A Final Dinner in the States

How do you choose a last meal? It's kind of a classic choice, right? Do you go with something exceedingly simple? Bread-and-wine with twelve of your closest friends?

Or do you go for something more elaborate, something closer to what a death row prisoner might choose? In 2011 death row inmate Lawrence Brewer requested and received for his last meal “two chicken-fried steaks with gravy and sliced onions; a triple-patty bacon cheeseburger; a cheese omelet with ground beef, tomatoes, onions, bell peppers and jalapeños; a bowl of fried okra with ketchup; one pound of barbecued meat with half a loaf of white bread; three fajitas; a meat-lover’s pizza; one pint of Blue Bell Ice Cream; a slab of peanut-butter fudge with crushed peanuts; and three root beers.” He then refused to eat the meal, leading Texas to do away with the custom of providing “last meals” to people they were about to execute.

I tended toward the simple end of the scale.


For my final dinner in the United States (for a while, anyway), I've chosen to go a very simple route—cheese, crackers, beer, olives, and a few other tasty items.

I started with a 2009 Bourbon County Stout by Goose Island. I will say that I think the “Bourbon Barrel Aged“ thing is overdone. At one time it was new and interesting. It made sense as an innovative way to give a richer character to some beers, as the oakiness of the barrel and the essence of the bourbon infused stouts with some alcohol notes and a strength of palate that simple aging along couldn't give. And while I'm not a big fan of everything that Goose Island makes, their bourbon barrel-aged stout is fantastic. They've been doing it since 1992, and after a bit storage in the basement these beers get some real character.

Nowadays the whole thing is so tired that breweries are aging lagers in bourbon barrels. Talk about jumping the bourbon barrel shark. As the kids say these days—WTF!? Just make a good lager and be done with it. I love innovation and experimentation in beer, but a lager has a certain character to it that bourbon just doesn't compliment.

Anyway, Goose Island was one of the first breweries to do the bourbon barrel thing. And they do it very, very well. Their stout is a wondrously silky beer with some alcohol overtones and tastes of plummy, pruny dark fruits. There's a nice feel of alcohol hanging in the background, but nothing overwhelming. This is a big beer, and it takes a while to drink.

Dinner consisted of a three-cheese plate of Gorgonzola Cremificato Extra Creamy, Neal's Yard Dairy Gorywdd Caerphilly, and a Meadow Creek Grayson. On the side I included some ham with a mustard sauce and a few pickles and olives.

The beer was a Muffin Top Belgian Style Tripel IPA (more on this trend in a future post) from Clown Shoes Brewing in Massachusetts. This is a new offering from the company—having come out in October 2011. The beer opened with the distinctly floral hop aroma that only American hops can provide. This places it more into the guidelines of an IPA than a  Belgian Tripel, but whatever. It's got a nice aroma. The flavor of the beer is fruity and sharp, with a strong malt character. Like a good IPA the hops are stronger, and the malt character is there to support the hops. There's a bit of lemony-ness to it, which gives it some tang.

It goes really well with the slight sourness of the Caerphilly cheese, with each balancing out the other. I also like the symmetry of being on the verge of flying out to live in England, and having as a last meal a Welsh-English cheese along with an Americanized version of a Belgian-English beer.

The symmetry is good because modern Belgian beer originated as an offshoot of British beer. Of course, monks had been brewing in Belgium for hundreds of years. But when the French Revolution swept through Belgium the monasteries were disbanded and the brew kettles and equipment melted down for other uses. Brewing there came to an end from 1795 until the Trappists at Westmalle began brewing again in 1836. But that was for the monks only, and no commercial Belgian beer was sold until 1861 (with Leffe leading the way). Into the vacuum flowed British beer, eagerly exported by big British brewers and eagerly imported by thirsty Belgians. So most beer sold in Belgium, up through 1902, was from British exporters and was in the style of British Ales.

At that time a local newspaper held a contest for beer recipes to reestablish the Belgian style. With yeast from England and recipes mostly in the English style, the first non-Trappist breweries were opened shortly thereafter. It's fair to say, then, that Belgian beer started out with a distinctly British character and background. So, paring an English cheese with a Belgian beer that has its roots English beer culture seems fitting.

The philosophical pairing of the Gorgonzola is a bit more suspect. It's a buttery blue cheese that needs to be on a cracker, but that gets overwhelmed by the strong hoppiness of the Clown Shoes Muffin Top. Still, it's good.

In all, the rotation of the three cheeses interspersed by sips of the Belgian-style Tripel IPA, along with the ham and pickles to cut the palate, was a nice final meal here in the States. Next post from England, where the food adventure begins.