Category Archives: Beer

Fat Yak sires lazy offspring

22 July 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Herd mentality

The release this month of CUB’s Lazy Yak – first offspring of Matilda Bay’s successful Fat Yak Pale Ale – reveals much about the rapidly growing craft beer market. It also supports predictions the big brewers are best placed to profit from it.

Fat Yak was itself a toned-down version of Matilda Bay Alpha Pale Ale. Brewed originally at the CUB’s Matilda Bay Garage Brewery in Dandenong, the astonishingly bitter, malt-sweet Alpha displayed the sheer power and idiosyncrasy of the American Pale Ale style.

The enormous success of Alpha’s less astonishing offspring, Matilda Bay Fat Yak, saw Fat Yak supplant Matilda Bay as the brand drinkers recognised.

And now to appeal to a growing herd of less savvy craft beer drinkers, the Yak herd expands. The new member, not yet tasted, tones down the bitterness considerably from the original while remaining an all-malt brew.

Beer reviews

Rye River Brewing Co McGargles Granny Mary’s Red Ale 330ml $4.20
Granny Mary’s warm, burnished mahogany colour comes from the roasted malt used in its making. Subtle roasted-grain flavours push through the beer’s malt and caramel-like flavours, giving a pleasant tartness to the dry, moderately bitter finish. The ale comes from Rye River Brewing of County Kildare, Ireland.

Hawthorn Brewing Co Pilsner 330ml $4.20
Hawthorn Brewing’s pilsner emulates the classic Czech style from the town of the same name. It succeeds to a large degree with its bright golden colour and fresh, full, malty palate, cut through with lingering hops bitterness. It’s more fun to drink than the average mass-made pilsner, thanks largely to its notable hops bitterness.

2013 – a great apple year in Orange

15 July 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Good vintage for Small Acres Cyder

Like winemakers along the southern NSW tablelands, James Kendall loved the 2013 vintage. However, Kendall’s enthusiasm is for cider apples, not grapes.

In 2006, with wife Gail, Kendall bought bare land at Borenore, near Orange. They established the Small Acres Cyder business and planted three hectares of English and French cider apple varieties.

Kendall, with local winemaker Chris Derrez, makes most of his cider off-site from purchased fruit. However, in good seasons, he uses his own cider varieties and cellar to make a bottle-fermented version.

He uses the traditional rack and cloth method to extract juice from the apples. This oxidative process enriches the flavour and deepens the colour of the resulting cider, which undergoes a secondary fermentation and 24-months’ maturation in bottle.

The just-released 2013 vintage replaces the sold-out 2011 vintage, winner of the champion Australian cider trophy at the 2013 Australian Cider Awards.

Beer and cider reviews

Small Acres Cyder “The Cat’s Pyjamas” 2013 750ml $33
Maker James Kendall writes, “We named the Cat’s Pyjamas after the 1920s saying meaning the best that you can do. It’s certainly not your average cider”. Bottle fermented and aged for two years, it pours deep lemon-gold with persistent small bubbles. It’s ultra fresh and mature at the same time, with delicious, piquant pure apple flavour.

Wychwood Brewery Pile Driver Classic English Ale 500ml $6
Wychwood’s loveable, deep-amber-coloured ale remains a winter favourite, with its warm, malty, molasses-like aroma. The rich, smooth palate reflects the aroma. And spicy, herbal hops cut through the malt adding flavour and a long, persistent bitter finish. The malt–hops combination delivers flavour galore despite a modest 4.3 per cent alcohol content.

Cooper’s release 2015 vintage ale

8 July 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Another fine beer for the cellar

Cooper’s released their first extra strong vintage ale in 1998, not too long after Dr Tim Cooper turned from medical practice to brewing for the old family firm.

At a time of rapidly growing interest in so-called “premium” beers in Australia, Cooper blazed the trail for powerful beers capable of improving with bottle age.

Beer aficionados were well familiar with the concept. But Cooper brought the idea – and the beer – to a wider audience.

