Tag Archives: Belgian ale

The Trappist Dance Card

A Full Trappist Dance Card
A Full Trappist Dance Card

I’ve struggled for a while to come up with a similie for this. It might be the Beer Geek equivalent of an Adventure Freak climbing Everest and swimming the Channel in one weekend. Or, in Geek terms, of watching a whole season of The Wire in one sitting — with the commentary on, rather than the audio, or playing Sam & Max Hit the Road right through from memory without getting stuck. What I mean to say is: we pulled off a rather special Nerd Milestone, and it was bloody marvellous.

The big Belgian abbey ales are rightfully famous, particularly those made at the Trappist monasteries — the number of which in the brewing game has varied over the years, but currently stands at seven. And I’d venture to say that a good majority of Proper Beer Geeks haven’t had one of each in their ‘career’ — owing largely to the scarcity of Westvleteren, especially — let alone all in one night.1 It was way too much fun. The group I did this for / with had been doing occasional tastings at Malthouse for about two years and we’d mentioned the possibility of this a few times before. Finally, we got all our ducks in a row. I was almost-embarrassingly giddy with excitement and was way too distracted with hosting and tasting duties to take proper notes. Thankfully, one of the group acts as “scribe” for the choicest and weirdest comments; he’s planning on doing a blog post of his own about it, so I’ll share that when I can.

— La Trappe Bockbier

We started with La Trappe, partially since they were only relatively recently ‘let back in’ to the Authentic Trappist fraternity, after a brief falling-out over them contracting-out too much of the work. The only non-Belgian brewing monastery (being from just over the Northern border, in the Netherlands), their stuff is now pretty damn ubiquitous (they are the largest producer, though only by about 20% over Chimay and Westmalle) but we managed to find this one, a bock not normally seen on local shelves — it gets Double Bonus Uniqueness Points for being the only Trappist lager. It made for a nice start, an excellent point of comparison (since doppelbock is, broadly, the German cousin of the famous Belgian abbey ales), and a pleasant autumn sipper all on its own. To me, it just seemed like proper doppelbock; rich with a date-ish fruit flavour, and packing a strangely not-unwelcome mustiness.

La Trappe Bockbier
La Trappe Bockbier
La Trappe cap
La Trappe Bockbier, bottlecap

— Achel ‘8’ Blond

From the biggest to the smallest producer — and the one which, in my experience, most Beer Nerds have particular trouble remembering when they try to list off the Trappists. Adding to the ease with which it slips the memory, Achel only got back into the beer-making game in 1998. The Germans had looted / salvaged their brew gear in the First World War and they never fully recovered until, in a rather-charming move, they were helped back onto their feet by Westmalle (the monastery from which their founding monks originally came) and Rochefort (a monastery founded by their own monks in turn). This was a zesty, charming blond/e (depending on your preference), somehow sweet and dry all at once. It did seem odd that a re-founded-in-the-nineties brewery would be so old-school in their packaging, though, but maybe the point was to hark right back to the early 20th Century. I did feel extra peculiar taking a photo of a blank white bottlecap — but I couldn’t not get the full set, once I’d started.

Achel ‘8’ Blond
Achel ‘8’ Blond
Achel ‘8’ Blond, bottlecap
Achel ‘8’ Blond, bottlecap

— Orval

Orval. Just “Orval”. Weirdly, for a bunch of Catholic monks, there’s no uniformity in the naming of each monastery’s different beers. There are abritrary-ish numbers, colours, and the single-double-triple ladder. Orval has no need for that, and their sole commercial2 beer screams uniqueness in other ways, too; it’s dosed-up with the usually-wild and usually-meticulously-avoided Brettanomyces yeast, something which lends flavours often described as ‘barnyardy’ or ‘saddle-ish’. If you look up the chemistry of these things, you’ll see that ‘Band-aids’ and ‘antiseptic’ are also listed among the commonly-evoked sensations — and they were very-much the lead roles in the one other bottle I’ve had of this, some time ago. Not so much that it was rendered unpleasant, but enough to make me a little anxious; nervous to have another in front of company. But damn, it was delicious. Still very different, but gorgeously sherberty and dry and zippy and delightful. A lot of that is probably down to it being conspicuously fresh, which usually means that the hoppiness is still quite forceful and the Brett-ish funk hasn’t ramped up much yet. There’s no need to necessarily fear an older bottle, though; consensus seems to be that it ages in waves — there must be some dizzyingly-complex chemistry going on, as different yeast strains play off against each others’ work over time — so the scary-chemical side comes and goes. It’s a dice roll, for sure. But a totally worthwhile one.

