Category Archives: Beer

Wine drinker with a beer problem visits England and Germany

6 August 2008BeerChris Shanahan

As a wine drinker with a beer problem, I find that Germany and England make ideal destinations. Especially in the countryside — where wine selections tend to be appalling (and, in England, expensive at two Aussie dollars to the pound) — beer becomes the default option in most restaurants, cafés and pubs.

And there’s as big a difference in the choice of brew as there is between the languages. In England the superb three-decade legacy of CAMRA (campaign for real ale) manifests itself in every inn and village.

The signs scream ‘great food real ale’. And there doesn’t seem to be an outlet that doesn’t have, if not real ‘real ale’ a pretty good commercial facsimile of one. Often real, pumped-from-the-keg ales sit side by side with nitrogen-sparged versions – prompting a comparison, of course, and consumption of a few more pints than planned.

In Germany, beautifully crisp, dry, bitter golden lagers dominate the scene, and you can buy them anywhere – even in the local florist if you happen to be in Lychen. They’re absolutely delicious with warm weather and great platters of tender pig knuckles.

But there are dark lagers and a good sprinkling, in both country and city, of dark and light wheat ales, two examples reviewed below. And if you’re within one hundred kilometres of Berlin you’ll find heaps of sweet and sour Berliner weisse, too.

Weihenstephaner Hefe Weissbier 500ml $5.49
This beautiful example of the Southern German wheat beer style comes from the Weihenstephen brewery, dating to 1040. It’s bottle conditioned and therefore has a yeast (hefe) haze and spectacular head. It has the lightness and crispness of a wheat ale with a delicious, soft, smooth mid-palate and invitingly fruity aroma.

Erdinger Dunkler Weizenbock (Bavaria) 500ml $6.99
Erdinger’s distinctive dark bock combines the sharpness and freshness of wheat beer with the strong flavours of roasted grains. And a high alcohol content of 7.3 per cent gives a mid-palate warmth and richness not normally seen in wheat ales. As a traditional winter drink it’s in it element at the moment.

Beer review — Moo Brew & Matilda Bay

30 July 2008Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Moo Brew Pale Ale 330ml $5.50
Today’s two beers, both purchased from the same retail outlet, show different faces of the American Pale Ale style – and critical importance of freshness. Moo Brew has this in spades. It’s an exciting, full-bodied ale cut with the brisk, resiny aroma and lingering bitterness of fresh hops. It’s a stunner.
*****

Matilda Bay Alpha Pale Ale 345ml $5.20
Even a month past its ‘best before’ date, Alpha was a more than respectable ale. But age had taken the edge off its hops character – a critical element of this robust beer style – leaving a rich, malty, bitter ale of some character but not the keen edge seen in fresh samples.
***

Changi airport brews it up for weary travellers

30 July 2008BeerChris Shanahan

Why do airport transit lounges offer few diversions other than gotcha-priced shopping? Changi’s new terminal three shows that it doesn’t have to be that way.

To this traveller, a microbrewery tops Changi’s impressive list of comforts. Its gleaming copper brew kettles on the mezzanine level provide a siren call to bored, thirsty travellers below. Who could resist?

As I tasted through the range, service manager, Charles Soh, said that the airport brewery was one of three Brewerkz facilities in Singapore. While the beers on offer in early July came from one of the other breweries, Soh expected the Changi facility to be operating before the end of the month.

There’s food available, too. And if you don’t feel like downing a half litre of a single beer ($S13.63/$A10.39) for $S12.99/$A9.91 you can sample four of the eight brews in elegant little tasting glasses

Brewerkz currently offers a diversity of styles — Golden Ale, Pilsner, Singapore Pale Ale (a favourite after two visits), Irish Red Ale, India Pale Ale, Fruitbrewz (strawberry), Oatmeal Stout and Olde Ale — all brewed by Canadian Scott Robertson.

The standard’s high across the range — despite a cloying note to the Fruitbrewz — and a sip or two provides a splash of colour in a dreary, half-way-around-the-world journey.

Parlour room beer list — ok, but could do better

11 June 2008BeerChris Shanahan

The chic new Parlour Wine Room in the Acton Pavilion offers plenty for wine and cocktail drinkers. But it’s somewhat more limited in its beer offerings.

The list of fifteen beers and one cider is certainly well selected, if limited, and even the fussiest beer palate need not go dry. But no matter how careful the selection, it’s one of convenience – by far the majority of brews, including the cider, come from just one company, Lion Nathan.

