Beach Brew

I have not made one of these for a while and want to get a couple of brews away that are pretty quick. An adaptation of my my first one that got a second at SABSOSA a couple of years ago. It looks pretty much like this:

84% Baird’s Marris Otter
4% Thomas Fawcett Chocolate
12% Dark Brown Sugar
Magnum at 60 minutes to 27IBU
Wyeast 1318 London3

OG 1.044
FG 1.011

38.2 EBC

I haven’t made this in ages so am looking forward to having some around. Need to start thinking about a Kolsch for ANAWBS too.

After the ambiguity I emailed the BJCP, who got back to me very quickly, to ask if my 70% result would qualify me for the certified level with appropriate experience. Less than 15 minutes later I received clarification that my exam score did qualify for certified. All I can say is that I am relieved and impressed with the responsiveness of the BJCP and in particular Susan Rudd, the exam administrator.

While we are on the subject the feedback from the exam was great. It pointed out many flaws in my knowledge. Many of these were from taking the exam for the first time and not knowing exactly what to expect and also being very short on time. My first style question I wrote far to much on and lacked time for other questions. The markers identified this flaw. That is experience I guess. The feedback they give is spot on and really helpful. Though I now wish I could say yes I know that I just ran out of time. Given the chance I may take the exam again. Armed with experience I think I would do much better.

In this post. I thought I had achieved a high enough result to reach the certified level. Turns out the information is different in the exam study guide to what is in t members guide. In the study guide it states you need a minimum score of 70% for certified, this is the score I got in the exam, but in the member guide it states you need a score above 70%. So I am not certified and can only ever be recognised. Such is life. It does suck to miss by 1% though.

I tasted my steam beer for the first time last night. It has only been in the bottle for a week so it is very young at this point. However the beer is crystal clear. That 2112 yeast certainly floccs out well. It is a little too pale for the style but this was by design. It is very active and foamed up a fair bit in the glass but did not taste over carbonated. It poured a nice size head. I am worried about this becoming over carbonated though. At bottling there was more C02 in solution than I expected so I cut back the priming but I think it may still be a little high. I the beer sat at 15C for a week after fermentation had finished and then I brought it up to 15C for 24 hours after lagering. Looks like I may need to make that longer in future.

The aroma was great just a slight hint of hops and maybe a little fruit. A general malt character but nothing that stood out to me. The taste was very clean with some light malt and a little fruit and yeast characters. Very clean and dry. It had a little sweetness that I believe may be due to the fact that it has not finished bottle conditioning. There is a definite hop character but not as strong as I was hoping for. The Northern Brew I had was not the freshest in the world. I will make sure I have some nice fresh hops next time I make this, which will be very soon.

All in all it is tasting pretty good but is still a bit young. I look forward to trying it again in a week or two and hope I have not stuffed the carbonation.

I had a couple of bottles from other micros while in Melbourne. To qualify these came from a local bottle shop so may not have been the freshest and best looked after beer in the world. These are both being written a few days after the actual tasting so there are probably a number of inaccuracies.

First up was the 3 Ravens Blond Ale. Apparently this is supposed to be a Alt. Not really an Alt in my opinion but it may make the style guides roughly. Despite a very careful pour this came out very cloudy. The beer was also very lively in the glass and looked not dissimilar to a soft drink. Despite this the beer poured with no head at all. The beer had a reasonably fruity nose with a little malt. The flavour was not what I woudl expect from an alt. It was quite fruity and reasonably sweet. It did not have the dry finish or the bitterness one would expect of an alt. It was also very highly carbonated. To the point where it was prickly on the tongue. So not a terrible beer but certainly not what you would expect from an alt.

Holgate Brewhouse Mt Macedon Ale. Their web site says this beer is inspired by Kolsch but adapted with a British Ale yeast and American hops. So really at the end of the day it has little resemblance to a Kolsch. That aside I will review the beer. This beer also appeared quite lively on pouring but was crystal clear even when the entire bottle was poured(this is bottle conditioned). It had very little head. The aroma was a little malt and just a touch of hops. Some traces of honey also, but clean. On tasting there was a delicate malt profile with a little fruitiness. The hop smack the brewer talks about was not there but there is a light citrus flavour in the finish. This was also a very sweet beer but probably what the brewer was aiming for. All round an enjoyable beer with out having the grin factor.

A quick run down of our small pub crawl through Melbourne.

