Category Archives: Beer

Cascade’s all-Tassie hop celebration

3 June 2009BeerChris Shanahan

Eight years ago Max Burslem brewed Cascade’s inaugural ‘First Harvest’ ale – a beer dedicated to Tasmania’s hop harvest.

The just released 2009 vintage, coinciding with Max’s fortieth year with Cascade, uses fresh hops flowers from three experimental hops varieties that Max says ‘have never been used in brewing before’.

Max even named the three varieties himself, honouring Tasmania’s earliest hops pioneers Richard Clarke, Ebenzer Shoobridge and the Francomb family. Max says that Clarke grew Tasmania’s first hops, Shoobridge established the industry in the Derwent Valley and the Frankcomb family pioneered the Huon Valley.

The hops for first harvest came from the Derwent Valley’s Bushy Park Estate hop field, site of Shoobridge’s plantings. In the brewing process they join Tasmanian barley, malted at Cascade’s own malt house.

Each brewer has his own style – and this is streets away from the Wig & Pen’s on-tap versions reviewed here last week. Max’s is less in-your-face in the hops department and not as aromatic. Against a background flavour of rich, smooth malt First Harvest focuses more on hops flavour and its pervading, loveable bitterness.

And next week we’ll look at Chuck Hahn’s James Squire Hop Thief. It’s bound to be utterly different again, but still in the zesty, bitter hops mould.

Brewers go hop mad

27 May 2009BeerChris Shanahan

The hops season ended recently and already we’re seeing beers that capture, in various forms, the wonderful aromas and flavours of freshly harvested hops.

From Foster’s there’s Cascade First Harvest Ale, brewed with fresh Tasmanian hops flowers. And from Lion Nathan, there’s James Squire Hop Thief, brewed at the Malt Shover Brewery and making a return after last year’s absence.

I have samples of each on the way for review in the next week or two. But closer to home, the Wig & Pen brewpub, Civic, offers three extraordinary ales brewed on the premises and served from the tap – including one that’s cask conditioned and hand pumped in the real ale style.

These are idiosyncratic beers and a little goes a long way. But they’re beautifully made. And they express various hops characteristics – aroma, flavour and bitterness – from a range of hop varieties, added at different stages of the brewing process to a diversity of malts.

The varieties include Golden Promise, American Simcoe, Tasmanian Hallertau and Tasmanian Galaxy (from Bushy Park hop gardens).

Kirin to take over Lion

20 May 2009BeerChris Shanahan

On 27 April Lion Nathan issued a media release saying its board had agreed to terms for Kirin’s takeover of the company. Japanese based Kirin currently holds about 46 per cent of Lion. The board’s recommendation of the takeover and terms is subject to no better offer emerging and confirmation from an independent expert that the offer is ‘in the best interests of Lion Nathan’s non-Kirin shareholders’.

Assuming the takeover goes through, Kirin will own the Hahn, XXXX, Malt Shovel/James Squire, Tooheys, Boags, West End, Swan, Emu, Waikato, Macs, Steinlager, Lion, Speights and Knappstein beer brands as well the rights to brew under licence, and distribute, Heineken and Beck’s beers.

It will also give to Kirin ownership of a range of premium wine brands – Stonier, Knappstein, Tatachilla, Wither Hills, St Hallet, Argyle, Smithbrook and Mitchelton – as well as Fine Wine Partners, a distribution business focused on top end products.

Kirin owned about 46 per cent of Lion before the takeover offer. Public statements to date say that the Australian crew running Lion Nathan will remain in place, becoming part of a bigger regional team.

This could be good news for some of our leading beer and wine brands. But given the scale of the Kirin operation and the peculiarity and capital-intensive nature of the wine business, I wonder if they’ll continue as a producer?

Where all the barley grows

6 May 2009BeerChris Shanahan

Ever wondered where the world’s ocean of beer comes from? There’s a guide, of sorts, in the source of barley, beer’s building block. And the figures are staggeringly large – not surprising when we consider that the world’s two biggest beer drinking nations, China and the USA, drink about 64 billion litres between them.

According to the United States Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service, the world consumed about 143.9 million tonnes of barley in the year to April 2009. The figures don’t differentiated between brewing barley (surely the finest way to consume these precious little grains) and eating barley.

