Beer Radar for WBM \u2013 May 2012<\/p>\n
By John Kr\u00fcger<\/p>\n
New beers to wet the whistle<\/p>\n
Over the last month we\u2019ve been trying out some absolutely cracking beers from some well renowned small brewers around the world. We wouldn\u2019t recommend them if we weren\u2019t buying them regularly and loving every last drop.<\/p>\n
Our first selection are fine examples of why the Kiwi\u2019s are ringing our hop loving bells. We haven\u2019t chosen the more offensive IPA\u2019s and brutally hoppy beers, but hop freaks will still enjoy these pilsners with a difference.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Tuatara<\/strong> – Pilsner<\/p>\n It\u2019s a pilsner with the volume turned up to NZ craft beer levels. It\u2019s clean, bitingly hoppy yet not too crazy. Saaz hops would make the Czech\u2019s proud of this one. Traditional roots and techniques keep this beer in the right place. So easy to drink but nowhere near the typical commercial bland pilsners.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Croucher<\/strong> – Pilsner<\/p>\n Just when you thought that fizzy lagers had died a bland flavourless death in a dark hole somewhere, Croucher come out with this beauty. Sharp like a whip crack, fresh and bright. Fresh hops add a load of flavour but the biscuity malts balance out the NZ Motueka and Riwaka hops perfectly. It well and truly passes the session test, and we\u2019re happy to keep testing it.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Vale<\/strong> – IPA<\/p>\n A new release with a bright red label. It\u2019s not a brutal beer but it ticks all of the IPA boxes. It\u2019s rich and malty with some darker malt complexity. There\u2019s still a well thought out selection of hops; Citra, Galaxy and Nelson Sauvin, providing a nice range of flavours without being too harsh and resiny. It\u2019s big, but it\u2019s not too hard to down a few. The Vale IPA has been available on tap for a little while now, but the bottled version is now out there and becoming quite a popular beer.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Little Creatures<\/strong> \u2013 The Quiet American<\/p>\n An unusual hybrid from the superstars of beer in Western Australia. We\u2019ve never seen one before, which might explain the name. Simply put, it\u2019s a hoppy Belgian strong ale, but this isn\u2019t a simple beer. The Belgian yeast gives this beer estery, spicy characters. Belgian candied sugar additions top the alcohol up to 7.2%abv which gives a hint of hot alcohol. New season US Cascade and Chinook hops bound out of the glass with citrus peel and pine resin flavours and aromas. It\u2019s challenging, it\u2019s weird, and it\u2019s certainly worth trying.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Lobethal<\/strong> – Double Hopped IPA<\/p>\n Alistair Turnbull, owner and brewer at Lobethal Bierhaus has tweaked his IPA to new levels. He\u2019s doubled the hops to double the fun. This is a big hoppy beer that\u2019s still very drinkable. Crystal malts give it quite a dark rich colour and flavour but there\u2019s plenty of hops to balance out the malt sweetness. An extra addition of hops to the bright tank give an extra layer of resiny hop character with a bucketload of hop aroma wafting from the beer. This is the kind of beer that you can taste the next morning if you have more than one pint. It\u2019s becoming a very popular beer with the beer nerds, which might explain why we keep seeing the little Lobethal ute delivering kegs all the time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Beer Radar for WBM \u2013 May 2012 By John Kr\u00fcger New beers to wet the whistle Over the last month we\u2019ve been trying out some absolutely cracking beers from some well renowned small brewers around the world. We wouldn\u2019t recommend them if we weren\u2019t buying them regularly and loving every last drop. Our first selection … Continue reading Wet The Whistle<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-beer","category-craft-beer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=126"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":127,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126\/revisions\/127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beerradar.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}