Cooper produced follow-up vintages in 1999 and 2000, skipped 2001, started again in 2002, missed 2003, produced another in 2004, missed 2005, then continued non-stop from 2006. He released the 2015 vintage this week. It’s available nationally in bottle and on tap.

The ale’s keeping qualities come from its rich maltiness, high alcohol, high level of hopping, and the anaerobic environment of maturation following secondary fermentation in bottle.

Beer reviews

Coopers Extra Strong Vintage Ale 2015 355ml 6-pack $28
Cooper’s fifteenth vintage ale, continues in the fruity, malty, high-alcohol (7.5 per cent) style established by earlier vintages. However, the beer varies each vintage. In 2015 hops aromatics integrate smoothly with the ale’s natural fruitiness and the bittering level is higher. The assertive, lingering bitter finish works well with the deep, sweet, malt flavours.

Matso’s Lychee Beer 330ml $3.42
Brewer Marcus Muller developed this now popular hybrid at Matso’s brewery, Broome. Muller now brews at Zierholz, Canberra, but Lychee continues under his successors. Slightly reminiscent of the Belgian wheat style, Lychee offers fresh, light, delicate flavours with a little sweet kiss, courtesy no doubt of the lychee and elderflower in the brew.

Has craft beer had its day?

1 July 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Canberra brewer disillusioned with “craft”

In an interview with Radio Brews News, reported in Australian Brews News, Canberra brewer Richard Watkins said he’d become disillusioned with the name “craft beer”. Many people regard it as pretentious, he said, and it downplayed the skills of large-scale brewers.

Like the “premium beer” category used a generation ago – or the current “natural wine” movement – “craft beer” lacks a formal definition. It might imply small scale; or it could mean skilfully crafted (as opposed to being merely brewed?).

If we ever define “craft brewer” in Australia, we’ll perhaps take a different tack than America’s Brewers Association. For them, a craft brewer makes as much as 702 million litres a year, provided they’re less than 25 per cent owned by a non-craft business and use traditional methods.

More likely, Australia’s pragmatic drinkers will skip the semantics and go on enjoying good beer, no matter who makes it.

Beer reviews

South East Brewing Behemoth Black Ale 500ml $17.95
Behemoth black ale truly is a huge and monstrous creature. Its impenetrable darkness, 10.8 per-cent alcohol, massive malt and mother lode of hops strain at the chains, before running amok on the palate, saturating it with, well, monstrous flavours of the sweet, malty, bitter kind. For consenting adults only.

St Louis Kriek Lambic 250ml $4.00
Belgium’s kriek-lambic beers were originally lambic beer (sour, spontaneously fermented with a tag-team of yeasts and other microbes), to which whole cherries (kriek) were later added for fermentation. This sweetened, but still spontaneously fermented version, provides a glimpse of the idiosyncratic, sour style, albeit a little sweet for my palate.

Record crowd attends beer awards presentation

17 June 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Celebrating the world’s biggest beer-judging event

More than 800 people packed into this year’s presentation dinner for the Australian International Beer Awards. The Royal Agricultural Society of Victoria, which runs the awards, claims it as the biggest beer-judging event in the world.

This year 58 judges at the Melbourne show ground tasted their way through more than 1,700 entries submitted by 344 brewers from 35 countries.

Trophy winners include brewers large and small from all over the world. And some of the awards may put a smile on the face of the uninitiated.

Will Australian brewers worry when a Vietnamese brewer, Saigon Beer Alcohol Beverage Corporation’s 333 Premium Export, wins the trophy for best Australian style lager? Or will the Belgian and French be up in arms over Australia’s Little Brewing Company’s success in their style division?

See the full catalogue of results at rasv.com.au/beer.

Beer reviews

Thatcher’s Gold English Cider 500ml $5.90–$7.50
Thatcher’s Gold won three trophies in the 2014 Australian Cider Awards: best in show, best cider and best international cider or perry. It’s widely available in bottle shops and also on tap. The cider has a bright, pale-golden colour an aroma of very ripe apples and flavour to match, with delightfully brisk acidity and dry finish.