Europe is by far the biggest barley producer (65.5 million tonnes) and consumer (57.5 million tonnes), ahead of the second placed Russian Federation on 23.1 million tonnes and 17.4 million tonnes respectively – making both groups nett exporters.

China, the world’s biggest beer drinker, consumed 4.2 million but produced only 3.3 million tonnes, while the second biggest beer drinker, the USA, produced about 100,000 tonnes more than it produced (production 5.2 million tonnes; consumption 5.2 million)

Australia remained a nett exporter, having consumed 3.9 million tonnes and harvested 7.0 million tonnes.

The Ukraine and Canada are both major producers (12.6 million tonnes and 11.8 million tonnes) and consumers (5.8 million and 9.4 million tonnes) and therefore important exporters.

China leads the beer world

29 April 2009BeerChris Shanahan

The world’s barley growers are going to make a killing the way China’s beer market’s growing. Sometime early this decade it overtook the United States as the world’s biggest consumer and, according to a Reuter’s report in March, ‘is now over 50 per cent larger’.

I’m not sure when the crossover happened, but as recently as 2004 China’s annual consumption of 28,640 million litres beat America’s 23,974 million litres by a mere 20 per cent.

But with a per capita consumption of just 22.1 litres in 2004 – compared to Australia’s 109, the USA’s 81.6 and the Czech Republic’s awesome 156.9 – Chinese growth may have barely started.

The Reuter’s report of 31 March also cited preliminary data from researcher Plato Logic placing China’s Snow beer range as the world’s biggest seller in 2008 at 61.0 million hectolitres, ahead of America’s Bud Light Range (55.6 million) and Budweiser (43.4 million), Brazil’s Skol (35.4 million), Mexico’s Corona (32.7 million) and Holland’s Heineken (29.1 million).

Reuter’s says that Snow is brewed by SABMiller and its Chinese partner China Resources Enterprises Ltd.

Amazing brew marks Chuck Hahn’s double anniversary

22 April 2009Beer, PeopleChris Shanahan

Chuck Hahn should take a bow for his brewing masterpiece – Ten20 Commemorative Ale – an almost impossibly luxurious, harmonious, and complex beer. Other brewers are going to look at this in awe.

Chuck brewed it to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of Hahn Premium and the tenth of James Squire. And in a salute to his brewing alma maters, he used hops from the USA, New Zealand and Australia.

Chuck says that dry hopping with Pacific Hallertau from New Zealand gives the beer its distinctive, herbal/citrus aroma. But that’s just the entrée to a remarkably powerful but harmonious brew.

It’s a deep copper colour, tinged with mahogany: and behind the tangy hops aroma lies a huge depth of malt. It’s there in the aroma, but in the mouth it’s opulent, bordering on viscous – with a silky, smooth texture that could be too much if it weren’t for the heady alcohol (7.9 per cent) and countervailing hops bitterness.

It’s risky brewing beers of this dimension as one or another flavour easily dominates (many undrinkable curiosities in the market testify to this). Chuck’s mastery is in creating such a bold, malty, hoppy, alcoholic beer that’s such a pleasure to drink. It’s one to sip, like wine.

Alas, he’s brewed but 1,900 cases. It’s just come into the market and available in selected retail outlets.

Chuck’s ten-year itch — Hahn, James Squire and Kosciusko Brewing

15 April 2009Beer, PeopleChris Shanahan

Does Chuck Hahn have a ten-year itch? He launched Hahn Premium in 1988, the Malt Shovel Brewery’s James Squire Original Amber Ale in 1998 and expects to pour the first Kosciuszko Pale Ale in Jindabyne this week.

In 1988 he was an independent brewer, following a distinguished brewing career with Coors USA, Tooths and Reschs of Sydney and Lion New Zealand. By 1998 he’d rejoined the corporate fold as chief brewer for Lion Nathan. They’d acquired the Hahn Premium brand (as well as Chuck) and supported the new Malt Shovel venture at Chippendale, Sydney, in the original Hahn Brewery.

Chuck later handed the chief brewing role to another great Australian brewer, Bill Taylor, to focus on the Malt Shovel venture. This time around he’s established a small brewery in the Banjo Paterson Inn, Jindabyne.

