Homeland Holidays

Christmas Eve dinner saw one of my mother's classic recipes take a gluten free twist. A salmon and rice pastry bake. Enveloped in my shortcrust pastry, it was literally like coming home again - albeit with an admittedly dense pastry. A power outage midway through prep sent us all into a panicked frenzy as I also had a gluten-free vegetarian curry potpie in the works. The omnipotent Hydro Quebec engineers must have sensed the cumulative groans of despair from an entire suburban block's worth of residents fretting over Christmas Eve meals in limbo as the problem was resolved within an hour.


Coupled with Brasseurs Sans Gluten's Glutenberg millet based red ale, my Christmas game was strong this year. Probably my favourite of Glutenberg's range thus far, there are lots of subtle flavour notes in this one but the overall taste is full, well-rounded and satisfying with no hint of the initial interior monologue questioning whether or not I actually find this latest instalment in my gluten-free beer drinking escapade palatable. No hesitation. It's a keeper.

Guest Beer-House: Cerveteca Lisboa

Portugal, craft beer. Two things you would not think to be synonymous given the culture's penchant for wine, but there you have it. Cerveteca Lisboa gave us a solid few hours of craft beer from various countries before we hit the Bairro Alto one night in Lisbon. They had quite a few gluten-free beers on offer. I tried two from Danish brewery Mikkeller, who use traditional ingredients and processes to brew their beers but they de-glutenize it by way of enzyme additives. Charming. And common practice. The third was another Danish brewery, To Øl

Mikkeller's I Wish IPA, which they tout as the world's first gluten-free beer, was quite good with an almost pine-like aroma along with the usual hints of citrus.

Mikkeller's American Dream (Gluten-Free version) was a lager, and I've expressed how I feel about gluten-free lagers, but this one did break the mould ever so slightly; an abundance of fruity aftertastes without being cloaked in citrus and just a hint of carbonation. Very dry though. Mikkeller also make a regular version of their American Dream so it's imperative for a Coeliac to ensure they are getting the right bottle.

To Øl's Hop Love Pils was quite enjoyable and I discovered this one by fluke when a friend had ordered it and it was only upon reading the label and googling it that it proved to also be gluten-free. I did only have a small taste (not sure what controls are like for brewing as they reportedly use other breweries' equipment). One of the cloudiest pilseners I've ever seen, a very delicate fruity aroma, peach perhaps, with sharp grassy undertones. Rather lovely though and evidently indistinguishable from a regular pils.

Cerveteca Lisboa was a top visit and the owners were very pleasant, keeping our interest peaked until closing time. Saúde!

Cerveteca Lisboa
Praça das Flores 63
1200-192 Lisboa, Portugal

Ealing Beer Festival 2015

Even a tube strike wouldn't deter me from visiting the Ealing Beer Festival this year given that they had two gluten-free beers on offer and that I had just moved home and was in need of pint glasses. The GFPA from Allendale was sadly unavailable on day one so I put all my eggs in one basket and trekked over to the other end of the tent's alphabet to find Wold Top's Against the Grain. A couple of half pints of this smooth pale ale hit the mark, rocking in at 4.5% and offering a creamy, assertive taste. I'm still rather fond of the home-brew two friends helped concoct for me but Against the Grain passed the test, unveiling a shroud of that ever resonant adjective used for so few gluten-free beers: drinkable.

Wold Top's Against the Grain

Canadian Gluten-Free Beer

Home to Montreal for a gluten-free Christmas.

Health food and dietary foods in particular are shocklingly expensive in North America, be it for lactose/dairy intolerance, veganism or coeliacs. I wouldn't mind paying a premium for the alternative flours, baked goods and gluten-free tourtiere if it strictly came down to the attributed manufacturing cost (ensuring there is no cross-contamination in the production and packaging process for example) but it does seem as though there is a mark-up to take advantage of North Americans lurking in the free from aisle for a fad diet.

Glutenberg's IPA, Red Ale, APA and
Double Belgian

That being said, the gluten-free beer on offer in Quebec was not outrageously priced in comparison to food, and certainly not in in relation to Estrella Damm's gluten-free beer, Daura, which is the only brew available to coeliacs at even the largest of Tesco stores I've visited in the UK. Bless Quebec and their love for beer and microbrewing culture. The local IGA grocery store I visited in my suburb of Montreal had two brands, canned Glutenberg and bottled La Messagère, offering 7 varieties of gluten-free beer at this particular store.

I only had two hands so I picked up a case of Glutenberg IPA and La Messagere Rousse (and had to forego the milk).

The IPA I had with dinner was not great. It was almost unbearably carbonated, sharp, and dry with very little flavour. To be fair, I have yet to try a gluten-free pale ale or even lager that I didn't struggle to finish and perhaps going for the strong ale for my first beer since a so-so citrus-infused gluten-free lager in Amsterdam was ambitious. I'm still keen to try Glutenberg's other flavours, some of which are award winning (which I didn't notice in my rush of euphoria at the grocery store).

La Messagère's Rousse red ale, was woody and flavoursome with hints of caramelization and spice, yet still robust, which worked well on its own and with a feast. I am quite pleased to be spoiled for choice by two respectable microbrasseries whenever I will visit home. Get brewing to keep up, Europe.

La Messagère's Rousse, Millet and Blonde

Allergy & Free From Show 2014 (Kensington Olympia)

Bob Moore of Bob's Red Mill Flours

• Met up with a lovely and insightful gluten-free blogger based in Berlin and spoke with some wonderfully innovative promoters and suppliers. The folks at CELIA Lager, promoting their Czech beer, very patiently explained their process of de-glutenising barley malt. Quite carbonated but it certainly makes for a good gluten-free summer beer.
• Met the man behind (and face on) Bob's Red Mill Flours - a company long known for its range of flours but also commendable for its practice of processing and packaging their flours in a quality controlled gluten-free environment. Purchased some sorghum flour and trusty tapioca flour. 

  

  Scott Farms Sweet Potato Chips

• Scott Farms Sweet Potato Chips were hands down my favourite acquisition of the day. Wonderfully simple in concept but masterfully executed.
• Greens Gluten Free Beers were another great exhibitor with an abundance of flavours to sample but unfortunately not purchase on the spot. The IPA and Dry Hopped Lager were pretty good and have now inspired me to discuss further with some home-brewer friends about brewing a batch of gluten-free beer. Enter sorghum!

Next year: bring more hands.