Orval
Orval
Orval, bottlecap
Orval, bottlecap
Orval, freshness
Orval, freshness

— Westmalle Tripel

Speaking (as I was, above) of naming systems: Westmalle’s one is strangely influential outside Trappist circles. Their original “Enkel, Dubbel, Tripel” approach named their beers according to their positions on an ascending scale of strength — the words, perhaps obviously, simply mean “single, double, triple” although “first, second, third” is probably more in the spirit, since their Tripel wasn’t necessarily three times boozier than their Enkel. Eventually, though, the second two words came to connote not just strength but also the particular character of Westmalle’s beers — their Dubbel happens to be dark, their Tripel is golden. So a ‘Tripel’ is no longer just your third-strongest beer (whoever you are); it should really be one like Westmalle’s. And speaking of that, we found it quite confrontingly gunpowdery — the flowery perfume quickly giving way to a hot taste. Perhaps owing to its relative lightness, it wore its high strength the perhaps most prominently of our set. I’m kind of sad to note this — but it must be true of one of the group, after all — but this was probably the least-well-received beer of the night. In the company it was in, that’s not the bad thing it could be, of course; is there such a thing as “praising with faint damn”?

Westmalle Tripel
Westmalle Tripel
Westmalle Tripel, bottlecap
Westmalle Tripel, bottlecap

— Westvleteren ‘12’

Maybe the anticipation and then overshadowing of this had something to do with the consensus on the Westmalle… This is far-and-away the hardest-to-get Trappist. They produce fractionally more than Achel but have charmingly-peculiar purchasing regulations in place — though the rumour of a mandated Oath to the Pope that you wouldn’t on-sell what you buy is disappointingly false; they instead just print a discreet “Do not resell” plea on your receipt. Between the brewery gate and this end of the World, the price skyrockets in a way that definitively proves demand: we bought two bottles for NZ$60 each, which was us getting a good deal with which we were delighted. But demand isn’t the point for the monks at Westvleteren. Trappist monasteries are obliged (as a matter of doctrine) to be ‘productive’ in some commercial way to support themselves and some charitable works, and one assumes that the bigger brewing operations (like Westmalle and Chimay) are rationalised on the grounds that more money equals more charity. Westvleteren don’t go in for that, brewing only enough to “be able to afford being monks”. Hell, they don’t even spring for labels, instead cramming all the legally-required text onto the bottlecap. Now that’s frugal.

Despite (and probably partially because of) their protestations and reluctance, though, their beer is legendary. Which always brings that peculiar sort of nervousness to your first encounter with it, when you’re never sure how much of the Emperor’s New Beer phenomenon might be propelling the mystique or quite how you’ll ‘come out’ as not liking it, if you don’t. But damn, I had no such worries with this. I can honestly say that it didn’t remotely disappoint; it was stunning and wonderful and everything I wanted it to be. It took me ages to take my first taste, because the aroma was just bloody lovely enough. My feeble notes list chocolate and fruit characters and a definite Weet-bix-ish / Milo-ish maltiness. Which doesn’t come close to capturing anything. Suffice to say I’d happily go in on another sixty-dollar bottle. And I earn even less money than you probably think.