The brewing equipment and Kosciusko Brewing Company and Kosciuszko Pale Ale copyrights belong to Lion Nathan. But the Banjo Paterson Inn is owned by publicans Gary Narvo and Peter Harris (of Woy Woy and Gosford) and Gavin Patton, a Jindabyne plumbing contractor, says Chuck.

While Chuck controls the brewing (he was driving to Jindabyne when I spoke to him) licensee Steve Pursell is the bloke you’re likely to meet if you drop in to see the brewery and try the brew.

A delicate touch of hops flowers at Red Hill Brewery

8 April 2009Beer, PeopleChris Shanahan

David and Karen Golding brew wonderful beer down at Red Hill on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula. Their brewery and cellar door sits smack in the middle of one of Australia’s leading pinot noir neighbourhoods.

The cool climate that favours pinot noir also suits hops. And although hop growing isn’t a major industry on the peninsula, the Goldings turned to it because they had to be primary producers to get their liquor license.

For drinkers, that’s a bonus as the fresh hops flowers give Red Hill Brewery beers a unique piquancy and delicacy – even in two classic styles usually devoid of hops aroma or flavour.

Red Hill Brewery Wheat Beer has the classic fruity esters of the style, but there’s a lovely, subtle tang of Tettnanger hops. It’s beautifully done, as the hops don’t take over the delicate wheat flavours.

Big, bold, malty Scotch Ale sometimes uses no hops at all. But the chocolate richness of Red Hill ‘s version is successfully balanced by a lick of Goldings and Willamette.

Golden Ale is a great beer – complex, refreshing, full-flavoured but not heavy and cut through with the delicate flavour and soft bitterness of Hallertau and Tettnanger hops.

You can read more about this terrific brewery and order the beers at www.redhillbrewery.com.au

Mac’s beers — attractive flavour spectrum

1 April 2009BeerChris Shanahan

The three Mac’s beers being imported from New Zealand by parent company Lion Nathan present an attractive spectrum of flavours – from the pale, light, low-carb Spring Tide to the richly malty, but mid-alcohol Mac’s Gold All Malt Lager to the full-bore, hoppy Hop Rocker Pilsner.

The range also shows the challenge brewers face in retaining flavour as alcohol or carbohydrate levels decline. In themselves alcohol and carbs have little flavour. But their contribution to the overall richness of beer becomes apparent when they’re not present.

Anyone who’s drunk low alcohol or low-carb beer understands the flavour disappointment. Brewers try to compensate by boosting other flavour components, notably of hops in low-carb brews. The Woolworths-owned Platinum Blonde is a good and successful example of this approach, as is Mac’s Spring Tide.

But the vibrant hops aroma and flavour even of these well-made beers barely mask the flavour hole. They’re tolerable. But if you’re into full-strength beer your interest’s likely to fade quickly.

Mac’s Gold, I believe, is far more successful. Its modest 3.8 per cent alcohol is sufficient, in combination with rich malt and subtle but attractive hops, to maintain interest time and again. And Hop Rocker is brisk and rich with a distinctive pungent but not over-the-top hoppiness.

Lion to bring Mac’s beer to Australia

4 March 2009BeerChris Shanahan

Fine Wine partners, the wine distribution arm of brewer Lion Nathan is about to launch Mac’s beer in Australia. The Canberra kick off (at Parlour Wine Room) will be done and dusted by the time you read this. But if you miss the party, there’ll be no shortage of beer afterwards.

I’ve drunk various Mac’s brews in New Zealand over the years and always found them to be first rate. They’re beers you can enjoy to the last drop.

Although Lion Nathan bought the brand years ago from founder Terry McCashin the beers, from what I’ve tasted, haven’t been dumbed down.

It seems a bit like the situation in Australia where Lion has a stake in Little Creatures Brewery, Fremantle, and owns the Malt Shovel/James Squire Brewery in Sydney outright. Both make very fine ‘craft’ beers but in comparatively large volumes – meaning that they’re easily accessible for most drinkers.

I’m looking forward to tasting and reviewing the Mac’s Aussie range (they’re not available as I write) as soon as they arrive. Like the other Lion beers they should be widely available and priced realistically.