While that says a lot for the terrific style diversity Lion offers (James Squire, Kirin, Beck’s, Knappstein, Little Creatures, Pip Squeak and James Boag), it leaves big gaps both in style and diversity within styles.

It’s early days for Parlour room. But the beer list could become a lot more interesting with the addition of a few more classic world styles and perhaps a revolving range of boutique Aussie brews.

It’d be good, for example, to see on the list Bavarian and Belgian wheat beer, American pale ale, English pale ale, a Czech Pilzen and a stout or porter, to represent the dark side of the beer family. And the list of worthy Aussie boutique brewers that might be represented grows longer by the day.

A chat with Chuck Hahn

4 June 2008BeerChris Shanahan

Shock, horror! After all the build up in this column there’s to be no James Squire Hop Thief this season. Brewer Chuck Hahn tells me we may see a new Aussie-hops version in the future, after the American and Kiwi based brews we saw in earlier brews.

Meanwhile, says Chuck, if the hopheads want hops he suggests James Squire Pilsener – to my taste one of the most assertively hopped local brews cast squarely and uncompromisingly in the robust Bohemian mould.

It recently won the World Beer Cup’s gold medal as the best Bohemian-style Pilsener – a victory that saw Chuck fielding calls from the world’s beer press, including one from the Czech Republic’s Pilsen region.

But Chuck’s not saying why there’s no Hop Thief this year. Perhaps it’s the distraction of a new winter warmer that’s on its way – a high alcohol ale seasoned with Australian pepper berries, added towards the end of the boil. It’ll be released in the first week of July.

Meanwhile there’s still a little of Chuck’s summer specialty — Mad Brewers Raspberry Wheat beer — out in the trade. This is a light, dry, pleasantly tart ale seasoned with raspberries (3.5 tonnes of them) and a touch of mint.

A cascade of hops-driven ales

21 May 2008Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Canberra’s Wig & Pen launched this year’s first hop-harvest beers – three idiosyncratic styles described here recently. Then Foster’s Cascade First Harvest Ale arrived on retail shelves this month, albeit in limited quantities – just 4,300 cases. Max Burslem, Cascade’s brewer, says that this year’s First Harvest Ale, the seventh vintage since its release in 2002, features three new Tassie-grown hops varieties as well as Tassie barley.

It’s come a long way since the first beer – a lager-like ale, I recall, from a team with little lager making experience. But Max says his brewers, through experiment, ‘developed quite a knowledge’ over the years, culminating in a pretty exciting 2008 ale.

It uses early harvested barley – malted especially for First Harvest – and a touch of roasted malt to give a deep amber colour. Max had also been working with local hops growers to have the three new varieties to the brewery within hours of harvest, at their resiny, oily, aromatic peak.

He added the bittering hops, ‘Guy Fawkes’, early in the boil, ‘Mill Line’ a little later for flavour and, finally, just before the boil ended, ‘Strickland Falls’ to give passionfruit and citrus aromatics.

Cascade First Harvest Ale 330ml 6-pack $19.99
This is the juicy, fresh, beer equivalent of Beaujolais. It’s built on plump, sweet malt flavour that’s cut through with the fresh, bracing pungency of just-picked hops. As well, the hops provide a brisk, teasing, lingering bitterness that slightly outweighs the malt sweetness. Limited availability as Cascade produced only 4,300 cases.

Beer barons — old world styles; Aussie flavours

14 May 2008Beer, Beer review, PeopleChris Shanahan

Richard Adamson of Sydney’s Barons Brewing says that he and partner Scott Garnett wanted to “have a serious go” at the premium beer market by offering something unique.

And they kicked off in November 2005 with the release of an excellent high-alcohol (5.8 per cent) brew – Black Wattle Superior Wattle Seed Ale, seasoned with roasted wattle seed.

At the time, Adamson’s planned to add more brews featuring native Aussie ingredients. And since we first reviewed Barons two years back, he’s added a bottle conditioned Belgian-style wheat beer (reviewed below). It’s seasoned with lemon myrtle, rather than the orange peel and coriander favoured by Belgium’s benchmark, Hoegaarden.

Baron’s initial release, though, was an English-inspired ale, Extra Special Bitter, that evolved from extensive sampling and a taste-off between a couple of Richard’s recipes and four English favourites: London Pride, Old Speckled Hen, Old Hookey and Adnums SSB.

