why doesn’t someone open a shop that just sells beer and meat?

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So tonight I’m cooking a Flemish stew. With meat. And yep, you guessed it, BEER. Surely the most perfect combination on god’s great earth. I once had the most divine Flemish stew at the Belgian Beer Cafe in Melbourne and have never really been able to forget it…. sometimes I just take a moment and go to a quiet meaty place and think about that stew…. it really was that good. It was also made with Leffe - a Belgian beer that is out of this world! Both in taste and potency - you really have to take it easy with Leffe, some of them are about 8% so it pays to sit tight and appreciate the taste otherwise you could find yourself asleep in your own vomit. Oh yes. Your own vomit. TRUST me.

So, back to the stew…… (apologies for the vomit reference), I got this recipe from a recent Men’s Health mag and I believe it is the one used at the Belgian Beer Cafe. I made it a few weeks ago for some friends and it was just super! So tonight I’m doing it again but not to the recipe, I’m adding some - ba-ba-ba-bammmmmmm - VEGETABLES!!! I know, it’s like adding lemonade to beer. But there it is, we need some vegetables. I can feel scurvy starting to take hold. Now this recipe calls also for Leffe but I have been into every bottleshop in Hobart and there’s not one bottle of Leffe Brun (Brun is french for brown, it’s a dark fairly dense beer a bit akin to a stout but I think a bit sweeter. As I don’t have it here to taste I won’t get too descriptive because it would only be from memory), so kindly, the recipe’s author has included an alternative which is Toohey’s Old. I had never tried it before and am pleasantly surprised by it’s light taste. I love a good chunky stout - you know the type - a meal in a can. But this is quite light in taste and texture. A bit easier to guzzle maybe. Which always appeals.

So there you go - a somewhat long-winded way of saying that I have found a new dark beer that I think I could become quite fond of… and also a good excuse for me to drift off to the Belgian Beer Cafe in my mind where everything is made with meat and Leffe and I have a super-human tolerance to 8% beer.