beer Archives - eatrio.net

#EatRioLoves: Beer

03/02/2022/2 Comments/in Musings

Not everything in Rio is 100% intuitive; it can take time to appreciate or understand some of the finer aspects of Carioca life. For this reason, I created the #EatRioLoves series. Whether you are here for a short visit, or you’re planning to stay for longer, I hope this series will help you connect with some of the things I’ve grown to love during my 11+ years in the Cidade Maravilhosa. Today I have few things to say about the beautiful barley beverage: beer.

Temperature

Beer here is served cold. You knew that already, right? Wrong! It has to be ice cold. It is not uncommon to hear someone ask the waiter which beer is coldest before deciding which to order. Temperature trumps brand preference. Similarly, helpful waiters will often inform you that the brand you’ve just asked for is not sufficiently chilled – you’ll be expected to choose an alternative.

When beer is really cold, there’s a danger that it will turn to slush as it fills your glass – there are various ways people try to avoid this, including caressing the base of the bottle in a sensual, circular motion and avoiding any sudden movements (even a little bump can be enough to set off the freezing process).

Estupidamente gelada!

Acceptable beer temperatures include: bem gelada (well chilled), estupidamente gelada (stupidly cold), geladíssima (really really cold) and cu de foca (as cold as a seal’s arsehole). Anything failing to conform to these exacting standards is considered quente (hot) and will be tossed into the street in disgust.

Eat Rio Craft Beer Tours

27/07/2018/4 Comments/in Food and drink, Things to do

NOTE: (April 2023) We are hoping to re-launch our craft beer tours later this year, but for now these are not running. However, if you’re looking for some excellent places to try craft beers in Rio, get in touch and I’ll point you in the right direction!

In last week’s post I made a brief mention of a failed attempt to visit beer supply shop (this went down shortly after I had experienced a mellow kind of nirvana at a nearby snack bar). Well I expect you’ve all been eaten up with curiosity ever since, plagued by questions such as:

Why a beer supply shop? and Did you go back another time when it was open? and, erm, What did you buy there?

Well settle down people, because I’m going to respond to your pressing perguntas. The answers, respectively, are:

I was looking for some supplies to make beer; and Yes, I went back 2 days later about an hour before they were due to close; and I bought malted grains, hops and yeast.

These are malted grains of barley. The process of malting is unthinkably cruel. First you encourage a grain to start germinating by adding water. Then, just when it gets going, dreaming of a full and happy life as a stem of grass, perhaps with plans to one day have its own child grains to continue the wondrous circle of life, you kill it by exposing it to hot air. Makes you think doesn’t it? Still, cruel or not, it’s essential for making decent beer so what can you do?

Regular readers will remember that I’ve made beer a couple of times in the last few years. On those occasions it was just some carefree fun which resulted in about 40 bottles of passably delicious home-brewed beer. But this time around things were different; this was serious. This time I was making beer with my Eat Rio colleagues and it wasn’t fun – it was work (…but also fun).

In this excruciatingly circuitous way (is anyone still reading?) I’d like to announce that we will soon be releasing our latest culinary tour experience – the Eat Rio Craft Beer Tour. The beer scene in Rio is blowing up! Since 2012 there have been a plethora of local breweries popping up in Rio. When I first got here in 2010 you were lucky if you could find a place selling Heineken – nowadays there are dozens of speciality bars selling IPAs, APAs, Golden Ales, Bocks and Porters. Some are made in accordance with the old school traditions, others are flavoured with all kinds of exciting Brazilian fruits and spices. For a beer enthusiast in Rio it’s a wonderful time to be alive.

A Chowzter Balti Mission in Birmingham

16/01/2015/6 Comments/in Food and drink

To finish off the tales of our recent trip to England, I wanted to tell you about an unexpected culinary adventure that took Mrs Eat Rio and me to Britain’s second most populous city: Birmingham.

A couple of things to quickly say about Birmingham. Firstly, unlike its Alabama namesake, you don’t pronounce the “h” when saying the city’s name (here’s how it’s done – North American visitors: learn this before you arrive to avoid ridicule). Secondly, despite the recent report from satirical news agency Fox News, non-Muslims are very welcome in the city. This is a constant source of relief to the 79% of Birmingham’s residents who are in fact non-Muslim themselves…

It was almost 2 years ago that I first met Jeffrey Merrihue, founder of Chowzter. Before long he had signed me up to curate the Chowzter list for Rio. I also do occasional writing jobs for them and take part in their awards events. Jeffrey is one of those people who is described by many as ‘larger than life’ – full to bursting with ideas and enthusiasm, particularly when it comes to great food from across the world. Jeffrey left his home in the US years ago and today lives in London, so when he heard we were in town he came up with a typically crazy plan. We would go on a Balti Mission to Birmingham.

Amazon Beer taste test

29/08/2014/5 Comments/in Food and drink

In the previous post we established that there are a growing number of places that stock decent beer in Rio, but what should you order when you get there? Most of the Carioca beer enthusiasts I’ve met seem obsessed with Belgian ales, particularly those with heavy flavours and high alcohol contents. I suppose that if you’re going to spend R$30 ($13) on 330ml of beer, it’s nice to feel that you’re getting some bang for your buck.

When I take guests out on food tours, we taste a few different Brazilian beers including some from the state of Rio and others from further afield, but my favourite by far are the Amazon Beers. Amazon Beer (Cervejaria Amazon) is a brewer located in Belém in the northern state of Pará. They produce a range of 7 beers and a few days ago I decided to taste 3 of them:

From left to right – Açaí Stout, Cumaru IPA, Bacuri Forest.

Where to drink beer in Rio

27/08/2014/4 Comments/in Food and drink

Beer drinkers coming to Rio may be disappointed at first – many bars and restaurants only serve the lightest of beers such as Brahma, Skol and Antarctica. The near absence of flavour in these beers is primarily due to the use of up to 45% unmalted cereals, primarily corn and rice. This lack of flavour is why Mrs Eat Rio refers to these as ‘beer soda’; some people even debate whether you can honestly call these beverages ‘beer’ at all.

Moving up the food chain a little, the fancier beach kiosks and even some beach vendors are starting to stock Heineken. It might not be a wonder-beer exactly, but it has significantly more flavour and bite than the bog-standard beer sodas.

Carioca Beer Enthusiasts

With this background of terrible beer, you might be surprised to hear that during my time in Rio I have met more beer enthusiasts then in any other city. My theory is that if you spend your early drinking years indulging in tasteless budget beers like Itaipava and Nova Schin, then when you finally taste something decent, it blows your mind. I picture an 18 year old Brazilian tasting his/her first Guinness or Duvel, realising that real beer has real depth of flavour and embarking on a journey of beer discovery.

Tag Archive for: beer

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Temperature

Carioca Beer Enthusiasts