FAB POW! Thornbridge Halcyon with Extra Mature Cheddar

Here we go. A hip new serial feature for Pencil&Spoon which was dreamt up yesterday while I was having a run. FAB POW! The Food and Beer Pairing of the Week!

Simple really, I just say a great pairing that I’ve had and you can tell me any cool ones that you’ve had. We can share the wealth of eating and drinking under a nicely onomatopoeic title that makes it sound camply cool like a comic book superhero fighting the bad guy (in fact it sort of is like a superhero and his sidekick, beer and food I mean, fighing together to save the world).

I’m starting with a themed choice as today I am going up to Thornbridge Brewery for the day (I'll be on the train when this auto-posts itself at 9a.m). FAB POW! Thornbridge Halcyon with Extra Mature Cheddar. The beer's a 7.7% IPA and it’s got that essential feature of the heavily-hopped beer: it drives you crazy wanting more. It’s a rollercoaster of sweetness and bitterness, one follows the other in a vicious circle, and it’s addictive. The caramel base lies beneath the citrusy fruit smack. Put this up against the kind of cheese which makes you wince with its strength (you know the one, it makes you mouth pucker) and you get a heavenly match. The cheese fills your mouth and the beer flows over it, mixing on your palate, lifting it up and away in different directions; tangy, sweet, salty, sharp, bitter, more sweet. And it’s BIG. It’s uncompromising. But it’s brilliant. The beer is fruitier and the cheese creamier. And don’t just take my word for it, here is what Kelly Ryan from Thornbridge says. And if you want the beer then Beermerchants are selling it. It’s one of the very best IPAs you can buy in the UK (Beermerchants have also got Bracia and Jaipur which are stunners). There it is. FAB POW! done. Anyone had anything good recently? I wanna know!