Westvleteren ‘12’
Westvleteren ‘12’
Westvleteren ‘12’, bottlecap
Westvleteren ‘12’, bottlecap
Westvleteren ‘12’, bottlecap (again)
Westvleteren ‘12’, bottlecap (again)

— Rochefort ‘10’

And then we threw this into a massively unfair Tough Act to Follow situation, but it performed very well, bless its pretty blue bottlecap. Rochefort ‘10’ is the biggest of their three, which are all essentially rungs on a ladder of heftiness, rather than a trio of distinct varieties — in choosing their classification scheme, they’ve opted for a combination of seemingly-abritrary numbers with colour-coded caps. (My math might be off here, but I suspect that their ‘6’, ‘8’ and ‘10’ are references to ABW — alcohol by weight, rather than the more-usual alcohol by volume.) It was really delightful, and an interesting point of comparison between the previous and the next of our set. We really liked the winey, porty, sour-fruity character and while there was some malt in the aroma there wasn’t really any chocolate flavour in the taste, at least compared to the Westvleteren. My notes record us as comparing it to a bottle of Cab Sav that you left open and forgot about for days, but you liked enough / were thirsty enough that you just thought ‘fuck it; I’ll have it anyway’ — or an overloaded fruit bowl that you find on the turn after coming home from holiday. In a good way, you understand.

Rochefort ‘10’
Rochefort ‘10’
Rochefort ‘10’, bottlecap
Rochefort ‘10’, bottlecap

— Chimay ‘Bleue’

And finally, the last slot on our Dance Card went to an old friend. The Blessed Blue was certainly my first exposure to Trappist beer, and I’ve really never tired of it. Also, naturally, there’s the consideration that by this point of the evening we should probably be sticking to things more familiar than exotic if we’re to be remotely fair. Judging by the timing of the similies involving near-rotten fruit bowls with the Rochefort above, we got that about right. After six varied and powerful beers, though, this still held its own. Compared to the two which preceded it, its body was considerably lighter (reflected also in the drop in strength from 10.2% and 11.3% down to ‘just’ 9%), and the port-winey-ness milder than what you get in the Rochefort, but the spiciness came more to the front of the stage and put on a hell of a show. In the end, since we are at the end, there is a damn good reason that Chimay Blue is a classic.

Chimay 'Bleue'
Chimay 'Bleue'
Chimay 'Bleue', bottlecap
Chimay 'Bleue', bottlecap
Chimay 'Bleue', instructions
Chimay 'Bleue', instructions
Trappist Dance Card, bottlecap trophies
Trappist Dance Card, bottlecap trophy collection
Diary II entry #83, The Trappist Dance Card
Diary II entry #83, The Trappist Dance Card

1: “Dance Card” isn’t too foreign / old-timey an expression, is it? Such things really did exist — in some wonderfully weird forms — and something about the phrase just stuck in my head while planning this.
2: Like the other Trappists, Orval also make a patersbier (charmingly known as Petit Orval) for the consumption of the monks themselves. Much lighter in the booze department, these things are usually restricted to the monastery (and the obligatory adjacent tourist-distracting café / gift shop). Since I’ve finally knocked off this milestone, and since I have a longstanding Midstrength Obsession, I’m dead keen to try them. I’ll have to put a nigh-impossible Patersbier Dance Card on my To Do List.

Yeastie Boys ‘Blondie: Rapture’

Yeastie Boys 'Rapture'
Yeastie Boys 'Rapture'

As much I was enjoying the relative novelty of a Friday Night Off, I was also having a Bit Of A Day. The Gonzo and the writing helped somewhat, but when I returned to the Malthouse and saw that a few tap beers had run out, necessitating a fridge shuffle, I volunteered to sort it out. A dose of Kegtris — with its unique combination of heavy lifting, organising things into neat piles, and near-zero temperatures — is always good for my Zen, peculiar creature that I undoubtedly am.

Colin (the Overboss) was grateful for the Free Labour, and so offered to make it Slightly Not Free by shouting me a pint of the just-tapped ‘Rapture’ as reward when I finished. And it made for a lovely after-exertion restorative.