Badlands Darkness London Porter 500ml $8.00
Badlands’ robust porter takes the palate on a silk-smooth ride through the dark side of ale. Flavours reminiscent of coffee bean, chocolate and a hint of charcoal reflect the roasted malts used by the brewer. It’s a warming, gentle, winter brew in which a subtle bitterness provides balance without overshadowing the malt.

Scramble for craft funds favours the big

10 June 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Big brewers set to reap the benefits

IbisWorld research suggests our big brewers, Lion and SABMiller, are better placed than small brewers to reap the benefits of rapidly growing craft beer sales.

The researcher estimates craft beer’s market value at $167 million, following annual growth of ten per between 2010 and 2015. IbisWorld says 147 businesses in the craft beer industry employ 552 people.

In this rapidly growing market, says IbisWorld, small-scale newcomers face few barriers to entry and require comparatively small capital inputs. However, commercial success requires larger volumes and larger capital inputs – which favours the big brewers and their existing craft brands.

Echoing these thoughts in an interview for Radio Brews News, Stone and Wood founder, Jamie Cook, estimated short-term capital requirements for the industry at $85 million. The challenge for small brewers, he said, was to keep up with market growth and the big brewers.

Reviews

Killer Sprocket Hey Juniper 500ml $8
Killer Sprocket comes from Sean and Andrea Ryan, operating out of the Cavalier Brewery Melbourne. They make Hey Juniper in the richly malty, highly hopped American ale style, and season it with juniper berries. The combination of hops and juniper gives a pervasive – and inescapable – bitterness to a unique beer.

Holgate Brewhouse Nut Brown Ale 500ml $8.90
Holgate Brewhouse’s tenth anniversary ale combines “lashings of Australian macadamia nuts and hearty English malts”, says the back label. The beer’s deep and brooding brown colour matches its earthy, charry, malty, vegemite-like savoury flavours. Despites its weight, it’s spritely and fresh on the palate, with a mild bitterness offsetting the sweet malt.

Canberra’s BentSpoke Brewery – one year, 160-thousand litres

10 June 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

A year in brewing

BentSpoke Brewery opened last June and on the strength of its superb brews became an instant Canberra landmark, smack in the heart of once-daggy Braddon.

For its first birthday this weekend, brewer Richard Watkins plans on unveiling four special brews, one each on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday (and bugger the Tuesday hangover).

He’s tight lipped about what’s in store. But for Canberra Times’ readers he’s revealed insights of the first year’s trading.

“I think we’ll hit about 160,000 litres”, he said. Spreading all that amber liquid over the three thousand patrons visiting each week puts consumption at a little under two pints a head.

The strong and bitter Crankshaft IPA proved by far the most popular of 31 brews offered during the year.

And for the future Watkins hopes to, “get our beer on tap around Canberra and maybe even into bottle shops”.

Reviews

BentSpoke Grainy half-pint glass $8
Under the ever-inventive Richard Watkins, BentSpoke’s new brews come and go at a pleasing pace. The new winter warmer, slurped joyfully on a cold autumn afternoon, offered the deep, sweet, toasty flavours of five grains – barley, wheat, oats, spelt and tiny teff – gently offset by mildly bitter hops.

BentSpoke Larken’s Brown half-pint glass $7.50
Larken’s Brown percolates through BentSpoke’s hopinator en route to the glass, absorbing exotic flavours from a mix of cinnamon, chillies and roasted coffee beans from Highgate Lane. Coffee aromas and flavours dominate the brew. And if it wasn’t cold, frothy and alcoholic, the drinker might swear they’d downed a very good espresso.

Zierholz – brewer by appointment to the King

10 June 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

Local brew for Canberra watering hole

Popular Civic watering hole King O’Malley’s recently joined forces with Fyshwick brewer, Christoph Zierholz, to create The King’s Pale Ale for sale exclusively through O’Malley’s.

O’Malley’s owner, Peter Barclay, and three staff, Mark Piesley, Dan Kelly and Jacka Hicks worked with Zierholz on the recipe and brewing.

