Waiter, there’s pizza in my beer

Flavored brewskis: the next big thing?

By Ashley Griffin Gartland

August 3, 2007

Pizza and beer: it’s a classic combo. But mixed together?

One Chicago man believes he has seen the future, and it is called pizza-flavored beer. Self-proclaimed mastermind Tom Seefurth has added tomatoes, garlic, yeast, and herbs (in purified, strained, and fermented form) to beer that looks like his favorite beverage but tastes like — you guessed it — pizza.

The combo is not without precedent; witness bacon-flavored beer. A few fans and Chicago beer houses have jumped on the pizza beerwagon, and Seefurth has even earned a mention on Jay Leno for his novel idea.

Today, pizza; tomorrow, the entire menu? According to Seefurth, plans for salsa beer, curry beer, and even oatmeal-raisin-cookie beer are all in the works.

If you’d rather have your pizza on a plate and your beer in a glass, check out NPR’s pairing suggestions, which include sensible tips like picking your beer based on your pizza toppings (smoked-sausage pizza with brown ale, for example). The site also suggests pairings beyond the pie plate — say, beer with crème brûlée.

Finally, there’s the textbook guide to beer-and-food pairings, Garrett Oliver’s The Brewmaster's Table: Discovering the Pleasures of Real Beer with Real Food. Oliver, the brewmaster of the Brooklyn Brewery, seeks to prove not only that there are vast numbers of foods that go well with beer, but also that beer and cheese have far more in common than beer and wine.

Maybe that pizza-flavored beer really is a match made in cheese heaven.

Elsewhere on Culinate: Liz Biro’s article about beer inspiring a cook and a review of a book about American beer.