Whereas its crisp-and-snappy ‘Europa’ version was brewed with a ‘clean’ German Kölsch yeast, ‘Rapture’ was fermented with a Belgian abbey yeast and its light body of mild malt and understated hops provides a perfect showcase for just exactly what sort of difference that choice entails. It’s very easy-going, but delightfully interesting; the funkiness from the yeast is in no way overbearing or confrontingly odd, it’s just quirky fruity goodness. Flavour-wise, it put me in mind of some sort of halfway-hybrid of Tuatara ‘Ardennes’ and Yeastie Boys’ previous Belgian-esque brew ‘Plan K’, although it has a lighter body than either of those.

‘Europa’ was pretty damn tasty, but if I had to choose between Blondies, I’d go with this. The sheer interestingness of a much-lighter-than-usual Belgian ale — the usual stereotype of Belgian brews being rather hefty isn’t universally accurate, but it’s the stereotype for good reason, nonetheless — earns ‘Rapture’ quite a few points with me.

Verbatim: Yeastie Boys ‘Rapture’ 11/3/11 on tap @ MH, reward for a (necessary) day-off dose of Kegtris. The second of the ‘Blondie’ pair of summer ales, this time with a Belgian abbey yeast. The lightness of the base really lets the unique yeasty flavours dance arond a little. Not all crisp + snappy like its sister, smooth, quirky fruitiness instead. Really rather fun. Massively reminds me of something, but I’m struggling to spot what… Not Ardennes or Plan K — but maybe their bastard daughter? Not overpoweringly funky, just easily so. And I’ve just unexpectedly landed on a nicely odd food match: Vintage Cheddar & Red Onion Kettle Chips (i.e., Purple Chips). The easy-going funkiness is in them, too. I am so fucking low-brow, sometimes.

Yeastie Boys 'Rapture', Hashigo tap badge
Yeastie Boys 'Rapture', Hashigo tap badge
Yeastie Boys 'Rapture'
Diary II entry #73.1, Yeastie Boys 'Rapture'
Yeastie Boys 'Rapture'
Diary II entry #73.2, Yeastie Boys 'Rapture'

8 Wired ‘Hopwired’ (Saison yeast)

8 Wired 'Hopwired', Saison yeast edition
8 Wired 'Hopwired', Saison yeast edition

Just when we got a couple of kegs of the ever-delightful Hopwired back in at work, I heard that Hashigo had a keg of an experimental Saison-yeast variation. Which sounded like a prime opportunity for ‘Science!’. I jokingly suggested to Dave that we should pour some pints, brave the Liquor Ban and meet halfway for a side-by-side tasting. He found the good plan buried in my nonsense, and brought a little-wee-flagon of the Saison-edition in to me at Malthouse. Bloody marvellous.

And what a fine experiment it was. Hopwired is a fantastic show-off of both brewing know-how and flavourful local hop varieties. Here in the Little Country, we’ve made passionfruity Riwaka hops, lemon-limey Moteuka hops, white-wine-grapey Nelson Sauvin hops — just to pick three that you’ll find in Hopwired, nicely heaped into a big bowl of fruit salad and then thrown, with some vigor, into your face. In a surprisingly-enjoyable way.

Saisons are, generally, light-but-complex, summery ales descended from Belgian farmhouse brews — and one of their unifying features is a certain funk brought on by the particular yeast used. It’s a difficult thing to describe; it’s a bit of a “know it when you see it” situation. Think of that distinctly woods-y, barnyard-y, slightly-too-real scent that the outdoors produces on occasion.

In Hopwired, the yeast softens that hurled-fruit-salad aspect off somewhat, and insinuates oodles of that musty, funky character. Perhaps because Hopwired is a good deal oomphier than the bones of a Saison would ordinarily be, that charmingly-freakish side is firmly in check, though; it doesn’t obnoxiously overwhelm things at all. There’s a wineyness in there too, which was vaguely reminscent of that in Dogfish Head’s stupidly-lovely ‘Midas Touch’ — it didn’t really taste like actual wine; more like what I wish wine was. Altogether a worthy beer, very worthy as an experiment, and a fascinating side-by-side. I’d almost always opt for the original ‘vanilla’ Hopwired myself, if it were down to one or the other, but this was cracking good fun.

