The Ninth Annual Blackhurst Beer Festival (Part Two)

And here is the continuation...

Beer Number Six - Peak Brewery, Sollinger Bock (6.5%, New Zealand)
Peak Brewery is a certified organic brewery based in Masterton making beer along classic British and European lines. They name all their beers after him and mountain ranges – the Solling range is in Central Germany, near the city of Einbeck where this style of beer is reputed to have originated (‘bock’ being a derivative of ‘beck’).

A bock is a strong lager of German origin (originally dark, although modern examples range in colour from light copper to brown) with several substyles including maibock (or helles bock), which is a paler, more hopped version generally made for consumption at spring festivals and (Northern hemisphere) Easter.

Colour: Hazy amber golden
Nose: Yeast; hops
Taste: Yeast; banana; fruity; tangy; touch of spice; leathery finish

Comments:
I’ve had this before – smoked gone right
Pineapple, mango, citrus, tangelo, watermelon, grass, horse piss and green tea – tasty; chewy; mmmm
Tobacco flavours, smoky cigarette water but quite nice
Mmmm, I like this; fizzy little number
Mmmm, nice with Huntley and Palmers and crackers but still a little sweet for a whole night worth of drinking
All my sensory organs have deserted me – wait... floral delicate nose; perfumed rose water
Yes please – malty; I can taste brown sugar
Tastes like home brew but isn’t – indescribable

And this was our winner - with 74 points it was the favourite in 1st place!

Beer Number Seven - Moylan’s Kilt Lifter (8%, USA)
Brendan Moylan was just a normal chap in California with an accounting degree. Naturally he realised this was incredibly dull and bought himself a Christmas present of a beer brewing kit. ‘One thing led to another’ and he had soon built his own brew pub. This is beginning to sound familiar.

His beer has since won six gold and four silver medals at the World Beer Championships, and was the California Champion at the US Beer Tasting Championships seven times out of the last ten. This is no mean feat as beer in America has come a long way, baby. Moylan claims, ‘Prohibition in this country ended our brewing tradition. Budweiser and a few others moved in fast and captured many of the larger markets. Now we’re entering a new phase of beer brewing. I think you’ll see it continue to grow.’ How very perspicacious.

The Kilt Lifter is, unsurprisingly, a Scotch-style ale (also known as Wee Heavy), described as robust and strapping. The term Scotch Ale was first used to describe ales exported from Edinburgh in the 18th century and is a popular term in the USA. It is not to be confused with what French and Belgian brewers call Scotch Ale, by which they mean peat-smoked, malt-flavoured beers. The ale should be slightly warmed in the glass to ‘enhance the truly bold character’ and ‘sharing is encouraged’.

Colour: Dark ruby-amber with ferocious off-white head (little retention)
Nose: Dark roasty chewy caramel malt; nuttiness and graininess; oak and earthy notes
Taste: Strong malt profile; complex spices and oakiness; toasted biscuit; caramel custard; figs and dates; earthy hops round out the finish

Comments:
Smoked fruit salad served with a whisky side – quite acidic – Scottish?
Strawberry liqueur followed by marmite and a fag
Sweet with horse manure and malt overtones
Maltexo
Pudding – dark chocolate overtones; dates; caramel sauce – reminds me of Speights’ Old Dark Ice Cream
Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup; peat single malt
Smells like the rubbish bin after the bin men have been – Tastes better than it smells
Peachy, malty liqueur

Apart from one person who liked it very much, and one person who really didn't, this beer recieved the most average award of the evening and came in equal 5th position with 48 points.

Beer Number Eight - De Molen Heen & Weer (9.5%, The Netherlands)
De Molen is Dutch for the mill – in the Netherlands, all mills are windmills unless specifically stated. Heen and Weer means back and forth, because the De Molen Brewery has two separate locations and the beer folk spend a lot of time driving between the two – those crazy Dutchies!

It is an Abbey Triple style: the term ‘Abbey Beers’ was originally given to any monastic or monastic-style beer. In a champagne-esque move, the Union of Belgian Brewers introduced the logo ‘Certified Belgian Abbey Beer’ in 1999 which could only be borne by beers brewed under license to an existing or abandoned abbey, with the monastery having control over certain aspects of the commercial operation and reaping a proportion of the profits. Heen and Weer is not one of those, but just has a vaguely monastic branding.

The term ‘triple’ comes from the Low Countries and is believed to relate to the strength of the beer as indicated by the number of crosses on the cask – X being the weakest strength, XX being medium strength, and XXX being the strongest (approx 3% abv, 6% abv, and 9% abv respectively).

