AsiaLIFE

Ladies, hand the magazine to your boyfriend/husband/testosterone-oriented pals; this article is not for you. This is a story about men and beef. Not to say that the ladies can’t enjoy a good cut of cow, it’s just that you aren’t invited to this party. Sorry, men only. You’re still reading this, aren’t you? OK, we’ll let you have a peek in, but just this once. Words by Craig Gerard. Photography by Conor Wall.

Welcome to the Phnom Penh chapter of Beefsteak and Burgundy, the 265th branch of a worldwide organisation. The purpose of “B&B,” according to the local chapter’s president Peter Brongers, is “a monthly nice meal with friends and that’s it. Nothing more.”

The organisation started in Australia in 1954, when a group of business men from the Adelaide wine industry would meet for lunch on Fridays to discuss their wines. Noting how others were envious of their weekly merriment, they invited others to join, and the first official club meeting was held in April of that year.

Those founding members decided that a club should have a maximum of 30 members so that everyone could get to know each person well, and, as stated on the B&B website, “to encourage free and unrestrained discussion of particularly the wines that were served.” The Phnom Penh club also follows this membership mandate, and according to Brongers, the limit was reached soon after the club was formed in July of 2010. Guests are permitted to attend as long as they reserve in advance and are of the correct gender.

So how come no women? The original club was just men, so that started the tradition. However, there are mixed gender clubs within Beefsteak and Burgundy, as well as ladies only chapters. But the Phnom Penh founders stuck with the traditional arrangement, and if you witness the tail end of a B&B meal, you can easily see why. After five or six glasses of wine and five courses of food, most participants sink back into their seats to digest without a care to appearance or decorum. It is the kind of open-the-beltbuckle-two-notches digestion, as tongues, loosened by imbibing, let fly with all sorts of colourful stories.

The gentlemen who attend are all very comfortable with each other and with this setting, and there are no pretenses, no putting on airs, and no pressure to impress each other. Through that camaraderie it becomes clear that this group chemistry did not happen by accident. The evening is based on good friends sharing good food and good wine.

And the food is better than merely good. The group hits all of Phnom Penh’s top restaurants: Topaz, La Residence, Raffles, Tepui and more, with each place highlighting its best dishes. The menu is set well in advance between consultations with the chef and the food master, who in Phnom Penh is Pascal Brandt-Gagnon. The wine master, Darren Gall of AusKhmer, then pairs each course with complementary wines from the restaurant’s list.

As each course comes out, attendees share their thoughts about the merits and shortcomings of the dish. Since all are there to eat great food, there is no limit to the geek factor here. Every flavour is analysed, as if the entire table was judging a Master Chef competition. At the end of the meal, a member is asked to critique the food for the group, with the chef in attendance. This open and honest feedback aims to help a chef understand what the customers are thinking.

For this reason, the Phnom Penh Beefsteak and Burgundy membership looks like a Who’s Who of the city’s food and beverage industry. “It’s whoever wants to join,” says Brongers, who is the CEO of Kingdom Breweries. “Each city is different.” Having brought the group to the Kingdom, Brongers had previously been a member in Shanghai and Bangkok. The club welcomes all walks of life. As one member puts it, “if you like food and you like wine, you’ve come to the right place.”

On the one-year anniversary of the group’s charter this July, the men headed back to Pacharan, the location of the group's inaugural meal. According to Brongers, they will repeat many of the first year’s restaurants because not that many places in the capital serve the calibre of food they seek and have the capacity to seat up to 30 people.

On this occasion, the Pacharan meal included chicken Moruno, scallops with parsley olive oil, mackerel with ham shavings, pasta with prawn bisque sauce, and braised pork cheeks were served, and each dish was paired with a specialty Spanish wine.

And yet, there was no cow on the menu. Shouldn’t there be a large sizzling beefsteak, slightly charred on the outside, bloody on the inside? “We’re flexible,” explains Brongers. Brandt-Gagnon, the food master, opined that beef, while important, was not a critical part of the meal. “It is about eating great food. If there is no beef, that’s alright,” he says.

In the end, the lack of cow made no difference. The entire group enjoyed the feeling that comes from being painfully full. Satiated and cheerful, the gentlemen were free to chat, enjoy a generous pour of Tesseron X.O., and reminisce about the glory days.

Beefsteak and Burgundy meals are US$85 for non-members and US$70 for members. Annual membership costs US$70. If you are interested in joining, email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .