Great Friends, Great Food & Great Beer!

There is nothing like an evening with friends to share a great mexican meal and some gluten free beers. It is also a perfect night when your friends have children close in age to your own that play well together. I think we actually had about 30 or more minutes tonight of peace and quite to enjoy a bowl of steaming hot chicken South of the Border Tortilla Soup, a slice of my Hearty Cornbread and a plate of salad. The kids were busy playing upstairs without us. Thank you kids for giving us some adult time.

Naturally the night started out with some gluten free beer tasting while enjoying some chips and Cilantro Guacamole, recipe by Mom's Cook Gluten Free. It didn't even occur to me 3 years ago when we first moved to Germany that this would be the place if any to have the best gf beers. What took me so long????

The Three Beers:

1. Riedenburger Gluten Frei. Bio. Brewed with millet malt.
2. Neumarkter Lammsbraeu Gluten Frei.
3. Schnitzer Braeu - German-Hirse-Lemon. Gluten Frei (Gluten Free). Bio (Organic). Brewed in the Black Forest with the finest Hirsemalz (millet malt).

It was a tough call but I have to say that my husband and I liked #2 the best. It really is the closest taste to a real beer. Not a heavy beer but more like a Pils. #1 was the runner up for my husband and I and our friend Kent's first choice. It was a little heaver and darker than #2 but still a great taste. I would buy that one again. If you like a Radler you'd like #3, it definitely had that spritzer/sprite taste to it. The Radler is a popular and loved drink amongst the Germans and was my friend Christie's top choice but she too enjoyed all of them.

The reason that the Neumarkter beer taste so much like regular beer is because it is brewed with Barley Malt. But wait, barley malt is avoided in the gluten free world. Well, I have heard about a process that removes gluten after the brewing and now we actually tried one. I'm not certain that this process is fail safe and someone with a severe case of celiac disease might not want to risk it. It has been a couple hours now since we drank the beers and so far so good with my digestion. I had this beer on my birthday and again had no reaction. So maybe this new process might actually work.

Now back to the food... The South of the Border Tortilla soup came in a package as you can see if you click on the link above and was given to me by my sister-in-law for Christmas. I would have never known about this if she hadn't sent it and wow it is a great fine. Super easy, delicious and clean ingredients. Doesn't get better than that! Thanks Caitie!

The Cilantro Guacamole is Karen's recipe and rocks. The only thing I thought it still needed was a little bit of salt so I added 1/2 tsp and it was good to go. Thanks Karen!

Happy New Year to everyone, it is going to be a GREAT one!!