Colour: Hazy orange
Nose: Sweet malt; soapy sprucy hops; vegetable notes; apples; oranges; sweet caramel; gentle toffee; brown sugar
Taste: Sweet fruits and huge malt; oats and oranges; coriander; wheaty yeasty; honey; aggressive alcohol; slightly bitter with a malty hop aftertaste

Comments:
Patchiouli and malt – strong malt flavour with no hops – high alcohol?
Tastes good at first but fizzles out
Malty fizzy golden syrup
Clear, refreshing on the back of the tongue
Starting to get a smooth finish with whisky overtones – must be North of the border
Toffee caramel – not for me, thank you
Smooth, cooling caramel – like eating caramello
Smelled peaty at first, then less so, then rusty aftertaste

Strong, malty and chocolately caramel must be popular among the group as this beer ranked 3rd with 68 points.

Beer Number Nine - La Guillotine (9%, Belgium)

In 1906 Leon Huyghe founded Brouwerij Huyghe in the city of Melle in East Flanders on the site of a brewery which had been in operation since 1654. La Guillotine was first brewed in 1989 to commemorate the bicentennial of the French Revolution, which had such a devastating effect on the Belgian monasteries and the associated breweries. In 1790 the National Assembly seized all church lands and all religious orders were officially dissolved. Those religious buildings that didn’t close were destroyed and any remaining priests and monks were imprisoned or massacred.

La Guillotine has top-fermentation with re-fermentation in the bottle. It is curious as to why a Belgian brewer would choose to commemorate such an event, but perhaps the suggestion is that at 9%, more than two of these strong blond beers would cause you to lose your head.

Colour: Clear golden
Nose: Lemon; tulip petals; toast; spicy; yeasty; earth; grass; candied sugar; golden syrup; fruit cake; cereal
Taste: Lemon; leaves; cloves; grapes; sweet bready malt; light honey hints; soft caramel; vanilla; cough drop

Comments:
Aromatic, but not in a way that appeals, sorry
Like the previous one but keeps on giving – me likey!
Smooth, sweet and fresh
Not overpowering – I like it
Must have overloaded my taste buds – I can’t taste a blinking thing – Lemony Snicket
I did not detect lemon, grass, candied sugar, fruit cake, or tulip petals – I did get a hint of Chester’s urine
Syrupy smooth with a light finish
Lime and malt; great taste. Sell the family car; we’re buying the brewery – Yum!

Quite a popular little number (it appears we like them strong), this came second overall with 71 points.

Beer Number Ten - Ise Kadoya Stout (5%, Japan)

According to the label, ‘Ise Kadoya has made miso and soy sauce according to ancient tradition in a centuries-old wood building in old Ise, and now brews beer in small batches in the same traditional, natural way.’ Perhaps someone should tell them the process is a little different...?

They also have a restaurant and recommend this stout as an accompaniment to their oyster dishes. The restaurant was originally established to provide nourishment for the numerous pilgrims that journeyed to Ise City (one of the most sacred cities of the Shinto religion) and Ise Shrine from all over Japan.

Colour: Black opaque with thin tan head
Nose: Deep dark chocolate; roasted grain; coal smoke; cherry skins; some milkiness
Taste: Roasted grain; dark chocolate; caramel; soy sauce; dry roast malts; convincing ashiness; smoking toast; tingly mouthfeel; coffee finish

Comments:
Brown sugar but quite light in the mouth; sour rather than bitter – dark lager
Black beer – fizzy tarmac
Chocolate liquorice; candyfloss beer
I’ve run out of descriptive words
Fizzy dark – the champagne of darks, only it smelt like curry
Spaz’s home brew – I have just realised that may look offensive – I mean, perhaps a good start?
Gassy for a stout – not creamy and heavy as I expected
Smells of chocolate; malty

Not a spectacular finish, perhaps because expectations weren't met. This beer was awarded 44 points and finished 8th equal.
So the winner on the night was the Kiwi offering, which is interesting to note. Also of interest was the fact that the beers that I like (the hoppy, bitter ones with clean refreshing bite) were not popular with the group. I can only imagine that this is because for the first time in nine Blackhurst beer festivals, our tasters were predominantly New Zealanders.

Thanks to all for taking part in our not-at-all-scientific tasting extravaganza. And so, for another year, that's all folks!

The Ninth Annual Blackhurst Beer Festival (Part One)

If you've been following my blog for any length of time, you know how these things work. Ten beers; a group of friends; tasting notes; random comments. Let the reviewing commence!

