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Barons Lemon Myrtle Witbier
Pretty much every time I see a new wheat beer I haven't tried, I buy it and give it a go. Barons is a pretty new little brewery in Sydney but I've been very impressed with their pale ale and ESB, both of which are cropping up more and more around town, on tap in pubs like the Strawberry Hills.
This one, however, was absolutely disgusting. I love wheat beers. The twangier the flavour the better. This tasted like dishwater, when you've used one of those lemon scented dishwashing liquids. Vile.
The lemon myrtle gives a really nasty, artificial lemony flavour, while adding nothing. A squeeze of fresh lemon is a fairly common addition to wheat beers, and perfect to take the banana flavour out of those wheat beers that have been fermented at too high a temperature. The lemon myrtle is nothing like fresh lemon, or even the better lemon imitations. They call it cloudy too. It isn't.
A real opportunity missed. I suspect Barons is going for the export and tourist markets by incorporating bush foods into their beers, but they won't be getting many repeat sales with this one.
I think Australians are starting to learn about wheat beers with real flavour, as opposed to wheat lagers like Redback. They're perfect for the hot Australian Summer, with plenty of depth of flavour without being cloying, and they're hugely refreshing.
The best local one I've found has been Snowy Mountains Brewery's Charlotte's Hefeweizen which is pretty commonly available in the big liquor chains. Incidentally, this brewery is actually based in Crows Nest, Sydney: nowhere near the mountains, but with beer this good I wouldn't complain.
If only James Squire would bring back their spectacular Colonial Wheat!
23 Jan 2008 16:01 [category: /beer] #
Brewing again
Now that the weather has cooled down to reasonable levels, I put a brew on yesterday. Nothing spectacular, a Cooper's Mexican Cerveza kit with a kilo of Cooper's "Brew Enhancer 1". I'm planning to put chillis in some of the bottles when it's all done.
Soon enough I'll have complete temperature control with my beer box, but I'm still working on that.
10 Apr 2007 14:20 [category: /beer] #
The Beer Box
Last night I finished my woodworking course at Sydney Community College (old Leichardt High School). My project was to make a box that will keep my beer fermenter cool, as our house gets to very high temperatures on sunny days.
It's a big box on quite tall legs, which a sliding out removable front panel and lift-out top. The design allows me to bottle the beer without moving the fermenter, which keeps the yeast from getting in the bottle.
I'm planning to line the inside with expanding spray foam. Cooling will be provided by a Peltier effect thermo-electric cooler controlled by this kit. Since I'm already cooling, I figure I can experiment with proper lager fermenting temperatures over the winter too!
Photos shortly.
04 Apr 2007 10:32 [category: /beer] #
Homebrew shop in Newtown
I've just paid a visit to my homebrew shop in Newtown and I'm quite impressed. They're very nice guys and very knowledgable. Served me a lovely example of their brews too.
Just about to put a wheat beer on, using some Wyeast Belgian Wit yeast. I just hope the temperature inside our house is going to be okay for the beer.
I also bought one of those bottle trees, so I can drain bottles more efficiently. I fucking hate bottling, so I also took a look at their pretty keenly priced kegging kits. It's a big leap though, with quite a bit of expense between the keg, CO2 canister, connectors and spare fridge. Matt reckons he's gonna go to keg soon, so I'm keen to see how it goes.
13 Jan 2007 13:50 [category: /beer] #
Crown Seal Longnecks
Coopers have gone back to using crown seal caps for their longneck bottles. This is a real boon for homebrewers, who for some years haven't been able to buy anything but imported beer that can be refilled. For those of you from overseas, a longneck is a 750ml beer bottle over in these parts.
In other brewing news, I picked up my homebrew stuff at Big W today. It's amazing the difference between homebrew kit in Oz and the UK. A Coopers kit costs £9 in the UK. Here it costs $10. In an ordinary store, not a specialist homebrew shop. That's more than half the price. I'll start my first brew tomorrow.
