A Sweeter Spring!

by | 11/29/2022

As we approach a weekend full of much needed, beautiful, Spring weather – and one week closer to Easter – we’re gifted with a wonderfully written blog post by our hardworking brewers down at our newest location in Atlanta! They delve into interesting and flavorful pairings of candy and beer that leave us all wanting to run to the store to grab the necessities to try them ourselves. Enjoy!


Happy and Blessed Easter to all of those who celebrate!

We all know that chocolate and Pig Iron Porter go well together. Roasty, chocolatey, toffee-y Porter is such a wonderful companion to Milk Chocolate or a Reeses cup, but as a brewery team, we wanted to delve a little further in to the possibilities of easter candy and beer pairing! We (Whitney, Alex, and Tori [a loyal KOTH member here in Buckhead]) delved into six different popular varieties of easter candy, and we have put together a recommendation for each one. Every beer style or brand that we suggest will be available at your local Iron Hill Location, either on draft or available to take home in cans or as part of our Easter Can “Bunn-dle”!

Jelly Beans & a Pale Lager or Ale, like Danny Dortmunder!

Ahh, jelly beans. Such a divisive candy. Personally, I despise the black licorice ones, but love every single other flavor. I purposely avoid buying them because I know the moment I put them in a bowl, they’ll be gone in 24 hours, guaranteed. When thinking about a pairing, we were mildly flummoxed by how best to mate them with the right beer, but what we ended up on was stellar! We recommend pairing your colorful sweets with a Pale Lager or Ale! The sweetness of the candy will compliment the subtle noble hop bitterness of the pale lager style, and the gentle pale malt backbone of the beer ends up being the perfect foil to the candy. Try some Danny Dortmunder or Kolsch alongside your jelly beans, and your taste buds will thank you!

Marshmallow Peeps & a Fruited Sour, like our POG Champ – now available in retail stores!

Another candy that causes strong opinions to come out! I think the best peeps are the ones that have been left out for a month or so, so they’re nice and stale and chewy! Either way, try pairing your sugary mallo treats with a Fruited Sour like Iron Hill’s POG Champ or Saturday Morningz. The sweetness from the candy will make the acidic tartness of both the beer and the fruit POP on your palate!

Robin’s Eggs & Kryptonite DIPA – found on the shelf next to POG Champ!

These seasonal malted milk ball treats are Tori’s favorite! Again, they definitely would pair well with our Pig Iron Porter, but we wanted to push the limits a little further so we tasted them with our Kryptonite Double IPA and WOW!! Kryptonite has such a firm and sweet malt backbone that coupled with the sweet malted center of Robin’s Eggs was extraordinarily complimentary. And those bitter and fruity hops played so well off of that paired sweetness. Odd at first glance, but don’t knock it until you try it!

Reese’s Eggs & our most award winning Russian Imperial Stout that you can find in our Easter Bunn-dle this weekend!

Ok. 100% we know that peanut butter cups and porter go well together. Extensive personal research by the entire Iron Hill Brewery team has revealed this as fact. However! We absolutely also recommend you go big with your dark beer, and upgrade to a can of our Russian Imperial Stout as your cup companion. The beautiful silky espresso and dark chocolate flavors of Russian pair perfectly with the smooth and creamy peanut butter. Try it, trust us, you’ll love it.

Cadbury Crème Egg & our classic Vienna Red™ Lager!

So I’ll be honest here, Crème eggs are not my favorite easter candy. Just a little too odd for my personal taste. But we did find out that when paired with a malty Vienna Red Lager or even the fruit and dry spice character of our Bedotter, something truly special happened. The hyper-sweet mallow crème in the center of the egg went remarkably well alongside the caramel notes of Vienna, and highlighted the complex nuances of our world class Belgian Tripel, Bedotter.

Dark Chocolate Bunny & a Hazy IPA, just like our Juicebox IPA found alongside Russian in our Easter Bunn-dle!

Last but not least, we come to another oddball pairing in our tour de candy: Dark Chocolate Bunny paired with any one of our amazing New England (Hazy) IPAs. The bold fruity flavors in our Hazy IPAs pairs perfectly with the bitter sweetness of Dark chocolate, for a pairing as natural as chocolate and orange, or chocolate and pineapple, or chocolate and…well you get the idea.

We wish you all the best and the happiest of holidays. Please write back to us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or anywhere else you can find a local Iron Hill presence, and tell us what fun pairings you came up with! We always love to see you enjoying our beer in creative ways.

Cheers!

Alex and Whitney, your Atlanta Brewers