Beer Number One - Hinano (5%, Tahiti)

Claiming to be ‘the official beer of Tahiti’, Hinano sponsors beauty pageants (the Miss Hinano contest) and produces calendars of ‘dusky beauties in bikinis’. In 1990 it also began sponsoring the Miss Tahiti contest while raising its alcohol content from 4% to 5%. The website concerns itself greatly with the design of the vahine (woman) on the label, paying particular attention to the size of her breasts, which are altered every couple of years, although I note she has only got four toes.

As for the beer itself, it announces that it is ‘brewed in Tahiti since 1955, using only the finest ingredients from Northern Europe. Hinano satisfies the most demanding connoisseurs with its freshness and quality.’ Those at www.ratebeer.com respectfully disagree, although it is very popular in China. And, we presume, Tahiti.

Colour: Golden yellow
Nose: Malt; wet grass; sweet grain; skunk hop
Taste: Toast; cheese; cooked vegetables; slightly metallic; corn notes; light bitter finish

Comments:
Next!
It’s alive!
Sharp and flowery in an insipid way – astringent flavours
Easy to drink – smooth but watery
Light, fizzy, cold, tasteless
Lovely oat colour/ lemon dishwasher on nose/ good hop mid palate/ steely – all a bit bland
Metallic aftertaste
Easy drinking – no specific taste

Despite being the name of a friend's dog, Hinano rated the not-so-grand sum of 45 points (out of 100)making it 7th (out of 10).

Beer Number Two - Coopers Mild Ale (3.5%, Australia)
Thomas Cooper was a stonemason in Adelaide in 1862 when his wife asked him to brew up a batch of ale from an old (Yorkshire) family recipe to help cure an illness. Like a good husband, he did so and, due to the fact that his beer was made from pure ingredients (malt, hops and water), the doctors were soon recommending it to all their patients – this could explain a lot about South Australians. Coopers is now the sole remaining family-owned brewery in Australia.

Coopers Mild Ale is very commercial and very popular with the Australian drinking public, and if you like it, you can make your own because the good people at Coopers have posted the recipe on their website. You can also make your own label with their label maker to stick on your own homebrew bottles and ‘impress your mates’... or not.

Colour: Red-gold
Nose: Grain; apples; grassy hops; cardboard; toffee; hint of banana; dandelion leaves
Taste: Minerally; hints of grain; apples; pears; bread crust maltiness; light caramel; metallic finish

Comments:
No nose – does it have syphilis? There are many greeblies in it so it wouldn’t surprise me
Spaz’s socks after a long run – home brew?
After panicking slightly at the sight of so many floaties, I find this beer light on flavour
Smells like wet socks – tastes better than that though
Some spotty teenager’s wrung out and what I would imagine it would taste like if you licked them
Pineapple, little burnt scent on nose, nice mouth feel
Bland – low alcohol?
No smell, no taste, ‘Mr. Boring’

Clearly not a favourite from Coopers, coming in firmly in final place with 34 points.

Beer Number Three - Buxton Brewery, Kinder Downfall Golden Ale (4.3%, England)
The folk at Buxton Brewery name all their beers after Buxton and surrounding geological features (and to be fair, it is a very beautiful part of the world) with the exception of Old Big ’ead, named after Brian Clough in tribute to his services as manager of Derby County, Nottingham Forest and his brief but controversial spell at Leeds Utd. Ah, football and beer: a few of my favourite things (you can keep your raindrops on roses and brown paper parcels!) But I digress...

This golden ale is named after a waterfall on Kinder Scout in the Peak District of Derbyshire – over which I can only surmise unsupervised German children came a cropper. The beer is described as ‘a solid sessioner’ so perhaps people are understandably too busy drinking to worry about waterfall woes.

Colour: Golden yellow; creamy off-white head; clear but cloudy
Nose: Fruity, citrus, grapefruit; faint pineapple jelly; light malt; hint of honey; some dough; grass; sour gooseberry undercurrents; dandelion hop
Taste: Citrus: mellow marmalade; light white sugar; gentle earthy malt background; lemony jellied orange hops; lightly toasted grains; mild doughy bread; hint of grass; spicy; pepper; some glue; bitter finish

Comments:
Smoked; hopped; it’s an IPA that’s gone nuts!
Dark exotic hints – I couldn’t drink more than one mouthful
Sweet, honey and orange on the nose, which I liked until I tasted it – way too hoppy for little old me!
Cloudy – phwoar; what a stink! Far out, that’s foul – bitter and hoppy
Nooooo!
Jekyll and Hyde: all light and fruity and tra-la-la; then it turns round and rodgers you
Marmite, cocoa, molasses, cigar box, truffles
Hoppy – this is a big fat bunny; heavy tannins, metallic aftertaste
Hops and wee; was used to put out a house fire and then spooned back into the glass

Although I liked this beer very much (in fact it was my favourite of the evening), it seems I was in a minority among the group as it scored a measly 44 points to make it equal second last.

