Beer pairing for a Crawfish Boil

I am still waiting to bottle my first batch of homebrew, and (like so many) already thinking about what to make next. A friend of mine is throwing his annual crawfish boil in early May and I would like to brew up something special just for the occasion.

So, any suggestions for what beer goes best with gumbo, crawfish, spicy boiled, potatoes, corn and the like? I was originally thinking of a blood orange hefeweizen (recipe from Extreme Beers) but a quick google search suggested a best bitter or maybe an american brown ale. Any other suggestions?

Thanks in advance

According to Garrett Oliver, Brew Masters Table;

No Crawfish listed...

Crab; Witbier, weissbier, helles, pilsner, Irish Stout, Saison

Shrimp; Witbier, weissbier, helles, pilsner, Irish Stout, Saison, Belgian Strong Ale, APA

Gumbo; APA, brown ale, IPA, Amber Ale, Dortmunder, Weissbock


I 'd go with a session beer like a APA or an American Wheat.

i would think a good lager with mild bitterness.. in my experience with crawfish and beer, brown ales just didn't seem that refreshing when your lips are numb. something very cold and mabye a lil on the light side. you will be drinking a lot of it to stop the burning and u don't want a headache during cleanup time

I would say a good hoppy American Pale Ale, or IPA. If you're trying to please the crowd so to speak I'd go with a hefe/witbier. However, for me spicy + hops = awesome! Something about the bitterness, hoppiness, and spicy just works together. Where is all this taking place again? I may need some directions .

TwoHeadsBrewing said:

I would say a good hoppy American Pale Ale, or IPA. If you're trying to please the crowd so to speak I'd go with a hefe/witbier. However, for me spicy + hops = awesome! Something about the bitterness, hoppiness, and spicy just works together. Where is all this taking place again? I may need some directions .

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Exactly what I was thinking. A nice hoppy pale ale would really hit the spot. One with a bunch of Centennial hops.

Here's something off topic but this thread has me thinking about it... A buddy of mine and I dragged our wives out one night about eleven years ago to catch crayfish and cook them on the shore. As we were cooking them, my buddy grabs a freshly cooked crayfish and bites the head off. Juice and steam squirt all over the place and his eight month pregnant wife starts hurling! Priceless...

I'd say something along the lines of a brown ale, maybe a porter. I may be in the minority on this, but I usually go for scotch ales, doppel bocks & cream stouts; any of which (IMHO) would go well with your crawfish. Sorry, but I just can't bring myself to recommend a pale ale or pale lager. I'm sure most would go for something pale & hoppy. Regards, GF.

TwoHeadsBrewing said:

I would say a good hoppy American Pale Ale, or IPA. If you're trying to please the crowd so to speak I'd go with a hefe/witbier. However, for me spicy + hops = awesome! Something about the bitterness, hoppiness, and spicy just works together. Where is all this taking place again? I may need some directions .

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+1 here. Hoppy beers go great with spicy foods. I had a pretty hoppy APA with some really spicy jambalaya last week and it was awesome.

Cool, thanks for all the responses. I had originally thought of a best bitter, but I have a light ale in the secondary right now so i didn't really want to brew another light-type ale. I think I am gonna go ahead with the IPA. In fact I am gonna take a stab at the continual hopping to try and make a 60 minute IPA in the spirit of Dogfish Head's (although to prevent copyright infringement issues I will call it a 59 minute IPA). I may even try an English IPA kit that uses some wood in the fermenter.

Now.... what to brew after that?

We are doing our 4th Annual Crawfish Boil here in Austin this week-end.

I have a friend that lets me use his Jockey box and we are able to run 2 taps.

I have in my Kezzer
20 gallons of Hefe
20 gallons of my Grier Pale Ale (beechnut brew house)

The hefe is by far the fav of the BMCer's . I serve NO BMC and the taps flow all day.
Good times.

First though that came to me was TurboDog, but then ya'll are probably talking about good homebrew. Anyway...I'll go now.

Consider stout, it works very well with seafood.

Cream Ale or Pils. That's where my tastes are taking me.

First three beers that came to mind without too much thought...

1-Hilliard's Pils
2-Double Mountain Vaporizer Pale
3-Perfect Crime Smoked Saison (i think this would be strange-good...)

Witbier.

I have never had crawfish, but we have plenty of crawdads in the cricks around here. Maybe I should take the kid out and pick up a few dozen. I'm fairly certain my wife would hurl just imagining eating one of them.

Crawfish boils around here consist of lots of bmc and hours of standing around in the heat eating those spicy delicious little suckers.

I just can't imagine washing down spicy crawfish with a brown or porter or stout. I would go with a sessionable lighter beer, something to quench your thirst while you keep eating, wheat beer, maybe an APA. But personally the first thing that comes to mind would be biermunchers cream of three crops recipe.

Dang! Looks like Michigan is FULL of crawdads!

But do you really suck the "juice" out of the head?? I've taken apart plenty of crawdads when I was a kid and there wasn't much in there that was appetizing..

Homercidal said:

Dang! Looks like Michigan is FULL of crawdads!

But do you really suck the "juice" out of the head?? I've taken apart plenty of crawdads when I was a kid and there wasn't much in there that was appetizing..

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You suck out all the spicy glory that is in there.

McLovin82 said:

I am still waiting to bottle my first batch of homebrew, and (like so many) already thinking about what to make next. A friend of mine is throwing his annual crawfish boil in early May and I would like to brew up something special just for the occasion.

So, any suggestions for what beer goes best with gumbo, crawfish, spicy boiled, potatoes, corn and the like? I was originally thinking of a blood orange hefeweizen (recipe from Extreme Beers) but a quick google search suggested a best bitter or maybe an american brown ale. Any other suggestions?

Thanks in advance

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You want something that can stand up to the seasoning. Your blood orange hefe idea sounds good. Bayou Teche's Saison D'Écrivisses (Crawfish Season) is made for this sort of thing. Spicy/floral, crisp, hoppy and just a little funky. I would definitely go for a hefe/saison/farmhouse type beer with a decent amount of hops. NOLA Flambeau Red is also a really good complement, so a hoppy red ale could work.

American lager, wheat, citrus wheat. And it should be a gulf state beer. Louisiana or Texas.

I was going to suggest one of the "new generation" IPA's myself. Like my Cougar Country IPA. It's bittered with warrior,flavored with 1.2oz each of ahtanum,EKG,simcoe & mosaic. Dry hopping now with the remaining .8oz of each flavor hop now. I got the idea from Sam Adam's Latitude 48 IPA & their Double Agent IPL to name two. The grapefruit flavors get pushed to the back,with fruity herbal bity flavors being in the majority. The bittering qualities of warrior play very nicely with those hops. I think they'd pare quite well with the spicy flavors with a sort of palette-cleansing effect. A hoppy red ale sounds good too. I used to love the original Killian's Irish red with ribs myself.

The crawfish boil is the star in this show. The home brew is the supporting beer making it even better. IMHO a IPA would have some nice bitterness, be cool and refreshing. The masses would like it.

Crawfish boil?

Why... Budweiser of course.

smccarter said:

Crawfish boil?

Why... Budweiser of course.

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No. If you're going to do a NAIL at a crawfish boil, it should be a Dixie.