastic nonic, then hungrily wander off into the stalls to try your beer with all manner of fantastic fare on offer in the market proper: Thai green seafood curry, Middle Eastern confections, British venison burgers, Toulousean cassoulet, Swiss cheeses, Spanish charcuterie, and the list goes on.

This is exactly what I did with my pint of Wickwar’s toffee-sweet, moderately hopped, satiny smooth Station Porter. It was brilliant by itself, and seemed to meld effortlessly with just about everything I ate with it. Its buttery character and roasted sweetness found a happy home in the cozy cheese and potatoes of Raclette. Its caramel notes and lightly spicy hops linked up nearly perfectly with the peppery pork fat of a chorizo and arugula sandwich. It brought forth hidden mocha and dark fruit notes for an encounter with a chocolate-covered raisin and shortbread bar. The only thing it didn’t work with was a Cornish oyster on the half shell, but overall I was extremely pleased to have such a versatile brew in my hand as I perused the market. The porter, and the Market Porter, are indeed very lovely companions to food.

The Market Porter
9 Stoney Street
Borough Market
London
SE1 9AA
020 7407 2495

Monday to Friday: 06:00-08:30 and 11:00-23:00
Saturday: 12:00-23:00
Sunday: 12:00-22:30

On my recent, brief trip to New York to visit family and friends, I had a checklist of specific foods I wanted to eat there; I wanted nothing but good food experiences – nothing mediocre, nothing mundane. To these ends, the trip was beyond satisfactory. Fork-tender Greek-style grilled octopus, colorful piles of Ethiopian curries on spongy injera, a lowbrow burger, a highbrow burger, and butter beans with bacon and crème fraîche all made their way into my gullet, washed down with a variety of uniquely American indulgences: high-gravity craft beer, bottomless cups of coffee, and the notorious Twinkie milkshake, which was probably conceived either by some mad genius chef, or somebody’s six-year-old child.

Yes, it was a five-day feeding frenzy on fantastic food – a very successful trip in my book. And though it’s hard to choose highlights from such a delicious holiday, my two favorite meals were probably a sampler plate from Miss Maude’s Spoonbread Too and good ol’ Akamaru tonkotsu ramen from Ippudō.

Miss Maude’s sampler plate included fried chicken, fried shrimp, barbecue short ribs and baby back ribs, candied yams, black eyed peas, and collard greens, a burly plate of food that was so good and perfect it could be in a museum – an exemplary soul food meal, Harlem, circa 2009. The ribs fell off the bone as if they couldn’t wait to be eaten, and the shrimp had a brilliant, fresh flavor that burst through the solid crunch and spice of its breading. I was especially impressed with the humble greens, wilted yet firm and unexpectedly tinged with a hint of smoke, like they had been cooked over a fire.

And then the Akamaru – well, we all know how I feel about Ippudō. Or do we? Ippudō is legendary. It was among the first bowls of really exceptional ramen I had in Tokyo, and it remained a favorite – somewhere in my top three, I’d reckon – over the course of the two years I lived in Japan, even after countless bowls of worthy competitors. The creativity displayed in Ippudō’s kiwami shin’aji and the ramen en flambé at its sister restaurant, Gogyō, cemented Ippudō’s status in my mind as one of the greatest ramen shops in existence. It seems silly, in retrospect, that I even considered not going there while I was in New York – the only city outside Japan lucky enough to boast an Ippudō.

Both of these meals (and yes, a bowl of ramen is definitely a meal – welcome to the site!) are sold as soul food. Miss Maude’s is soul food in the typical American sense of the word (and pardon my glib definition here): simple yet hard-to-get-right cuisine with loads of fat, protein, and carbohydrates originating in Southern Black households. The literature on Miss Maude’s and other restaurants serving this kind of traditional soul food often play up its homemade history; menus and reviews alike deploy comfort-food clichés such as “like Mom used to make,” “home-cooked taste,” and “just how you remember it” so repeatedly that crackers like me almost think that we actually did eat really awesome soul food growing up. Don’t we wish.

With this homey image in mind, the claim on Ippudō’s website that “Ramen is Japan’s Soul Food” struck me as a misappropriation of the term. Ramen, while hearty, frequently full of lard, and often relatively simple, it takes too much time and effort to cook at home (except, obviously, for the instant version); this, I thought, disqualified it as soul food. A Japanese visitor to Ippudō New York who could truthfully claim that his bowl of Akamaru was “just like Mom used to make” would have been raised by a very outstanding mother indeed.

Then I thought: what if the idea of “homemade” is allowed to extend outside the actual, physical home? While ramen isn’t really something that is cooked in the home in Japan, it is cooked at home in the sense that every town in Japan has a ramen shop, and, importantly, every region produces a different version of the dish that becomes a part of local culture and identity. Also, ramen is accessible – it’s cheap, fast, filling, and warming, and it provides a wonderful mélange of textures and flavors that just seems to make people a bit happier; in other words, it’s comfort food. So while ramen probably won’t elicit memories of the smell of pork broth wafting out of their kitchen when they come home from school, it’s likely to evoke a more generalized but no less affectionate nostalgia for their furusato, their old home – which may be their town, their prefecture, or (if they’re in New York), their country. And, for what it’s worth, Ippudō NY was just how I remembered it.