 
Beer Number Four - Nøgne ø Saison (6.5%, Norway)
‘The name Nøgne ø means ‘naked island’; a poetic term used by Henrik Ibsen to describe any of the countless, stark, barren outcroppings that are visible in the rough seas of Norway’s southern coast where the brewery sits. The founders gave Nøgne ø a subtitle – The Uncompromising Brewery – a plain statement of their mission: to make ales of personality and individuality. Brewing in traditional styles but thoroughly inspired by the boldness of American brewing, these Norweigan brewers fearlessly chart their own course’ – from the label.

For a while Saison beer (French for season) was an endangered style, but has recently become flavour of the month, particularly among American breweries. It was traditionally a low-alcohol pale ale brewed seasonally in farmhouses in Wallonia (the French-speaking region of Belgium) for farm workers to consume during harvest season. There was no particular style, as each farmer would brew his own and it was just a loose term for a refreshing summer ale.

In America, Saisons tend to copy the yeast used by Brasserie Dupont (whose Saison Dupont was named ‘the best beer in the world’ by the Men’s Journal in July 2005) which ferments better at warmer temperatures than the standard fermenting temperature used by other Belgian Saison brewers. They also tend to be brewed with an average range of 5% to 8% abv, although there are still plenty at the more traditional strength of 3.5%.

Colour: Hazy yellow
Nose: Paint; pineapple; lemon; wheat; sugary meringue; hay; horse dung; bready pepper; sour fruitness; floral; clover; light iron
Taste: Zesty citrus; tangerine; pineapple; spiced yeast; breadiness; sweet malt; mild hops; grass; banana tones

Comments:
Hay – dry and grassy; tastes a bit chlorinated – unpleasant, like drinking out of the kids’ pool at the end of the day
Finally, a beer I like! Cumin and orange peel
Tastes a bit shandy-ish and a bit yeasty also
Cloudy, spicy – nice mixture
Honey, honey; one for the money
The smell of a dentist’s work room; pineapple and banana mostly
Flavoursome; light and hoppy – this is a smaller, lighter bunny
Carbonated horse wee with a little citrus

A slightly more favourable reaction for this one, totalling 65 points (which is the first over the 50% mark) and ranking 4th.

Beer Number Five - Mikkeller Centennial Single Hop IPA (6.9%, Denmark)
Two young home brewers from Denmark (probably fed up with the predominance of Carlsberg and Tuborg) wanted to make beers that “challenge the Danes’ taste buds with intense taste adventures”. Founded in 2006 in Copenhagen by Mikkel Borg Bjergsø and Kristian Klarup Keller, the brewery has gone from a kitchen hobby to international fame (Since August 2007 Mikkel Borg Bjergsø has run Mikkeller on his own). Mikkeller is possibly the world’s most productive brewery. In 2010, the good Danish beer folk launched 76 new beers – God bless them, and all who sail in them…

They take inspiration from all around the world, including the up-and-coming American breweries, which aren’t afraid to play and break the rules of brewing. Mikkeller Centennial Single Hop IPA is an American Style India Pale Ale, brewed and bottled by a Danish company in Belgium, imported to Minneapolis, USA, and then redirected to The Beer Store in Hamilton, NZ before finding its way to our back garden in Arrowtown. I think that’s what’s known as beer miles.

Colour: Vibrant orange, frothy, white head
Nose: Soft citrus: peaches; honey; creamy banana; sugar cookies; some mango; a little pine; smooth hopping
Taste: Citrus: grapefruit; orange; light to medium strong bitterness; fruity hops; elegant and floral; long bitter finish; full body and creamy mouthfeel; juicy profile

Comments:
Uplifting! The bitterness at the end is vaguely resinous and fruity – an orchard in a pine forest
The bitter big brother of the previous one – probably has a criminal record
Bitter and twisted – smells of wet earth
Pithy bitter
Air freshener masking public toilet smell... blocked my nose and tasted fizzy caramel
Macintosh toffee on the nose; peaty, yeasty, marmitey marmalade
No smell but strong aftertaste
Citrus; honey; malt; chocolate

Probably the most divisive beer of the evening - some loved it; others hated it. Only two tasters ranked it in the middle, but that's where it ended up - 5th equal with 48 points.

This is now becoming a very long post, so I shall continue in another one...

