If you’re not a wine drinker, then it might be that you’re looking for inspiration for meal ideas that can work well without having wine on the table. Here are just a few suggestions, where beer is more than acceptable!

Mexican

Have a Mexican fajita night, where you supply the ingredients for everyone to make their own fajitas at the table. Key ingredients include sautéed chicken, guacamole and salsa, as well as the soft tortillas to wrap everything in or hard taco shells if you prefer. Alternatively you can make quesadillas – hot Tortilla sandwiches. Eat with a Mexican beer on the side – like Sol.

Barbecue

Grilled meats, veggie kebabs, fish; whatever you grill will go well with a nice cold beer or two. Of course you can have wine with barbecues just as easily, but there’s something more logical about drinking a beer from the bottle while you’re outside in the garden, and of course, you’d never do that with wine.

Foster’s beer has made a permanent association in the UK TV viewing public’s mind with summer through its series of good call ads. The ads centre round the activities of Brad and Dan, two Aussies who spend most of their time in a shack on a sizzling hot beach in Oz, drinking cold cans of Foster’s as they watch the world go by. Brad & Dan barbecue at times in their shack too, it goes with their laid back image that they just throw a few ‘snags on the barbie’ rather than cook a ‘proper’ meal!

Curries

An Indian meal is often associated with drinking beer, but it’s a myth that the beer takes the heat out of the curry. If you can’t handle the heat, you’d be better off drinking milk with your curry – or more traditionally – a yoghurt-based drink called a lassi. Still, there’s something great about having a nice chilled Cobra beer on the table with your korma, vindaloo or rogan josh.

Of course, there are plenty of other meals you can drink beer with; these are just a few of the better known combis.