8 Wired 'Hopwired': Saison yeast
Diary II entry #71, 8 Wired 'Hopwired': Saison yeast

Verbatim: 8 Wired ‘Hopwired’: Saison yeast 7/3/11 wee flagon gifted from David @ HZ. Experimental batch of the back-on-our-taps-too Hopwired. Smells like Science! Definitely changes the nose; musty + funky, softening off the fruit. Similar things happen in the face. Not scary-funky, just good old-fashioned James Brown funky. Hints of winey / sour flavours, but not too much. Really rather fun, though I would almost always be in the mood for the original.

Duvel ‘Tripel Hop’

Duvel 'Tripel Hop'
Duvel 'Tripel Hop'

Despite my usually-militant middle-class-ness, sometimes you just have to cross the tracks and try something out-and-out posh. Of course, it helps when you can also wrangle two friends into thirdsing the cost with you.

I have some great memories of standard-edition Duvel; it’s probably my most-embarrassing early Diary entry (I noted it down as a lager, for fuck’s sake; the shame, the horror), and it was there again in the early days of the photography-habit, on a bloody marvellous night out. So along comes a variant edition of a beer I already like, with a punny name. Honestly, how the hell was I supposed to resist? I didn’t even try.

And it was lovely, it was. Deliciously fragrant — with tempting wafts of things like vanilla, plum and jasmine — it was one of those beers where actually taking your first sip involved some determination, because just sitting back and enjoying the nose was so good. Thankfully, once you did dip in, the flavour didn’t remotely disappoint. It had all those flavours, given zip and zest by the lively effervescence.

I really should dig out the scan and photo for the Estrella ‘Inedit’ I mention in the Diary entry itself. That was another attempt at a poshified beer complete with a little booklet of notes and history, and was supposedly brewed in collaboration with the chefs at el Bulli, reputedly some superswank 3-Michelin-star restaurant — again, militantly middle-class; I’d never heard of it. But it was pants, it was completely and utterly worthless nonsense. Full of marketing and brandwank, but totally lacking in substance or point or interest. This thing, though, this ‘Tripel Hop’, avoids that problem entirely and basically did justify its price tag.

Verbatim: Duvel ‘Tripel Hop’ 16/2/11 $45/750ml ÷ 3 w/ Peter & Ollie 9.5% Sexy dark version of the labelling; one of this pleasant run of hopified-x, done with class. Utterly gorgeous, pale gold with a big white head. Delicious aroma; vanilla + plum skins and all sorts of goodness. Delicate on the palate with the usual racing bubbles. And I love a good punny name. Compare the included booklet with the Estrella Inedit one (which I rediscovered yesterday, tidying my room) and the latter really is a pile of wank; this one’s nicely done. It’s all jasminny and lush, like some sexy millionairess’ garden.

Duvel 'Tripel Hop' label
Duvel 'Tripel Hop' label
Duvel 'Tripel Hop'
Diary II entry #63, Duvel 'Tripel Hop'

Emerson’s ‘JP’ 2010

Emerson's 'JP' 2010
Emerson's 'JP' 2010

I’d managed to draw the early (3pm start) shift for New Year’s Eve, and the afternoon was nice and quiet for the most part, giving me time to whip around to the other side of the bar and join my friends for a beer. Toby and I couldn’t think of a better First Beer for the day than this, since it had the soon-to-be-dead year in its name, and him and I had shared an earlier vintage back in Melbourne.

The ‘JP’ beers are all different takes on a Belgian style of one sort of other, brewed in honour of J.P. Dufour, who apparently did much to introduce the joys of the beers from his homeland to the local brewing scene. 2010’s edition was a hoppy tripel or Beligianish IPA, depending on your point of view and usual preferences — and it does the hybrid thing very well, much like I remember Green Flash’s ‘Le Freak’ doing.