The Eighth Blackhurst Beer Festival (Part Two)

Continued as promised...

Beer Number Six - Schöfferhofen Hefeweizen (Germany, 5%)
Try saying that three times fast before and after drinking a bottle. This wheat beer rates quite highly in random lists of ‘my favourite beer’ and is apparently ‘quite savoury and spicy for a wheat beer’. Actually I have very little to write about this beer as the only comments I can find on the internet are in German. The only German I know is ‘schnell, schnell; achtung, achtung’ and, ‘ve have von the vorld cup more times’ – and it didn’t say that.

Comments:
This beer is a wallflower at the alcoholic drinks annual ball
Cloves; wheaty
Fruity, dishwatery; someone dropped an orange in the sink and left it there for three weeks
Sieved through fish! Add to a fish pie – it may improve it
Like Robert Mugabe; separating the wheat from the chaff
Six kids in a bath leave a cleaner, fresher taste than this fish-soaked communist ‘must have or die’ national drink
Wheaty
OMG – who left the fish in? Radioactive!
Yes please!
Cloudy, like Invercargill; made with aftertaste in abundance
Didn’t like it – nutmeg flavour
Cloudy, frothy and strong – I had three sips but I still wouldn’t say I liked it
Yeast for Africa, maaaan, and cloves – I bet the monks made this; cheeky little monk ees
Wheat beer with lots of head – ooh er, Mrs
Foggier than a North York moor
Baked trout with coriander seed aka dirty fish and chip shop oil what’s been emptied in the sink

Another polarising beer - you either like wheat beer or you don't - this garnered a total of 69 points and ended up seventh overall.

Beer Number Seven - Tuatara Hefe (NZ, 5%)
Beer reviewer Neil Miller writes, ‘One to shake up your beer preconceptions is the Tuatara Hefe (5%). Hefeweizen literally means “yeast in wheat beer” and the suspended yeast gives the beer the characteristic (and desired) cloudiness. The classical aroma and flavour characteristics are there – vanilla, banana, juicyfruit gum and spicy cloves. Challenging to some palates, this beer is spritzy and quenching.’ And we like Neil Miller so we’ll believe him.

Comments:
Strong fruity lager
Too fruity, spicy –ick!
Is this what they call eggnog? Would go with an omelette
Tight, like the nuns in the monastery where it was brewed
Rustic Norwegian flavours flow favourably throughout
Hoegaarden?
A befitting tribute to the Belgian Beer Cafe in Christchurch – angelica aftertaste
Serve with mussels and chips
A great beer which is then strained through Spaz’s used running shorts to add extra body and those bits that get stuck in your teeth
Brewed in old miners’ socks; strained through his undies – didn’t like the look of it; it tasted even worse
Overtones of vomit
Sweet and apricoty – this would be a good beer to have in the fridge because my husband hates it
Fizzy – nice and strong
I want to say nice and light and really tasty but, well, 30% isn’t a pass, is it? Not heavy enough to pin me down

So, we can conclude that my friends are not really wheat beer drinkers, then - this beer came 8th overall with 67 points.

Beer Number Eight - Belhaven Wee Heavy (Scotland, 6.5%)
Wee Heavy is a style of beer also known as Scotch Ale. Scottish beer used to be rated on the invoice price of ale per barrel based on the shilling currency; ‘wee heavy’ would have been known as 160/-. Strong ales were typically sold in bottles in ‘nips’ of 6 fluid ounces which equates to 1/3 Imperial pint. These ‘nips’ were also known as ‘Wee Heavy’, hence the origin of this term.

The Beer Advocate explains, ‘Scotch Ales traditionally go through a long boil in the kettle for a caramelization of the wort. This produces a deep copper to brown in colored brew. Compared to Scottish Ales, they'll be sweeter and fuller-bodied, and of course higher in alcohol, with a much more pronounced malty caramel and roasted malt flavor. A low tea-like bitterness can be found in many examples.’

Meanwhile, the Belhaven website opines, ‘It may have come from a right old recipe but Wee Heavy fits the bill today as much as it ever has. It is a classic Scottish heavy but has a lightness of flavour and a great reddish colour in the glass. A beer to be sipped, savoured and fully respected. Cracking stuff if we do say so ourselves.’

