{"id":1172,"date":"2010-12-22T00:01:27","date_gmt":"2010-12-21T11:01:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/?p=1172"},"modified":"2011-03-02T15:20:18","modified_gmt":"2011-03-02T02:20:18","slug":"croucher-hef-et-al","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2010\/12\/22\/croucher-hef-et-al\/","title":{"rendered":"Croucher ‘Hef’, Burleigh ‘Hef’ and Red Hill Wheat Beer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Croucher<\/a>
Croucher 'Hef', et. al.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I’m not crash-keen on wheat beers. I mean, I do like several of them very much (Three Boys Wheat is a stand-out example), but I’m rarely quite<\/em> in the mood — if I want something this light, I usually reach for a golden ale<\/a>. But that’s just me. It was a stinking hot day, so I indulged myself in a side-by-side(-by-side); I bought the foremost after the Croucher ‘October’ confusion<\/a>, and had the latter two thanks to my Australian friend Glenn and his duty-free allowance.<\/p>\n

I also couldn’t help but put two identically-named beers against each other. I’d have thought that the hefeweizen \/ Hugh Hefner joke was a common one, but I could only find two others on BeerAdvocate.com.1<\/sup> I’m torn, deciding a winner on that score — Burleigh put a stonking great moustache on the label, which is awesome<\/em>, but I thought the Hef himself was pretty much always clean-shaven, which seems to me like Points Off, then.<\/p>\n

The variance among the three was quite striking and made for a pleasantly-random scattergun sequence of sips from each — although what amounted to three standard-sized regular-strength beers in quick succession did catch up on me in the heat. Croucher’s was the darkest, tending towards banana cake<\/em> rather than the habitual-for-hefe fresh banana note. On occasions that side of it seemed too much or just slightly off, but it wasn’t a deal-breaker. Burleigh’s was much more in that ‘classic’ mode with light, fresh fruitiness, and then Red Hill’s threw in what I thought was a pretty noticeable hop sideline — possibly dragging it out of the traditional form, but interestingly so.<\/p>\n

My absolute favourite<\/em> factoid about German-style wheat beers centres on that banana flavour. Learning about how the yeast just coincidentally made that very-familiar ester<\/a> was an early Beer Nerdery moment for me (tutored by my biochemistry-majoring friend Toby, out on the balcony of the original Malthouse with a Tuatara tasting tray), but the best bit<\/em> is that the Germans have been making hefe since long before they ever had bananas imported. So where we normally meet the fruit first and then think that the beer tastes like it, there must’ve been a point in history where Germans would first try this odd exotic fruit and say to themselves “damn, this tastes like wheat beer<\/em>“. How wonderfully odd. I really must try to track down a historical reference.<\/p>\n

\"Croucher<\/a>
Diary II entry #43, Croucher 'Hef' et. al.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Verbatim:<\/strong> Croucher ‘Hef’, Burleigh ‘Hef’ & Red Hill Wheat Beer all 330ml + 5%, latter two from Glenn, so I couldn’t resist a comparison on a muggy day. 22\/12\/10 I should’ve really done a bright sunny day photo, but I’m hiding inside. I wonder how many other tokens of the Hef\/e trope there are… But Burleigh get extra cred for the silly ‘tache on their label. Croucher’s darkest, ambery even, then RH, then Burleigh. Taste + smells go: funky (too much?) banana cakey<\/span>; then lighter, fresher banana: smoother; then light + with a more-present hop sideline (they grow their own Tettnanger @ RH). This is basically science now, right? Amelia’s right that Croucher’s cakeyness is as if the cake has been in the sun too long — a slightly past-it-ness. I’m still not entirely a wheat beer guy, but they do have their place — hot days. Which I usually just try to avoid entirely. And then, nearly a litre of wheat beer inspired some Proper Science; a 3:2:1 blend. Turned out superchoice.<\/p>\n

\n

1: And even then — one (‘Head High Hef’ from Breakwater Brewing) hardly seems an overt reference, and the other (‘The Hef’ from Gardner Ale House) isn’t even made any more. More are quite-possibly lurking on RateBeer.com, but my advanced-search-fu was insufficient to bring them out.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m not crash-keen on wheat beers. I mean, I do like several of them very much (Three Boys Wheat is a stand-out example), but I’m rarely quite in the mood — if I want something this light, I usually reach for a golden ale. But that’s just me. It was a stinking hot day, so … Continue reading Croucher ‘Hef’, Burleigh ‘Hef’ and Red Hill Wheat Beer<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[6,15,14,10],"class_list":["post-1172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-diary","tag-pages","tag-australia","tag-nz","tag-wheat"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":661,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2009\/01\/13\/croucher-pilsner\/","url_meta":{"origin":1172,"position":0},"title":"Croucher Pilsner","author":"Phil","date":"January 13, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"We'd been lucky enough to have this and the Pale (which is further back in the Diaries) on tap at work once, so I already knew I was a fan of this, and it seemed like the perfect consolatory beer after a bit of a Day. It's lovely, really. (They\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Croucher Pilsner","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Croucher-Pilsner-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1118,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2010\/12\/04\/croucher-october-ipa\/","url_meta":{"origin":1172,"position":1},"title":"Croucher ‘October’ IPA","author":"Phil","date":"December 4, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"This totally managed to stump a few people and cause a minor nerd-riot, it did. We had two kegs of it at work, and the first went on through a Hopinator crammed full of mandarins1 -- \u00e0 la the rather-successful batch of fruited-up Twisted Hop IPA we'd previously done. When\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Croucher 'October' IPA","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Diary-2039-Croucher-October-300x285.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":403,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2008\/08\/28\/croucher-pale-ale\/","url_meta":{"origin":1172,"position":2},"title":"Croucher Pale Ale","author":"Phil","date":"August 28, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Verbatim: Croucher Pale Ale, from Rotorua, but with none of that city's usual aromatic downsides. An after-work drink, and a pretty damn good one. It's a little bit Little-Creatures-esque, what with being a pale ale, but not being a thwack in the head with a fistful of hops. More just\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Croucher Pale Ale","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Croucher-Pale-Ale-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1008,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2010\/10\/30\/croucher-pale-ale-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":1172,"position":3},"title":"Croucher Pale Ale","author":"Phil","date":"October 30, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Saturday brought an end to my Hamilton Expedition, but did compensate me with a lovely drive home down State Highway 4 -- I decided I'd done SH1 too often, so thought I'd go around the other side of the Lake. And when I got home, I had a house full\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Croucher Pale Ale","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Croucher-Pale-Ale-500ml-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2115,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2011\/03\/19\/croucher-patriot\/","url_meta":{"origin":1172,"position":4},"title":"Croucher ‘Patriot’","author":"Phil","date":"March 19, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"So here we are again with the 'Black IPA', which I'll just go with calling it for now (the brewery themselves went with 'American Black Ale') and which it seems is cementing itself as quite the trend -- though to take a stab at for how long would be patently\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Croucher 'Patriot', my first proper pint of","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Croucher-Patriot-first-proper-pint-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":983,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2010\/10\/29\/house-on-hood-and-house-croucher-mighty-golden-ale\/","url_meta":{"origin":1172,"position":5},"title":"House on Hood, and House \/ Croucher ‘Mighty’ Golden Ale","author":"Phil","date":"October 29, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Hamilton really does get a bad rap. Frequently from me, I'll freely admit. It just has this big, flat, sprawling bland black hole kind of a feel to it -- especially when you're trying to get through it on your way somewhere else. But there were increasing rumours of Good\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Beer taps at House on Hood","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/House-on-Hood-taps-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1172"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1172\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1182,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1172\/revisions\/1182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}