Cooking with beer: 6 easy recipes (and which beer to choose)

Cooking with beer is easy: it stands in for wine or stock in slow-cooked dishes, lightens frying batters thanks to its bubbles, and adds bready, caramel or chocolate notes depending on the style. The only real rule: pick a low-bitterness beer for long cooking, because bitterness concentrates as it reduces. Here are six easy recipes, from northern France to dessert, so beer stops ending up only in your glass.

Which beer should you cook with?

In the kitchen, beer behaves like a full ingredient. As it reduces, water and some of the alcohol evaporate, and what remains concentrates: the malt sugars, but also the hop bitterness. Hence a few guidelines.

• Stews and braises (meat, sauces): a brown ale, an abbey beer or an amber, round and malty. They give a glossy sauce with caramel notes.
• Seafood and poultry: a wheat beer or a light blonde, which play the role of white wine without overpowering.
• Frying and pancake batters: a fizzy blonde or pilsner. It's the bubbles that matter, not the taste.
• Chocolate desserts: a stout or porter, with coffee and cocoa aromas.
• Avoid for long cooking: IPAs and very hoppy beers, which turn properly bitter once reduced. Save them for drinking.

If some of these styles are still a bit fuzzy, our beginner's guide to beer styles sorts it out in a few minutes. And no need to open your best bottle: a decent beer is enough, but a beer you wouldn't enjoy drinking won't get any better in a saucepan.

1. Carbonade flamande, the ultimate classic

The signature dish of northern France and Belgium: beef slow-cooked in brown beer with onions and gingerbread. Allow one 75 cl bottle of brown ale or abbey beer for about 1.5 kg of braising beef (chuck, cheek, shin).

1. 1Brown the beef pieces in butter, a few at a time, then set aside.
2. 2In the same pot, cook three or four sliced onions until nicely golden.
3. 3Return the meat, add a spoonful of brown sugar, a dash of vinegar, thyme and bay leaf, then pour in the beer.
4. 4Lay two slices of gingerbread spread with mustard on top: they melt and thicken the sauce.
5. 5Simmer, covered, over very low heat for at least three hours. Serve with fries, obviously.

2. Welsh rarebit, the dish that doesn't hold back

A speciality adopted by northern France, the "welsh" is a gratin where cheddar melts into beer. Melt cheddar over low heat with a good glass of blonde or amber and a spoonful of mustard, stirring until smooth. Pour it over a slice of country bread moistened with a little beer and topped with ham, then bake until bubbling and golden. Add a fried egg on top and you've got the dish that makes everyone happy after a cold day.

3. Mussels in beer

The simplest variation there is: take your moules marinières recipe and swap the white wine for a wheat beer or a light blonde. Sweat some shallots in butter, add the mussels and a glass of beer, cover and cook over high heat until they open. The citrus and coriander notes of a wheat beer go especially well with the briny flavour. A little parsley, a dash of cream if you feel like it, and you're done.

4. Beer batter (and beer pancakes)

This is the secret behind crispy British-style fried food: replace all or part of the liquid in the batter with a cold, fizzy blonde. The bubbles aerate the batter, which turns lighter and crispier when fried. Mix flour, a pinch of salt and beer just before frying, without overworking it. Perfect for fish, vegetable or fruit fritters. The same principle works for crêpe batter: a little beer in place of some of the milk makes lighter crêpes.

5. Chicken in beer

The northern cousin of coq au vin. Brown chicken pieces, set them aside, then cook onions and mushrooms. Deglaze with a blonde or an amber, return the chicken and simmer for around forty minutes. Finish with a little cream and, if you have them, a few juniper berries for a northern touch. Serve with potatoes or tagliatelle.

6. Stout chocolate cake

To end on a sweet note: in your usual moist chocolate cake recipe, replace some of the milk with a stout. Its roasted coffee and cocoa aromas deepen the chocolate flavour, without the beer being really recognisable. Guests rarely guess the secret ingredient, which is half the fun.

Tips for cooking with beer

• Taste the beer first: its flavour will end up, concentrated, in the dish.
• Add it gradually to sauces and taste as you go, especially if the beer is bitter.
• Balance it: a touch of sugar (brown sugar, gingerbread, caramelised onions) softens a sauce that's too bitter.
• Recycle: a flat beer opened the day before works perfectly well in a stew. Bubbles only matter for frying batters.
• Serve the same beer at the table: it's the simplest pairing there is. To go further, see our beer and cheese pairings and which glass for which beer.

And to open the bottles?

One bottle for the pot, another for the cook: you might as well make the opening count. With the **Beer Mortar, the cap takes off* as the bottle opens. A fun way to turn making the carbonade into a show for the guests hanging around the kitchen.

Just one rule, even more true in the kitchen: aim at a clear area, never at people, and stay away from the hob and the pans. A flying cap is still a small projectile, a bit like a champagne cork. To understand how it works, everything is on the how it works page.

Cooking doesn't remove all the alcohol

Contrary to popular belief, cooking doesn't make all the alcohol disappear: some stays in the dish, all the more so when the cooking time is short. Beer recipes are therefore not ideal for children, pregnant women or anyone who needs to avoid alcohol. For them, a malty alcohol-free beer is a good substitute in most recipes. And for the beer served at the table, please drink responsibly.

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