Yesterday afternoon marked the tenth Annual Allagash Brewery Contest at ICE. For the past 10 years, Allagash Brewing Company has partnered with ICE to offer student scholarships for the best student recipe using Allagash beer. This year ICE students were challenged to create a dish using an Allagash Interlude — a beer made from wild yeast and aged in wine barrels. The recipes also had to fit in the theme of barbecue.

Three ICE students were selected as finalists from the dozens of entries and got the chance to prepare their recipes for the judges. Culinary Arts student Travis Henningfield prepared Pear and Pork Belly Kushiyaki with Interlude and Miso-Glazed Onigiri, Cucumber, Daikon Salad and Pear Chips. Skye Whitman made Grilled Duck Breast with Dried Plum & Interlude BBQ sauce with Allagash-Buttermilk Cornbread and Orange-Jicama Slaw. The third competitor, Davina Thomasula made Interlude BBQ Glazed Pork Chops and Drunken Cheddar Grits with Apple Jicama Slaw. More…

In perfect timing with the holidays, Sam Merritt, the founder of Civilization of Beer, conducted his regular Beer 101 class for the afternoon Culinary Management students right before ICE let out for winter break. This class takes place during the beverage module of the program where students explore areas of beverage service, controls, responsible drinking and alcohol governance, bar structure, the roles of bartenders and sommeliers and learn about profit maximization opportunities all within the context of wine, spirits, beer and mixology. Sam made beer tasting not only fun (not too difficult a task, right?) but highly educational for these potential future purveyors of the beverage. He is one of 100 certified Cicerone Beer Sommeliers in the US and spent over a decade selling and teaching great beer with the Craft Brewers Guild and the Brooklyn Brewery in New York when he realized that many culinary professionals lacked basic beer knowledge. As a result he founded Civilization of Beer, a beer consulting company that’s mission is to promote the responsible enjoyment of high-quality, craft beer.

The class kicked off with a entertaining exercise called, “La Isla de Cerveza.” Sam posed the questions “If you were on a deserted island with your favorite person and could only order one beer, what beer would you pick? If they delivered the wrong beer, what would be the one beer that you would send back at the expense of having no beer to drink?” We laughed as some students reluctantly admitted to liking nothing better than an ice-cold Bud Light Lime. Sam’s intention was to teach us good beer service is all about hospitality and knowing that it’s essential to serve what the customer wants to drink, not just what you like best. More…