First stop was the James Squire Brew House at the Portland Hotel. We got in just before lunch time so were able to get a good spot. Unfortunately the Speculator was off again. It seems every time I visit that the speculator has just gone off. I had a pint of the highway man. Not a bad drop. Nothing sensational but a good beer. The same couldn’t be said for the food. I had some very ordinary chilly squid. The place has a good atmosphere and is worth a stop and a few beers.

Next we were going to go to the St Arnou cafe in Lt collins St. However it was a couple of blocks further than I could be bothered walking at this point. The St Arnou beers I have had in the past have been ok but nothing that you would rave about. So we skipped this one and headed for Transport in Federation Square.

So at Transport. The place has a decent beer list. The usual imports you can get anywhere. They also have a good selection of local micros. I ordered a Red Oak Pale and Claire selected a Red duck Amber. The guy behind the bar had no idea. First he asked if we wanted glasses. Then he served as completely inappropriate glassware. The place is just a huge empty concrete cavern. It is completely soul less and has no atmosphere to speak of. We sat out side and had our beers. Mine had obviously not been treated well. After all I have heard about Red Oak beers I was expecting something great. However, what I was served was a long way from fresh. It was oxidized and lifeless and nothing like what I had expected. After this experience we decided to move on to Bells in South Melbourne.

Bells is a small brew pub. It has a bunch of taps including a couple of their own beers. I had heard good things about the place so was looking forward to it. We walked down to Bells from Transport to work up a thirst and some beer credits. About a 40 minute walk down there along St Kilda Rd which was pleasant enough.

From the outside Bells was not what I expected. Just looked like a regular suburban pub. Inside it was pretty much the same with little evidence of a brewery or even them trying to push their own beer. At the bar we asked for a menu of their beers. They didn’t have one so the guy told us about their beers, well he tol us what style they were. He missed two of them.

I decided to start off with their bitter and Claire had the wheat beer. We ordered pints and ended up with 330ml glasses. Not quite what we were after. The beer it’s self was very cloudy and didn’t look particularly appetising. No aroma to speak of. It didn’t get any better in the drinking either. The beer was under attenuated, sweet and appears to have been fermented at very high temps with a very ordinary yeast. The wheat was also bland.

They said they had a bock so I thought I would give that a go as I really like the style. What I was served was nothing like a bock. It was very pale, could have been a Mai Bock but that is not what they called it, it was incredibly fruity and not lager like at all. There was little to no malt character and none of that rich Munich malt flavour you expect from a bock. This wasn’t even a lager and wasn’t very drinkable.

Bells was a very disappointing experience. I was really looking forward to this small brew pub but unfortunately it just didn’t live up to my expectations. I would recommend avoiding this place.

We now got a taxi down to the Royston Hotel in Richmond. Things started turning around at this point. They have a good selection of micros on tap and it has a great atmosphere, even at 1600 in the afternoon with only a couple of people in there. We stopped here for a pint and a snack. I had a Hargreaves Hill Pale and Claire had a wheat from a Victroian Micro. The Hargreaves I had had before but it’s still a good drop. Probably a little less hoppy than last time I had it but it tasted cleaner and better made. However this was probably 18 months ago so I don’t really trust my memory completely on that. The wheat beer that Claire had was great. I’m not a big wheat beer fan but it had everything you would expect from a good heffe weiazen. The dips were really good too. I highly recommend this spot. It is s good warm up for visiting the Mountain Goat Brewery which open at 1700 on a Friday.

Obviously our next stop was the Mountain Goat Brewery. We were here at the right time. They currently have their limited edition double IPA on tap. This is a great drop. According to the guys it is all amarillo and Simcoe hops. This is very similar to an IPA I have just made. Mine is a little higher in alcohol and a bit more hoppy than theirs. It is a great IPA and well balanced despite the fact that it is highly hopped. The only down side to this one was that they would only serve schooners/pots. They said it was due to the high alcohol content, 7.5%, but I think it probably had more to do with the fact that it is a limited supply.

We also had the IPA and the hightail while we were there. All were tasting great fresh at the brewery. They had a really good atmosphere and some good looking pizzas, which we didn’t try. They did look good though. This was the highlight of the day with great beer and a really good spot. I can’t recommend a visit highly enough.

After a few pints here we headed into China town and had some food and a couple of Tsing Tao’s. Not the worst beer of the day but far from the worst too. Food was good though.