FERMENTED TABLES: South America

By: MJ

The first post in this series of continental FERMENTED TABLES experiences dealt with the very healthy beer scene in North America – where established commercial brewing and the rising craft brewing scene literally puts a wide range of beers on the table.

South America? Let’s say that the large commercial brewers have a firm grip on beer in the countries we visited. We were able to find some craft style ales and unique beers, but the market here is saturated with lagers and pilsners. There is a strong presence of some well known global brands – Budweiser, Stella Artois, and Heineken – these clearly keeping beer affordable and accessible in the region.

Also see the album of photos to accompany this post, at PHOTOS; Beer and Brewing, South America.

BRAZIL

1. Brasil Chopp – Pilsen. While in Rio we didn’t have any beer that I recall. We were too busy trying to get oriented to being in a new country and continent. However this was the one beer we had departing for Iguazu Falls, care of the airport hotel mini-bar. It was nothing to write home about, but a taste of things to come in the region.
2. While at our Iguazu Falls area hotel we sat poolside almost daily. Available by the pool was Heineken and a few of the local Brahma brand – I liked their rich and malty Malzbier.
3. The same hotel/resort restaurant had Eisenbahn Pilsen by the bottle. I read up on the history of this microbrewery beer while drinking it, which is a bit nerdy. It must be expensive to get beers from here to Northern Hemisphere competitions, but they are the most medaled brewers from Brazil.
4. While across the border in Argentina for a few hours to see the Iguazu Falls from another angle we had a late afternoon beer. I had something local, and PJ had a familiar beer called Miller. It was one of those beers that could have been anything and been good, as it was so hot and it was a long day. 

PERU

1. You cannot write about Peru without mention of the Pisco Sour. Pisco is a hefty spirit from distilled fermented grapes. Because wine is simply not strong enough! Besides being quite a signature drink (so much so it is isolated on their customs forms as the beverage you cannot bring into Peru), it goes particularly well with espresso and vanilla as a late morning neutralizer. (I found this out at that same pastry shop mentioned in #6 below.) On the first Saturday of February in Peru they have a national holiday… for this drink. These Peruvians keep it real.
2. Cusquena was the dominant local beer brand in the Cusco area. I was fond of their Negra beer, but not so much of their Golden. This was probably because we never really drank them cold in the hostal as the room had no fridge. 
3. We visited the Chocolate Museum. Just mentioning that as fermentation is a part of the deliciousness process of chocolate… in case you forgot the Hershey story.
4. I tried a few of the fairly local Peruvian ales, which were a nice change after all the lagers and pilsners of the previous few weeks. The IPAs were fairly mild, and I wonder if the availability of hops is limited as none of the beers to date had a strong hops presence. One would think hops would grow quite well somewhere on the continent! (Apparently Argentina grows about 460 metric tons (507 US tons) per year.)
5. At a coffee shop we noticed a local brewery advertised. We tracked down the location but it appeared to have closed, and the ad disappeared from the coffee shop the next time we were there. Weird, and sad, but maybe an opportunity for someone!
6. Hanz Homemade Craft Beer: They are just up the alley on the NW corner of Plaza de Armas and have several taps with beers from Cerveceria Willkamayu Artesanal. We had seen this roadside brewery from the bus on our way to and from Machu Picchu in the Urubamba area. It looks like they do small batch brewing, utilizing local ingredients. We had the the Red Ale and the Brown Ale without much fanfare, needed to be chilled.
7. I had a red helles bock from Lima at a pastry shop in Cusco. (See photo below.) Despite the weirdness of the last sentence, it was quite good and worth a shot on the home brew menu. Apparently nothing but the usual four ingredients. Sangre del Libertodor is the name.

