Upland Carmel Creates the Perfect Mood at its Valentine’s Day Food Pairing

A wintry, snowy Valentine’s Day brought a melancholy feel to Upland Carmel’s Beer Paired Dinner this year, making it one of the nicer beer dinners I’ve attended. This is their 3rd annual event and if the goal was to present a warm, intimate setting for their guests, then Upland Carmel fully accomplished this.

The rustic, industrial Upland Carmel Tap Room features repurposed wood planks that front the bar wall, with wood and corrugated metal accenting the seating area. Windows wrap around the corner of the room, allowing you to gaze out onto the cold night and dream about the warm days soon to come.

General Manager Allison Dalluege, assistant manager William Linge and their staff went out of their way to make sure this Valentine’s Day was a night to remember. Time-consuming personal touches did not go unnoticed by my wife or I; for instance, each table had hand-crafted name tags with clothes pins placed on it, as well as a bottle/vase that held tree twigs with paper, with heart-shaped cutouts stuck onto it.

The dinner began nicely with a starter of raw oysters on the half shell and house mignonette, paired with the Way Down Yonder sour ale. Blended with persimmons and pawpaws and having a lemony taste, this beer has a story of its own since Upland traveled to the bayou of Louisiana to collaborate with brewery friends.

Moving on, Coast Buster Imperial IPA and mushroom consommé was followed by an arugula and roasted fennel baby beets salad, paired with Malefactor, a bourbon barrel aged sour. While some barrel aged beers drip with more bourbon than I like, Malefactor has the perfect kiss of bourbon in it.

Here is where the beat picks up. The next dish was sea scallops, wilted watercress, bacon and cherry tomato, along with Upland’s Wheat Ale. The scallops were so succulent (I’ve never used that word before, but now seems like a good time to start) that each bite brought disappointment, knowing it would soon be gone. Absolutely delicious.

Next came a juicy and tender dish of Fisher Farms NY strip, sweetbread ravioli and oyster mushroom with the Komodo Dragonfly black IPA, followed by a waffle cookie ice cream, with berry compote. The Barrel Chested barleywine was the warming nightcap of the evening. Ahhh…

I talked with executive chef “Blinde” (his last name) and sous chef Scott Dougherty, and told them that if I had been able to pick the night’s menu against other choices, I would have picked the same dishes. Blinde acknowledged that pairing a dinner with a couple of sour beers brought challenges of its own, but he more than rose to the occasion. I was pleased to know that he also favored the sea scallops as his choice dish.

As a “struggling musician,” Blinde attended culinary school in Los Angeles and returned to Indiana to work with Upland. Using the farm-to-plate philosophy as much as they can, Upland Carmel utilized a Noblesville farm in helping create the sweetbread ravioli, delicately prepared by Blinde and Scott.

This was a six course, leisure exercise in food and drink enjoyment so there was no rush to get you out the door, and if this were a concert, you would have cheered for an encore. Breweries that do food pairings usually draw patrons in because of their beer, but then they get an opportunity to overwhelm with their food. Upland Carmel did exactly that.

Each guest was pampered and treated like family or a close group of friends. And, so what if I didn’t get a fluffed up pillow or a foot massage, I sure as hell felt like it when we left for the night. Guess what, I know what we’ll be doing next Valentine’s Day!

Cheers!

Rick

Visit Upland Carmel Tap House at 820 E. 116th St., Carmel, and be sure to check them out at The Taste of Carmel on March 3rd.
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You can find Rick Burkhardt on twitter @indybeersleuth or reach him at indybeersleuth@gmail.com.