Adamson released the beer that emerged after the tasting as Barons Extra Special Bitter, but later shortened the name to ESB. They made it originally in 2006 from four hops varieties, Golden Promise malt and a London Ale yeast imported from England.

The back label’s not so specific these days, but it’s true to the original style – a pleasing Aussie interpretation of a classic English bitter.

Barons Black Wattle Ale & Witbier 330ml 6-pack $16.99
These two brews from Barons ‘native’ range include roasted wattle seed and lemon myrtle respectively. They’re subtle inputs and compatible with the smooth, toffee-like malt flavours of the dark Black Wattle Ale and the zesty, lemon-and-clove briskness of the pale wheat-based wheat beer. Available at Plonk, Canberra Cellars and Debacle bar.

Barons Pale Ale & ESB 330ml 6-pack $14.99
Pale Ale is a gold/amber-coloured mild beer that’s creamy textured, fruity and soft with just the right amount of bitterness offsetting sweet malt. ESB (extra special bitter) draws inspiration from classic English ales like London Pride. It has aromatic hops and a brisk, malty palate cut with assertive hops flavour and bitterness.

Zierholz to open Canberra beer café

30 April 2008BeerChris Shanahan

Behind the papered-over windows at 225 Kembla Street, Fyshwick, Christoph Zierholz is fitting out a beer café, due to open in May.

Christoph began brewing at this site two years ago and now has Zierholz beers on tap at about eighteen outlets in and around Canberra – including University House, Debacle Bar at Braddon and Grazing at Gundaroo.

With Jan Gundlach of Flavours he’s developing a beer-compatible menu. This is likely to include food cooked with beer, courses designed to match particular brews, degustation menus, served with small samples of several brews, and carefully selected local produce. There’ll even be a selection of local wines.

Christoph says he’ll start with nine beer taps but intends to expand this to twelve or more later. And while the focus will be on the Zierholz beers brewed in sight of the café, he’s keen to feature guest beers from other craft operators.

So that customers can taste through the whole range of beers, Zierholz says he’ll offer a ‘paddle’ – a wooden try with a handle, and little holes bored in to accommodate perhaps a dozen shot glasses. ‘The paddle encourages people to trial different beers’, says Christoph.

And there’ll be brewery tours every second Saturday.

Brad Rogers leaves Matilda Bay, heads to Byron Bay

26 March 2008BeerChris Shanahan

Brewer Brad Rogers recently headed for Byron Bay, New South Wales, after years behind the Matilda Bay brew kettles, making some of the best, most interesting beers in Australia.

Brad studied winemaking. But after a vintage or two he switched to brewing for Fosters in the mid nineties. He started at the old Tooth’s Kent Brewery, Sydney, and enjoyed a stint at Carlton Brewery, Fiji, before joining the company’s craft-brewing arm, Matilda Bay.

Although Matilda Bay originated in Fremantle, Brad worked mainly at their ‘Garage’ brewery in Dandenong, developing great beers like Alpha Pale Ale and Naked Ale – sold only at Young and Jackson’s, Melbourne, home of the famous painting of Chloe.

Brad phoned the other day to say that he’d teamed up with entrepreneur Jamie Cook. He said that they’re developing a brewery in Byron Bay and expect to have their first beers available by August.
He’s not saying what styles we can look forward to – only that he’s going ‘to make just one or two properly’.

One of the partners owns eight pubs in the area, so the focus will be on draft beer. But there’ll be bottled stuff, too, so we may see Brad’s new brews in Canberra.

Having a go

20 February 2008BeerChris Shanahan

My late and great mate Len Evans used to talk of ‘studied mediocrity’ – not in beer, but in wine. And it applies just as well to the world of beer – not to our honest, everyday lagers – but to the beers that, in a studied, deliberate way, tone down the very characteristics that make a style distinctive.

We’re talking here of technically pure beers that’ve been focus-grouped to blandness – virtually de-brewed in an effort to offend no one.

But brewers with a fire in the belly – and they exist in both large and small operations – ignite our enthusiasm with countless variations of classic styles that become, over time, new specialties.

One brewer that caught my attention, former winemaker Ben Kraus, set up shop in a back lane off Ford Street, Beechworth a few years back. On a visit there last January, Ben’s ales, served on tap a few metres from the brewing vats was as exciting a range as I’d seen from a small local brewer.

I recently tried bottled versions in Canberra (you can buy them through the website, www.bridgeroadbrewers.com.au). While a couple didn’t have that stunning freshness encountered at the brewery, it was still an adventurous range of a very high standard.