BOLIVIA

1. Once over the border into Bolivia’s Copacobana we encountered Pascena, which is served in 330ml or 620ml bottles. It’s refreshing and mindless to drink with a meal, and sometimes that’s exactly what you need.
2. On a Copacobana grocery store shelf I noticed what I thought to be a wine called Judas. Luckily it was actually a beer. Not an ale, but dressed like one, and coming in a 7% ABV, it became a target to find over the next few days. (See the feature photo of this post.) At the English Pub where we had a late lunch in La Paz they had Judas by the bottle, so I had one, and it crept up on me. A bit light on the hops and still a lager styled beer, but worth it nonetheless.
3. We visited the Coca Museum, which is not related to fermentation or beer, but is related to historical use of a plant to influence societies and civilizations. The coca leaf is chewed, steeped like a tea, or refined (for mostly illegal purposes). It is an antidote for high altitude symptoms and an endurance booster of sorts.
4. Uyuni was where I stumbled upon a quinoa beer (by Lipena) made in Potosí, which was calling my name over dinner. It was distinctly different to other fermented grains, and would translate well into a wheat style. Plenty of yeast in the bottom, which had a somewhat rusty-red color despite the straw colored beer. Let’s hope it wasn’t actually rust.
5. On our tour of the salt flats we had no beer, but we did have some local red wine as provided by our guide. It is traditional to spill a little of your drink before consuming it, as a nod and offering to Pachamama. (Hence that is not blood on the salt flat in our photos, but red wine!) 
6. In Sucre we planted ourselves for about nine days, so had time to look around and taste a few local beers. BrewCraft had some good variety, and Serena had some easy drinking sessionable beers.
7. On our second visit to Joy Ride Cafe we sat out the back where the roof crumbled a title near the end of the meal. This was amusing, and not a reason to avoid the place – they have great coffee and mix of food also. It had been a long day and the generous beer I ordered hit the spot and balanced the salty meal I ate.
8. South America loves ‘dulce de leche’ and it’s roughly caramelized milk so it seems the perfect flavour for a stout. I was really missing stouts at this point in the trip.
9. We left Sucre on a crisp lager and a white wine, in the hot afternoon sun, reminiscing about the times we’d had to date on this trip. That’s unspecific in terms of drink type, but it didn’t matter. It was the experience we had in Bolivia that mattered.

PATAGONIA

Heading south we landed in Patagonia, the last region of South America that we visited. Here the ales and the beer paraphernalia were abundant, and a feeling of smaller local production was strong.

1. El Calafate is named after a plant from the region which produces an edible berry, the El Calafate berry. It is used for all sorts of foods and drinks as a flavoring… and rightly so. Legend has it if you eat the El Calafate, you are destined to return to Patagonia. We found a bottle of El Calafate Liquor, so we will be back!
2. La Zorra Brewery pleasantly surprised us in giving us a reminiscent taste of Colorado: Ales well made in a familiar type of setting and atmosphere. Food was also good here. Well brewed ales to fit various styles, and I sampled the three most diverse – stout, scotch ale, and IPA.
3. There’s a tea called Yerba mate that is common in South America, and it is quite popular but requires an acquired approach to drink. It almost seems ceremonious. Choose your style, from many different gourd shapes and sizes, and then load up the receptacle with the leaves. Add boiling water and let it steep, it’s intense. Sip it through an ornate bombilla. Then you keep adding small doses of hot water, repeated over and over again. I wasn’t sure when to stop, but did after becoming weary of adding hot water. This drink apparently has hot fluid related health consequences.
4. There was a second craft brewery (Cervecería Artesanal Chopen) with restaurant at the west side of downtown El Calafate that had a colorful chalkboard outside. Sadly it was not open on the few times we walked past.
5. The Toy Museum had one cabinet filled with the goods of yesteryear, and this included a section with alcoholic beverages. it is interesting to see the evolution of labels whilst bottles remain much the same.
6. The prominent regional beer on the market is made in Puenta Arenas and is called Cerveza Austral. I love the chilled air effect on their home page (click on that link!). They have a few styles and of note an El Calafate fruit ale, with which we became quite familiar and fond of.
7. When we were hunting for our Torres del Paine supplies we saw plenty of home brew sized ideas in neat packages (see photos in album). In the same supermarket we spotted a solitary bottle of D’Olbek, which had quite the fascinating cartoon label and bottle shape. Another nice homepage effect on their website!
8. South America is also a wine producer of note, and we enjoyed two occasions with wine in Patagonia. The first was a litre cask of wine on day two of our Torres del Paine trek, and the second was on day five – marking our six month mark of this trip,
9. The last Patagonian beer was clearly a local one: a Fuegian Cream Stout by Beagle. Delicious, it was.
10. On our last night on the continent we found a local Buenos Aires craft brewery (The Birra Lab) down a pedestrian street in San Nicolas area. We tested several of their brews which were quite flavorful. They did not do flights of tasters, which stood out as a bit odd, but were more than happy to provide small tase samples to help you make your decision.

From the continent of cold conditioned lagers and crisp pilsners we headed to the isles of cask beers and hearty stouts and porters: The United Kingdon.