Carlsberg Malaysia venture into new Craft Beer – Brooklyn Brewery launch at Meja Kitchen and Bar, TREC

Put put put your hands up, put your hands up. Who is a craft beer fan over here? I am one of them as craft beer is certainly a unique beer. Before year ends, Carlsberg took the opportunity to strike a strategic partnership with Brooklyn Brewery which an award-winning craft beer brew house in New York. Bringing us their signature brews Brooklyn Lager and Brooklyn East IPA.

The announcement took place at MEJA Kitchen and Bar at TREC, where we get a chance to sample this beer and also along with food pairing, which I am excited about. This would be my first time having beer food pairing.

There are two bottles with distinctive flavours profile and lets start off with :

Brooklyn Lager, in 5.2% ABV, is amber-gold in colour and displays a firm malt centre supported by a refreshing bitterness and floral hop aroma. The aromatic qualities of the beer are enhanced by “dry-hopping”, the centuries-old practice of steeping beer with fresh hops as it undergoes a long, cold maturation.

Its flavourful liquid was accentuated when paired with mini beef pepperoni bruschetta, oven roast leg of lamb with mini yogurt and fried “wu xiang” (Chinese five spice powder) chicken at the tasting. Very interesting food pairing combination as the food pairing flavours, opens up the beer profile even more prominent. It lifted the aroma of floral hop all over your mouth yet the mint gives it a light refreshing touch that it needed.  Wu Xiang or 5 spices totally opens up the flavour profile. The best combination among it where you can enjoy the fragrant of lager more.

Next,  Brooklyn East IPA, in 6.9% ABV, is a clean, drinkable pale ale that offers a bold balance, with a bright piney aroma, and the taste of stone fruits yet a firm bitterness from IPA’s ancestral  British home. It was best paired with spicy food when guests had it with spicy grilled tiger prawn, Vietnamese-style asam laksa and extra spicy, breaded, deep fried, stuffed, cheesy jalapeno poppers.

I would rate this is the best pairing for the night. Who would have thought beer and laksa could go so well. I must say if you do have a chance to dine at MEJA, do order this combination. Fragrant, gives you the slight bitter punch it needed yet laksa profile is spicy push it to have sweet bitterness. Another challenge if you love spicy stuff, pair it with cheesy Jalapeno. This 2 are the best combination for the night.

Nutshell, pair with SPICY food to get the best flavour profile of the beer.

For this beer, it is now available in selected Bars and going to be more readily available in most of the drinking bars and pub in year 2018 onwards. With Brooklyn Brewery Malaysia & Singapore Ambassador.

Personally, I felt that for easy drinking without any pairing Lager would be a good start but it seems I could only take 3 max.

IPA on the other end, is much easier to drink for longer chill out nights with friends. Bitter floral taste and easy to pair with any bar snacks you tend to have.