Wendy commented that it smelled “like a boy’s bedroom”, and I had to totally concede that point and quote her directly. The  ‘funkiness’ you get from Belgian yeast was perhaps met by a certain ‘sweatiness’ that seemed to crop up in some of our hops this year. Which also leads to a nice reminder on the way you can describe a beer in very strange terms — and still like it a lot.

Verbatim: Emerson’s ‘JP’ 2010 31/12/10 and how apt to start the end of a year with a vintage-dated thing. 500ml ÷ 2 with Toby, who shouted. 8.6% Belgian IPA / hoppy tripel. I have to quote Wendy, who said it tastes like a boy’s bedroom. The mustiness is definitely [there], and there’s the heat from the booze. Does the hybrid thing very well. And there was that infamous ‘sweaty’ hop batch this year. Again, it’s odd how you can describe something so weirdly, and still like it very much. The JPs are always good, and interesting, which is half the battle. It’s still nice and civilised in here, but I’m sure that’ll change.

Emerson's 'JP' 2010
Diary II entry #49.1, Emerson's 'JP' 2010
Emerson's 'JP' 2010
Diary II entry #49.2, Emerson's 'JP' 2010

Tuatara ‘X’ Anniversary Ale

Tuatara 'X'
Tuatara 'X'

Still (mysteriously) Wellington’s only local brewery, Tuatara recently arrived at their tenth birthday and celebrated (as breweries understandably tend to do) by making themselves a beer for the occasion. Essentially, they blammed ‘Ardennes’ up a few notches, landing it at a suitably1 anniversary-ish 10%. It debuted at Beervana and was apparently well received, and we had a few bottles in stock at work to plug the gap in between the availability of kegs.

Despite liking ‘Ardennes’, and also heftierBelgianesque beers in general, this just isn’t My Thing at all, which put me in rare disagreement with some usually-similarly-minded folk. But hey, subjectivity, right? For me, it committed the basically unforgivable sin of being just kinda naff; not different enough from Ardennes, other than in the strength — and that strength just rolls all around your face with its syrupy hotness and ruins any real chance for balance, or depth, or character. It’s your birthday, so you should go a bit crazy, but if your only thought for how to go crazy is to effectively pour petrol into one of your existing beers, something is amiss.

And — maybe that strength is to blame — shouldn’t you also make sure all the bolts are tight on an anniversary release? These things arrived with horribly-wonky labels that made you wonder just how dark it was in the warehouse that no one noticed nor cared, and the text on those misapplied labels also shipped with an awesome typo which cited their use of heretofore-unheard-of boble hops.

Tuatara can do great things; when their beers are ‘on’, they are delightful and accessible local takes on iconic styles of beer — although they really need to get around to admitting to themselves (and the rest of us) that their deservedly-popular APA is now part of the family and not a “limited release” as per the label, since it’s been continuously-available for some eight months. But Tuatara are also capable of alarming bits of rushed decision-making, over-stretching (with a side of corner-cutting), and evident narcolepsy at the switch. ‘X’, sadly, is a product of those latter temperaments — which is doubly depressing for a Birthday Beer.

Verbatim: Tuatara ‘X’ Anniversary Ale 2000-2010 19/11/10 10% 750ml shouted by a customer + shared. Essentially an embiggened Ardennes, it’s an over-strong tripel. Similarly dry, Belgish nose, but not alarmingly fumey. Warming in the face, though. Honey-ish, oily texture. Actually oddly ‘normal’, but with that hot, boozy finish.

Tuatara 'X'
Tuatara 'X' and its oddly crinkly label
Tuatara 'X' and its typo
Tuatara 'X' and its rather neat typo
Tuatara 'X'
Diary II entry #37, Tuatara 'X' Anniversary Ale

1: I’ve commented before on the “borderline numerology” trend among brewers, particularly in regard their own anniversaries and such. I remember it initially striking me as evidencing a lack of creativity, but I quickly decided I liked the obsessiveness and nerdery of it.

