Homebrew Review: Highetbrau

Good beer comes in many shapes and sizes, and just like a lot of things making your own can be even more rewarding and enjoyable than the commercial stuff. Highetbrau have been in the beer making game for a couple of years now - starting like so many homebrewers with pre-hopped malt and adding sugar. But good beer doesn't just mix itself up like cordial and brewer Jason Highet quickly moved on to crafting his own ales. And what wonderful ales they are!

It today's world of mass produced lagers and commercial craft beers it's easy to forget that the technical process of brewing beer is relatively simple. Boil malt, add hops, pitch yeast and wait. The real trick is in the detail. Highetbrau follow that simple ethos and it's the attention to detail where Highetbrau beer shines. Every brewer knows that cleanliness is next to beeriness and Jason is logical and methodical when it comes to preparing both his beer and his equipment.

You can find out more about Jason's philosophy over at booze bros, but for now I'll just straight into the good stuff. Today I tried 3 beers, Amberbier, Feijoabier and Darkbier.

First the Amberbier. Well it lives up to it's name and it's certainly Amber, as well as being impressively clear for a homebrew. Being an Amber Ale there is tremendous breadth in what the beer might be like, but there's really only one way to find out... There are lovely nutty and caramel aroma's with hints of citrus. The taste is full of caramel and grains with the distinctive bitter sticklebract hops finish lingering. Delicious and very easy drinking!

Then it was time for the Feijoabier. Very pale and tantalisingly cloudy. Clearly it's aroma is of feijoa but what's impressive here is that it smells like it was picked yesterday, fresh and sweet smelling. On the taste, the first thing you notice is light smooth texture with wonderful sparkling effervescence, then comes the feijoa taste which reveals a nice and light malty finish. Incredibly refreshing and this makes me hunger for warm sunny summer afternoons.

Then we meet the Darkbier. The aroma is classic porter - chocolate malt and coffee. In the mouth it definitely has the lighter body of a porter but quite surprisingly the rich depth of flavour that you might usually associate with a bigger stout. Subtle and effective hints of the chocolate malts and a lovely dry finish. 

All up, these beers are fantastic. They all have unique characteristics both reassuring of style and showing the spirit of experimentation that many craft brewers strive for.  

She's Crafty

Craft beer is a growing market in NZ, partially thanks to a renewed interest in brewing as an art, partly because the quality of craft beers has risen dramatically over the past few years with innovators and experimenters testing the limits of what a beer can be. Yeastie Boys from Invercargill take even the modern adventurous craft beer spirit to a new level.

Yeastie Boys famously bring a breadth of tasting experience to their beers, and though I've only sampled a couple at this point it's clear that they work hard to achieve the subtle balances that make good beer great. Their approach to brewing is challenging and rewarding, as is their entire approach to the industry. As far as I'm aware, no other brewer has produced an "open source" beer. Yep thats right, if you're inclined you can make it for yourself. Crafty indeed. Not only that but such kiwi beer alumni as Beer for a Year think pretty highly of the official version too!

Today I'm drinking one of their seasonal releases: Red Rackham.

It's a Belgian Red with a pretty big point of difference. Dark red to amber colour, herbaceous, spice and red stone fruit aromas as well as the obligatory maltiness you'd expect. Mouthfeel is impressive, full and prefectly sparkling... then theres the flavour. Knowing what I know about Belgian beers I was expecting rich malty frutiness. But thats not where the complex flavours stop, there's nuttiness, summer fruits, and something estery from the yeasts, then you get the unexpect twist of bitterness. Something a bit out of the ordinary for a Belgian style beer but something amazing none-the-less!

What do beer and oatmeal have in common

Actually not much but this great image the The Oatmeal should help clear that right up.

Three Pale Ales and One DJ

I was feeling quite thirsty on Saturday, so I decided to have my own little beer tasting. I've spent a lot of time with the darker ales of late so it seemed like time to explore something different. Enter the "Three Pale Ales and One DJ" tasting. OK so there wasn't really a DJ.