Comments:
Chocolate bitter – very full and warm flavours
Now we’re talking! Malty, sweet chocolate, roasted malt, soft finish
Would put a gloss on your coat
Cocoa, caramel, thick as Paul Faulkner and equally harsh on the nose
Sweet desert beer – heavy German tang; European flavours hand heavy in the mouth as an aftertaste
Sweet
A confusing number much like Morris Dancing – inexplicable
Sweet, darker, malty, sitting on top of my pie and peas
Pure liquid wonderment
Malty and sweet – bring it on!
Malt vinegar, but sweet and brown and fizzy – oh, and yucky
Darth Vader turns good – chocolate, molasses and treacle
Dark chocolate
Sweet!
Smells like a student flat in Castle Street – tastes like sweet liquorice and malt; a tad too sweet to have a session on though

Ladies and gentlemen; we have a winner. No one ranked this beer lower than five, and it was the only beer to score over a hundred (only just, with 101, but that makes it a 7/10 average).

Beer Number Nine - Chimay Premiere (Red), (Belgium, 7%)
Chimay Red is a Trappist beer brewed by the Cistercian Trappist monks to go with their cheese since 1862 – probably not the same monks, although possibly the same cheese. All Trappist beer is sold only for financial support of the monastery ‘and good causes’ – clearly such as the BBF.

When sold in the 75cl bottle, the Chimay Red is known as Première. It is a top-fermentation beer (see  Coopers Sparkling Ale) and is noted for its coppery colour and creamy head. The (interestingly translated) Belgian website notes, ‘The taste perceived in the mouth is a balance confirming the fruity nuances noticed in the fragrance. Its taste, which imparts a silk sensation to the tongue, is made refreshing by a light touch of bitterness. To the palate, the taster perceives a pleasant astringency which complements the flavour qualities of this beer very harmoniously.’ I imagine the translator moved on from this website to the latest Stieg Larsson novel.

Comments:
Bit fizzy; very tangy; old socks
Smoky; hint of possum urine and old goldfish water finish
Ah, now that’s me!! Sit on the deck and drink all day
Soda stream – get busy with the fizzy
Vitamised, carbonised, yeast-flavoured, mouth-staining shit; not to be used if you plan t kiss a female
‘Beers Fizz’ – an 80s band; making my mind up...
I like beer
If this beer was human it would be called Kevin and drive a Ford Capri Ghia
Rainwater left to rust in a 23-year-old 44 gallon drum
Aromas of apples, and indeed has flavours of burnt apples
Nuts! Well, you’d need to be to drink this
Muddy, murky, strong apples
Looks like a badly-poured home brew – very malty and far too sweet

Very disappointing after the last offering - I think we were all expecting more from the mighty Chimay - however, this limped in equal last with 58.

Beer Number Ten - Epic Porta Marillo (NZ, 7%)
The cheeky chappies at Epic (producers of New Zealand’s finest IPA in my not-so-humble opinion) co-operated with America’s Dogfish Head brewery to create a new brew for Beervana in August 2010. The beer, Porta Marillo, is an ‘imperial sorta-porter’ made with tamarillos. These weird fruit are an acquired taste (you have to eat them as part of your citizenship test); they have been roasted over Pohutukawa wood to impart a smoky flavour to the beer and Southern Cross hops are used.

The beer was launched commercially as a festival ale in November 2010. According to Wellington blogger, Nick Churchouse, it’s a sort of ‘Christmas carol in a pint glass – looking like a beautiful dark Christmas Eve, sparkling with all the promise of the Star of Bethlehem’. He may have had one too many. Can there be such a thing? Discuss...

Comments:
Heavy, dark, molasses and coffee
Dark roasted espresso – nice bitter; Ay, that’s loverly, chuck!
It would make me shit through the eye of a needle
Cuban cigars and wet dog
Like the Irish: thick fluid, arrogant, ignorant and leaving a bad taste in the mouth
Stouty but thin
Bicarbonate of soda, or green lipped mussels
Luke, I am your father
Blacker than a bailiff’s heart – lovely sarsaparilla
Delicious malty and Irish with a hint of liquorice
Bitter stout with a very strong flavour – good for your daily iron intake
Gives me a headache – too much aniseed
Very dark
Roast toasty winter night with beef and oyster stew – Aged in port barrels?

So the other Kiwi beer came fourth overall with 83 points, although three people rated it their favourite beer of the night - more than any other.

And that's it for another year...

The Eighth Blackhurst Beer Festival (Part One)

For various reasons, this year's Blackhurst Beer Festival occured later in the season than previous sessions. There was plenty of beer to be had, however, and we offered our 'discerning guests' a selection of ten brews from nine different countries. This is what was said:

Beer Number One - Peroni Leggera (Italy, 3.5%)
From the people who brought you Nastro Azzuro (as tasted at BBF VI) comes a new (launched in Australia in 2009) lager with the same crisp taste but fewer calories and carbohydrates. Peroni’s chief brew master, Roberto Cavalli claims, ‘Peroni Leggera is like a flamboyant Italian socialite; stylish in design and impressive in taste.’

