Last night, Fair Food hosted their annual Brewer’s Plate event. This year’s incarnation was held at the spectacular Penn Museum. It was a wonderful evening—great local food and local brews. Plus, the weather was kind enough to hold off for a few hours.
Some Thoughts:
–Pork, pork and more pork: Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised, considering Philadelphia Weekly’s recent cover story, but pig ruled this event. White Dog had ribs, Southwark had pig’s head, Garces’ Village Whiskey did pulled pork sandwiches (something I couldn’t even look at after a few days of leftovers) and Vargas Bar threw bacon on top of truffled mac and cheese, to name a few.
-My Favorite Things to Eat: A trio of pâtés from the Abbaye, goat cheese from Shellbark Hollow Farm, beer-braised lamb shoulder with pureed parsnips from Iron Hill, peanut butter eggs from John & Kira’s, a toasted lavash with Indian-spiced chicken from Royal Tavern. That said, there were so many delicious things—it’s hard to choose.
-Even more difficult is culling my favorite beers from the many (many) I sampled. I loved a Honey IPA from Prism Brewing (a small brewery currently working out of the General Lafayette Inn), Double Simcoe from Weyerbacher and a cask-conditioned something from Sly Fox. There were also some great porters and stouts. If there was one overarching trend, it was high ABVs. There was nary a beer below 7 percent, which made the small sampling cups more than adequate.
Can’t wait till next year.