First up, Epic Pale Ale. I can still remember being blown away when I first tasted this. It was one of the first craft beers widely available in supermarkets and back then as an uneducated Lager drinker it rocked my world. This is quite possibly the first Pale Ale I ever tried. Wow. The label doesn't lie - it does indeed just taste bigger.

The nose is all citrus with a bit of caramel, the colour is the most appetising of bright gold, then the taste. BANG Hops. Fruity Hops. Crystal sharp taste and that lovely lingering bitterness. Yes, Epic Pale Ale is all good.

Next out of the gate, Wigram Mustang Pale Ale. It might be that I did this tasting in the wrong order, but I kind of expected more from this. Granted, the style is intended to be American Pale Ale, but to my mind the differences should only be in the hops flavour and Epic uses US hops.

So maybe it's me but first whiff and a distinct something missing. Nice chocolate malts, but not really any hops up front. Not to be put off I pushed on. Colour was slightly muddier than I like a Pale Ale, but again, nothing too amiss and the colour is easily representative of a clever malt mix right? On to this sipping. There they are! The hops flavour starts coming through, unfortunately instead of the crisp fruity American hops I'm expecting, I get the earthy subdued flavour of UK Fuggles or something fairly similar. This might have been a passable bitter, but as an APA I feel a bit let down.

Now comes the stars of the show. I recently discovered that a local bottle shop stocks a fine, fine range of craft beers, including a couple that I've been hearing about for a long while. Last years Epic Hop Zombie was high on my "must sample" list.

What to say: If Wigram didn't meet expectations, Hop Zombie blows them out of the water. I almost think this is something beyond beer, except it most definitely is. Aroma is like the undead, earthy, musty, fruity sweet floral and honey, incredibly pleasant and already promising succulent fluid within. Lovely colour again, gorgeous, light golden as you'd expect from Epic. The taste, it's like they've resurrected hops from the dead, really just unbelievable. It's alsmot sweet but the sweetness doesn't seem to come from the malts - theres really something special about this hops (it's classified) and I'm not at all surprised that Epic are keeping this one close to their chests. Simply put, this is a beer unlike any other and highly delicious.

Good Beer, Bad Name

Wow, I feel like I'm a couple of rounds behind! A bit of disruption has kept me from blogging lately, but not from trying delicious beers so I have a bit of catching up to do. Great beer waits for no man, so I'll do a brief roundup of whats been sipping lately:

Just around the corner from my work is a little beer Mecca, unbeknownst to me until a couple of weeks ago. I would be remiss for not sharing this little secret for those other beer lovers out there. Liquorland on Forrest Hill Road has a pretty impressive collection of craft beers and their chiller and I are now well acquainted.

The plucky go-getters at Boundry Road Brewery have sneakily put no less than 5 rather splendid beers on the market in recent months. I was well aware that they had an IPA in the making, they'd made a rather lot of noise about that, but blow me down if they didn't drop a Porter, and Amber Ale, a lager and a Pilsner too! The former is available in 6 packs, while the latter I've only seen in half litre singles, clearly aimed at the growing beer enthusiast market to compete in the space that Moa, Emersons and countless internationals play in.

I'll focus on the Porter for now, since it's still winter and I'm still loving the Dark Ales (although I've had a couple of very respectable Pilsners and Pale Ales's recently that I'll get to in another post). Named Chocolate Moose (presumably the makers had sampled a couple come naming time!) because of the generous helping of chocolate malts in the making this beer isn't for everything, but it is completely captivating.

Ideal for a cold night with a roaring fire (as pictured) we've got a satisfying thick finish, lovely rich and nearly sweet malt aromas and an intriguing deep chocolate brown. So far Chocolate Moose is living up to it's name. I'm prepared for a unique experience, but the taste... beautifully rewarding, thick body and yes, a whole lot of chocolate. It might not convert a true chocoholic, but as a character beer this little beauty is sure to warm your cockles on a cool night. Like I said, it might not be for everyone, it lacks some characteristics of a good porter, but it makes up for it in other ways. If you're into trying something new, definitely get in there!