Gouden Carolus ‘Hopsinjoor’

Gouden Carolus 'Hopsinjoor'
Gouden Carolus 'Hopsinjoor'

An evening of pub-hopping and beer-having had made Kirsten and I rather peckish, so we backtracked a little up Hood Street to a place called Gothenburg, which had caught our eye on our way to House. She picked the food, and I took about ten times as long to pick the beers.

I had missed this ‘Hopsinjoor’ when we had a few bottles at work — we presumably got them from the same place the restaurant did; local (to Hamilton, that is) beer importers Beer Store — so leapt at the chance to have one. Kirsten herself had never had the Westmalle Tripel, and I thought both would go well with the prawns, calamari and anchovy pizza we’d ordered. And go well they did, indeed. I feel I deserve some Beer Matching points for that, but really the bulk of the credit goes to the restaurant for their insanely yumtastic food, and to these rather clever breweries.

The ‘Hopsinjoor’, as the name begins to give away, is a hoppier-than-usual Belgian ale, which has considerable zing thereby added to the nicely dry, complex goodness that is a well-made pale golden strong ale of its type. Trading a few sips for a side-by-side comparison, the extra angles of flavour become really apparent.

Gouden Carolus 'Hopsinjoor'
Diary II entry #31, Gouden Carolus 'Hopsinjoor'

Verbatim: Gouden Carolus ‘Hopsinjoor’ 27/10/10 330ml 8% $14 @ Gothenburg, Hamilton. This place for dinner, and drinks took longer to decide on; I’m guessing that Beer Store are largely to credit for the impressive, Belgian-stuffed beer list. We had this one at work a while ago, but I missed out. It’s a cloudy, pale straw. Big, yeasty nose; not a lot of hops present until you get to the face. There, they give a nice zingy bitterness that is welcome + unusual. Kirsten had the Westmalle Tripel and both have gone ludicrously well with the insanely tasty prawns, calamari + anchovy pizza we went for. Civilised.

Beer 101 Tasting Session

Beer 101 tasting session empties
Beer 101 tasting session empties

George (the gifter of the original Diary) organised a little tasting session at his house for a few friends of ours, with me playing the Informative Nerd. I’ll be the first to admit that I made them all run a bit of a marathon, but we hit most of the Big Styles, did some Interesting Comparisons, and had a whirlwind tour of the Long and Rambling History of Beer.

There’s a lot more variation in beer than there is in, say, wine or whisky, so a fairly zoomed-out overview can go a long way towards making people more ‘conversant’ in the basic styles, why they are what they are, how to figure out what they’re in for by looking at the bottle, and to help people discover what is (and isn’t) Their Thing.

I can’t help but notice, though, that I utterly failed to fulfil Jessie’s request / demand for a “super-awesome” Diary entry. I’m definitely more of an improvisational entertainer than an on-demand one — and that curry was seriously distracting. Especially after all that beer.

Verbatim: Beer 101 10/10/10 I have to write something super-awesome, says Jessie. No pressure. Tasting session & history lesson at George & Robyn’s, with Jessie + Simon + Pip. Great chance to get my nerd on, and evangelise to Robyn. We had: – Wigram Spruce Beer – Hoegaarden – Hofbräu Munchner Weisse – Köstritzer – Pilsner Urquell – Mussel Inn Golden Goose – Tuatara Porter – Invercargill Pitch Black – Emerson’s Bookbinder – Fuller’s IPA – Epic Pale Ale – Three Boys Golden Ale – Chimay Blue – Kriek Boon. And now, George + Pip have wrangled us a curry. Bloody marvellous.

