Raise a glass to France with its beer
Seated around a table in the reception room of the French Library's elegantBack Bay brownstone, Henry Faineteau, Frederique Bazire-Duriez, ChristianDuriez, Julien Lenoir, Stephanie Marchal, and Allon Beck examine what's in their glasses, breathe in its aroma, then taste it, with mmms and aahhs of appreciation. It's not Bordeaux or Burgundy that they're sipping, however. It's beer -- French beer.
Some fine beer is brewed in the farmhouse brasseries of northeastern France. In this area between Calais and Lille near the Belgian border, known as Nord-Pas de Calais, they've been making ale for centuries. When France celebrates Bastille Day tomorrow -- the day in 1789 when the citizens stormed the Bastille, thereby beginning the French Revolution-- perhaps some modern French tables will boast bottles of smooth, slightly fruity, effervescent farmhouse ale.
On this particular night, the tasters gathered around six ales made in their native country were captivated and soothed by the fruity, caramel-like flavors of some of the beers. We asked them to swish and swirl their glasses and talk about aromas, flavors, and impressions. The lovely drink that the French call bière de garde was as much an undiscovered treasure outside its own region at the time of the Revolution as it is today. Even Duriez, 28, a native of the Nord-Pas de Calais region who does post-doctoral research at CIMIT Innovative Technology for Medicine, had never seen or heard of most of the beers in the tasting. Faineteau, 30, who is from Haute-Savoie (near Evian), a post-doc in psychology at Harvard, adds, ''In the bigger cities, you can find bars that have beers from all over the world, but not some of these."
Bière de garde (literally ''beer for keeping" or ''laying down"), was originally brewed in the late winter and early spring, while it was still cool enough for fermentation to take place, then stored in barrels to be consumed during the summer. These days it is made year-round in 25-ounce bottles, frequently stoppered with a cork like sparkling wine. Malted barley from Champagne and hops from the Alsace are often used in brewing bière de garde.
These beers have a character that could be a great complement to food. And in the north, an area also sometimes called French Flanders, there is a style of cooking called cuisine de la bière that uses the region's brews as an ingredient in and an accompaniment to many dishes, says Bazire-Duriez, 27, a professor at the Alliance Francaise who is married to Duriez. ''There are the moules [mussels] that are cooked in beer," she says. ''And people drink beer with crepes."
Despite its popularity in the north, there is no egalite at the table in other parts of France for these beers. ''Wine is to drink with dinner," says Marchal, 24, from Bourgogne, a laboratory assistant in psychology at Harvard.
At home, say the French natives, beer doesn't replace wine at the table. ''Beer is a social drink," Faineteau explains. It is drunk at cafes while talking to friends, he says, and much less attention is paid to the character of the beer than the wine one has with dinner. We found a toffee- or caramel-like sweetness in most of these brews, along with subtle pear, apple, or raisin fruitiness, and sometimes a hint of spiciness.
Faineteau is still thinking about the beer tasting, he wrote in an e-mail later asking where to buy one of the ales: ''I still keep on my mind the sweet taste of the Choulette."
Even at most Paris cafes, it is difficult to find the artisanal beers from Nord-Pas de Calais. You see beers from the commercial French brewers Fischer and Kronenbourg, and Belgian brews such as Chimay and Duvel. It seems a shame that the craftsmanship of the Flanders brewers is not celebrated in the rest of the country. But since several of these ales are available in the Boston area, there's no reason why they can't be appreciated here.
So do something revolutionary: Try a French farmhouse ale. Vive la bière. 