Slam Dunkel

Water, Barley, Hops, Yeast. The ingredients list for beer is short but the variety that comes from those four things is vast and inspired. We are told that to make great beer we need the freshest ingredients, the best ingredients. The best beers much like the best meals, are made with attention to these details.

In order to preserve the purity of their beers the Reinheitsgebot was established in one of the birthplaces of beer, Bravaria in 1516. Reinheitsgebot, or "German Beer Purity Law" for short, initially excluded yeast, because it wasn't until after Louis Pasteur revealed the role of micro-organisms in fermentation in the 1800's that yeast was revealed to be an essential part of beer.

German Beer Purity Law, or at least the tradition of it has inspired beer makers ever since and particularly German/Bravarian beermakers which brings us to today's beer: Flensburger Brauerei Dunkel.

Right here we have a classic German Dunkel, which is just any mid strength beer made with darker roasted malts. Made in the classic pop-top bottle giving it a real european feel the beer is a warm reddish brown and much warmer in colour than many northern European Dark Ales. Wonderfully deep aroma with cereal and dough. The taste is rich warm and nutty with a nice light carbonation, a very pronounced cereal with a lingering bitterness.


More balanced than many of it's English counterparts for sure, and the colour is just so inviting on a cool winter's evening. 


It's sparked some interest on the role of yeast in certain beers which I'll look at another time.

Porter vs Stout - the battle continues

When is a Porter not a Porter? What makes a Stout? I see this as a continuum of dark-malted ales that ranges from Mild Ale through to Stout with some convenient and delicious stopovers along the way. But it's the blurring of lines that can be confusing so lets try and clear that up in a rigorous scientific experiment... or really just me tasting two beers.

I realise that I've gone into this before, but it's encouraged some debate amongst fellow beer drinkers, and beer is good and therefore worthy of consideration. Beer is good as we know. Beer can be great and there are a lot of brewers all over the country embracing the noble pursuit of great beer. Harringtons in Christchurch is one such brewery. Like so many microbreweries it's a family run affair that started with a humble range of beers and expanded to produce a wide range of delicious malt and hops goodness. If you haven't sampled their wares yet I'd strongly suggest you make your way to their shop and rectify that.

Without further ado the direct Stout/Porter comparison Clydesdale Dry Irish Stout and Wobbly Boot Porter Ale.

Appearance

Stout: Thick tan head and an impenetrable dark brown to black colour.
Porter: Bigger fluffier head, still brown/black, but slightly less dense

Aroma

Stout: Warm and malty with hints of cocoa and a slightly unsettling metallic characteristic.
Porter: Very similar to the stout if slightly less malty, and maybe some hazelnut.

Taste

Stout: Thick and reassuring, wintery roasted malt and a lovely lingering bitterness that slowly resolved into a deep almost burnt sugar maltiness. Beautifully carbonated. Very nice, complex malts and a dry finish.
Porter: True to style slightly less body and more carbonation than the stout. Much more like a rich dark ale with nutty and bread like maltiness and more than a hint of caramel.

Verdict

They're both excellent but the Porter just nudges ahead due to the balance of complex maltiness and caramel flavours, but that's just my opinion and we're really here comparing two types of beer. The Stout is heavier, thicker and less carbonated and dryer to finish. The Porter is more subtle in it's use of roasted malts, and drinks more like a darker Dark Ale, is less heavy and more carbonated. Traditionally a Stout would be higher alcohol but here both are 5%.

Like I said earlier, it's a continuum of darker coloured Ales made using roasted malt that ranges from Mild Ale through Dark Ale and Porter and ends with Stout. Yes the lines are blurred but it's rewarding to try and make the distinction.