Beer 101 tasting session empties
Beer 101 tasting session empties
Beer 101
Diary II entry #23.1, Beer 101
Beer 101
Diary II entry #23.2, Beer 101

Tuatara ‘Ardennes’

Tuatara 'Ardennes'
Diary II entry #18, Tuatara 'Ardennes'

‘Ardennes’ is one of those beers that I forget about for ages, only to pleasantly surprise myself when I go back to it. In this case, I was cleaning out the fridge one night — as I do; I’ve turned it from a chore into a sport and an artform, and have dubbed it ‘Kegtris’1 — and discovered an unlabelled (and so unsellable) bottle. Since I’d recently had the Golden Bear ‘Bear Trappe’ and ‘Ardennes’ was a candidate for Hopinator treatment, we had a little sampling. Almost certainly inspired by the Golden Bear, my vote was for peaches in the Hopinator, but we eventually went with pears, which did go quite nicely. Part of the fun of these extra-stuff-in-beer experiments is seeing how they change over time, from subtle to sometimes overwhelmingly (but not necessarily unwelcomely) heavily flavoured, depending on the doubtless-very-complex chemistry going on inside that neat little gadget.

Peter and I did try actually eating some of the pears when he was cleaning out the Hopinator after we’d gone through our supply of Ardennes; that was a bridge too far.

Verbatim: Tuatara ‘Ardennes’ 30/9/10 6.5% 330ml ÷ 3 w/ Peter & Amanda. Ages since we’ve had it on tap and there was an unlabelled bottle in a delivery a while ago. It’s a hopinator candidate, and the Bear Trappe made me curious. And it’s really lovely, actually. Big, fruity, dry. I definitely think we should run it over peaches if we Hopify it.


1: A fairly-cursory Google search — a.k.a. “research” — does begin to suggest that I might actually deserve credit for coining this useful word. It’s possible that that’s mostly because I’m just about the only person in the world who enjoys the combination of a) prolonged exposure to zero degrees Celsius, b) heavy lifting (boxes ≈ 16kg, kegs ≈ 65kg), and c) a task that boils down to Organising Things Into Rows and Piles like some kind of gibbering compulsive.


Golden Bear ‘Bear Trappe’ 2010

Golden Bear 'Bear Trappe'
Golden Bear 'Bear Trappe' 2010

I suspected I’d like this; it was recommended by a few people who are usually good for such things (including Kieran, the Beer Wizard in Residence at Regional). But I was pleasantly surprised to utterly freaking love it.

Golden Bear is a tiny little brewery at the top of the South Island — an area charmingly-sprinkled with such neat little operations; it’s a popular area for people to go to drop out of the rat race and do what they love, instead — and a few such people do exactly that and start brewing. The chap from Golden Bear is Californian (the name comes from a symbol for the state), as is my friend and fellow bartender Halena, so I thought I’d split this with her after a shift (much as we’d done with a similarly-fantastic Sierra Nevada ‘Southern Harvest’). I had it all poured and photographed, and then had a minor freak-out when I remembered that I’d lost my pen that night and that all the spares seemed to be blue. I’m very much a Creature of Habit, to the point it borders on being problematic sometimes, and I was hesitant to give in and muck up the colour scheme of Diary II so early. (Diary I has its share of random-pen entries, so I do manage to sort out my priorities, eventually, but they always felt… odd.)

As you can see, it pours a very appealing hazy dark gold and has a pretty damn luxurious big thick white head that is easily resurrected with a little swirl when you’re further down the glass. And you definitely will be swirling it, because you’ll want absolutely all you can get of the insanely lush and fresh fruity nose — helped in part, no doubt, by the brewer’s clever inclusion of actual peaches in the mix. It is, to quote my notes, “just bloody lovely”; absurdly well balanced, delicious, and just different enough.

Golden Bear 'Bear Trappe'
Diary II entry #15, Golden Bear 'Bear Trappe'

Verbatim: Golden Bear ‘Bear Trappe’ 2010 27/9/10 $17 @ Reg. 750ml ÷ 2 with Halena after a Monday shift. (The Californian connection again, after all, like with Sierra Nevada Harvest.) 7.5% Cute punny name, nice big-ass bottle with a nifty re-sealable plastic screwcap thing. Big strong Belgian tripel with actual “black-boy” peaches thrown in, rather than just waiting for the sometimes-peachy note you get. Just bloody lovely. Massive fruity + fresh nose, nice thick white head that’s easily resurrected. Neither too-sweet nor too-tart. And damn, am I glad I had a backup black pen; I was freaking out for a second, there.