The marketing department confirms that it is targeted at ‘20-34 year-old premium beer drinkers’ and that it is ‘an easy-to-drink, non-filling, sociable beer’. It seems that you can drink as much of it as you want to without getting full, or pissed. Some might ask, what’s the point?

Comments:
Very hoppy; light, tangy European lager
Light, kind of florally. If this were a perfume it would be CK One - Inoffensive
Good nose and dry finish (bit weasely piss)
Nice smell, I think it had a taste?! – Good with whitebait
Smooth, like my patter, with a kick in the balls to follow
Looks and tastes like sun-baked cat’s piss
Cheaply made from seawater imported from Japan
Weasely
Need a lime or at least several more glasses
Very light colour and tatste; rather like sex in a canoe (you know the rest)
Weak, like a southern fell runner
Hoppy, like a sporty wee grasshopper
Smells edible, but I couldn’t eat a whole one
I think maybe this is a lite beer because it doesn’t taste of much
Fizzy and light on flavour
It’s a Weimaraner; a little scatty but good looking
Light coloured; quite bitter; very fizzy; lager
No, no, no, no, no – keep it away!

Interestingly, this was the most divisive beer of the evening with four people voting it their least favourite and two voting for it as their favourite. I guess it depends on your position on light lager; overall it beer came in equal last of the evening with a sum total of 58 points (out of a potential 140).

Beer Number Two - Quilmes (Argentina, 4.5%)
Quilmes is a province in the city of Buenos Aires. It is also an Argentinean lager ‘brewed from local barley and hops and purest Patagonian water’. The brewery (founded in 1888 by Otto Bemberg, a German immigrant) has 75% of the beer market share in Argentina. It sponsors the Argentinean national football team and polo team – the colours of its labels are Argentina’s light blue and white. With a pedigree like that, it’s probably good at hand ball and penalties too.

Comments:
No colour, no aroma, a taste reminiscent of pencil sharpenings – are you sure this is a beer?
Very average; almost like beer but not quite
Yum! Another pint please
Good with blue cod
Fizzy; may cause gas
Euro style from the homeland
Rich in yeast and organic filtering matter
We know now why Mexicans drink tequila
Hoppy
Money’s on the honey
Smokey aftertaste; medium strength – like Paul Garvie
This tastes like the beer my parents forced me to drink when I was a teenager – no wonder I don’t like beer
Blonde and tasty and fresh like a sunflower dipped in jelly crystals
Honey coloured like an old tart’s backside
Not much on the nose; watery, bitter, squinty; Ivana Trump of beers – would not drink again
Light, fruity, easy drinking –very good

With a total of 77 points, this beer took the fifth spot of the night - it was the only beer that didn't rate as anyone's favourite.
 

Beer Number Three - Flying Dog Tire Bite Golden Ale (USA, 5%)
Being an American brew, this beer has pretty good (albeit overtly macho) marketing. The Flying Dog website quotes Hunter S. Thompson: ‘Good people drink good beer’, and features artwork by Ralph Steadman – the brilliant political and social artist and cartoonist. He blessed the brewery with the statement, ‘Good beer; no shit’, over which they waged a four-year long court battle with the Colorado Liquor Board over their attempted censorship of the phrase. (The slogan ‘If you’re lucky your bitch will look this sexy after twenty years’, referring to the twentieth anniversary of their Raging Bitch Belgian IPA passed without a murmur – see what I mean about the machismo?)

 The brewery was established in Aspen, Colorado in 1990 after a dozen ‘under-qualified and unprepared’ mates completed ‘an amateur mountaineering expedition’ up K2. Drinking beer after surviving this trek George Stranahan noticed a picture on the wall of a flying dog that had been drawn by a local artist. He writes, ‘Now, we all know dogs don’t fly, but nobody told this particular dog it couldn’t fly’ and so he adopted the symbol of the flying dog with the mantra, “it is amazing what you can achieve if nobody tells you that you can’t.”

The beer is brewed in ‘kölsch’ style – this is unique to the Cologne area of Germany where they used wheat and lager yeast to lighten the colour and increase the dryness.