With typical understatement, Zierholz says, “I’m quite pleased with it – tasty enough but really sessionable”.

He modelled the beer broadly on the full-bodied, assertively bitter American pale ale style – but with the throttle pulled back just enough to provide easy drinking without losing complexity.

Five different malts (BB pale, maris otter, and Weyerman carapils, carafe and Munich) give King’s Pale Ale its opulent malt and caramel flavours. And three hops varieties (southern cross, amarillo and mosaic), added at different times, provide complex aromatics, flavours and lingering, but not overwhelming bitterness.

Reviews

King O’Malley’s King’s Pale Ale (Zierholz) pint glass $8
Zierholz-brewed King O’Malley’s Pale Ale looks luxurious even at is pours deep gold-amber and richly headed from the tap. The sturdy, persistent foam tops a deeply flavoured, rounded beer, with a satisfying, chewy, malty depth. Hops gives an attractive lift to the aroma, liveliness to the palate and a convincing, lingering bitterness.

O’Brien Gluten Free Pale Ale 330ml $3.50
Beer-loving coeliac John O’Brien launched his first gluten-free beer in 2005 – made for him at Bintara Brewery, Rutherglen. Two years later, O’Brian and fellow coeliac, Andrew Lavery, established their own brewery at Ballarat. The pair’s pale ale provides fresh, easy, crisp drinking with a lingering, bitter, hops finish.

Beer consumption falls

20 May 2015Beer, Beer reviewChris Shanahan

But mid-strength gains

ABS figures released in May reveal a decline in Australia’s “apparent” per-capita consumption of alcohol from 10.6 litres in 2009 to 9.7 litres in 2014 – the lowest level since the early 1960s. The bureau says the figures overstate consumption as they don’t allow for wastage and other factors.

The figures also show a steady decline in both total and per-capita beer consumption over the past five years, as well as changing patterns in the styles of beer we drink.

Consumption of low-alcohol beer fell from 156.9 million litres in 2009 to 93.4 million in 2014. Per-capita figures were 9.0 litres ad 4.9 litres respectively.

Mid-strength beer gained popularity, rising from 281.8 million litres to 328.8 million litres (per-capita 16.3 litres and 17.4 litres).

Consumption of full-strength beer fell from 1.9 million litres to 1.7 million litres per capita 107.9 litres to 92.3 litres).

Reviews

Stone and Wood Limited Release Stone Beer 500ml $8–$10
Byron Bay’s Stone and Wood excel as brewers and marketers, building each year on its ever-changing, annual Stone Beer. This year it’s a black, 6.4 per-cent ale with deep, complex fruity, nutty flavours and moderate, toasty bitterness. The addition of wheat malt gives a lively boost to the sweet, plush mid-palate.

Little Creatures Return of the Dread Domestic Stout 330m 4-pack $18
Lion-owned Little Creatures produced Return of the Dread as a hearty, winter-only brew. The name salutes an earlier one-off batch, The Dreadnought. It’s a serious stout: dark as night and high in alcohol (7.2 per cent), with powerful roasted malt flavour, opulent palate and a mother load of bitter Fuggles hops balancing the sweet malt.

National Press Club sniffs the beer scene

6 May 2015BeerChris Shanahan

Talks between Canberra brewer Christoph Zierholz and National Press Club manager, Paul Butler, led last year to the club’s first matching of food with local beers.

The club’s wine dinners, of course, stretch back decades. Indeed I recall an early 1980s event for the liberal interpretation of “wine tasl ting” adopted by the diners, mainly journalists.

Last year’s beer event featured brews from Canberra’s Zierholz, Wig and Pen, and BentSpoke, as well as Lion, represented by veteran beer man Chuck Hahn.

Zierholz and Butler ran another degustation event in May – this time devoted solely to our local brewers.

Zierholz hopes for more joint promotion of Canberra’s fledgling but highly regarded brewing industry. Like our local wine makers, Canberra’s brewers compete with each other, but can benefit greatly from promotion of the industry as a whole.