Comments:
Smells like horse urine; tastes like water from a school swimming pool – Blurgh!
Average
First taste – eek! But it grows on you, like a fungus – nice finish
Hint of something – I will think of it
If Toblerone were a beer, this is it
Suspiciously cloudy quickly followed up by an earthy sub-taste; pleasantly palatable – a beer developed for all classes with a slightly nutty undertone
Microbrewed
Mmmm, wants a curry
That’s more like it – liquid honey
Slight sharpness; easy on the eye; amber gold
Fresh and summer; hint of something citrusy
A hint of oranges on the nose and a suggestion of yeast
Cloudy like my mind – delicious honey tones
Whoever peed this has been eating asparagus with a side of slightly rotten apples

With a total of 89 points, this was the third favourite beer of the evening.

Beer Number Four - Coopers Sparkling Ale (Australia, 5.8%)
Thomas Cooper was a stonemason in Adelaide in 1862 when his wife asked him to brew up a batch of ale from an old (Yorkshire) family recipe to help cure an illness. Like a good husband, he did so and, due to the fact that his beer was made from pure ingredients (malt, hops and water), the doctors were soon recommending it to all their patients – this could explain a lot about South Australians. Coopers is now the sole remaining family-owned brewery in Australia.

Coopers Sparkling Ale is apparently ‘the pinnacle of the brewer’s craft – The ale by which all others should be measured’. It is an English-style golden ale and it doesn’t sparkle at all – in fact it has a distinctive cloudy appearance due to the sediment being left in the bottle. Coopers use no preservatives or additives during the beer making process; they use the top fermentation method, meaning that during fermentation the yeast interacts on the beer’s surface. The secondary fermentation process (which occurs in the bottle) is what gives it the cloudy appearance; little clumps of yeast suspended and swimming in the bottle ‘like a snow globe, but more fun.’

According to beer reviewer, Syrie Wongkaew (she of the snow-globe comment), ‘The initial taste is fruity without being sweet. The aftertaste is very bitter and dry. The beer has a good, full body. Although it is an ale, it has the light colour and intensity of a lager. However the beer's fruity aroma and cloudiness gives away its ale heritage.’

Comments:
Either this is very cloudy or Spaz hasn’t washed the glass properly
Cloudy, heavy, strong pale ale
Very nice – fruity, hoppy, bit premature on the finish (needs Viagra)
I think if I had a night on this my mouth would taste like I had eaten a dead possum
As sharp as a fly landing on a razor blade using its balls for brakes
Is the cloud actually from a mushroom via Japan?
Aftertaste like a quick-moving pale mass as the chicory base lingers more than the cement
Nutty
Slightly dubious cloudiness
Sickly sweet, ugly aftertaste, like Paul Garvie
Wheat – made by the monks up on a hill above the city of Munich
Everyone will love this, cause I don’t
A little bitter bugger, and smelly like my sons after a game of footy
Not much of a smell – blackcurrant flavours
Hoppy, but lacking on the follow-through; might drink again but would depend on what else was in the fridge

71 points placed this beer in 6th place overall.
 

Beer Number Five - Charles Wells Bombardier (England, 5.2%)
Wells & Young’s advertise their Bombardier as the drink of England; ‘the quintessentially English pint’, brewed with ‘the ripest hops and more malt per pint than other premium beers’ – which sounds like marketing flim-flam to me. They use ‘pure natural mineral water’ from their own well, sunk by Charles Wells himself and claim ‘this water is so good we could bottle it and sell it for the table but we choose to save it for the beer itself’.

 Their other beers are a golden ale (Burning Gold) and a porter (Satanic Mills), and they are the official beer of English Heritage. I bet Al Murray’s pub landlord would drink this if he weren’t a lager drinker. (Apparently he ‘flirted with bitter but came back to the gold stuff after about four months of gastric complications’.) Wells & Young's have been campaigning to have St George’s Day declared a national holiday for the past 15 years. So far they have had no luck, but their beer is still quite nice.

Comments:
Blackcurrant – is there a dash of Ribena in this?
Darker, cocoa aroma
Malty smooth – nice finish; would drink again
Smells like raw cake mixture or kahlua – still a bit bitter – ok with cheese sticks
Meaty, like a meat pie in meat pastry with a side of meat
Like my wife: splendid confirmation; great body; light sweet smell; fab lingering aftertaste; an arm wrestling beer
Strong

Smart little number; I’d call it Spaz – zippy with a winning finish

Distilled by virgins, poured from the vat over a virgin’s thigh, bottled by virgins, pure as the driven snow

Hops galore – I’m gonna grow long ears and a small tail – and malty, but not too sweet

No smell – easy to drink – cut grass with no aftertaste – weird!

Butterscotchy – yummy, yummy in my tummy

Dark bitter

Bitter finish with residual sugars; might drink again, but only after finishing everything else

This racked up 91 points to make it the second favourite beer of the evening.

To be continued in another post...