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| Picture thanks to @epicbeer |
I'M NOT much good with authority. It's something to do with my upbringing my father was in the military and all the yessir-nosir-three bags full sir carry on was a bit much. Uniforms and saluting brought on a rebellious streak. It carried on to boarding school where I was a smart-mouthed little brat, I'm sure. So when someone says do something, my natural inclination is to not.
I was like that when people started talking about FebFast where you're supposed to be all holier than thou and take a month off alcohol.
I tried that once before, going without alcohol for a wellbeing story that appeared in the Sunday Star-Times. I can forgive you for forgetting all about it it was, in fact, a forgettable exercise. Nothing happened, that I could tell. No tangible benefits.
So when various PR people started wittering on about FebFast, which must be for some cause I cannot be bothered looking up, my anti-establishment genes kicked in and I vowed to make February the opposite of FebFast. I'll call it FebFun and drink a different beer every day, including the bonus day of the 29th.
Not that I drink much. One beer a night will do me fine, two or three if it's a Friday night. Not that I'm a big ``everything in moderation'' fan it just seems to suit me to have a little bit on a regular basis.
February 1 started with a Golden Rye Ale from Kaimai Brewing in Tauranga. It's unusual this, because, as the label suggests it is made with malted rye as well as malted barley. Rye was a common brewing ingredient, especially in Bavaria, until 1516 when the Germans came up with their ``purity law'' and declared beer could only be made with malted barley, hops, water and yeast. It's said rye went out of favour because it was an unreliable crop and the German purity law was one way of saying, ``stuff this carry on with rye, let's lock down barley instead''.
Rye gives a grainier texture to beer and the Kaimai golden ale was very smooth a light and slippery sensation. I had another Kaimai rye beer on the 3rd this time the Porter but sadly it was infected. It's a shame because I'm told the Kaimai Rye Porter is a spectacular drop.
Most commercial beers will never be infected because they are sterile filtered and pasteurised, but in a bottle-conditioned beer like those made by Kaimai, the living yeast continues to ferment sugars after the bottle has been capped. The risk is that a rogue bacteria or yeast can get in to the bottle and cause a mouth-puckering sour taste.
Now sour is not always bad when it comes to beer. Between my contrasting Kaimai experiences I was lucky enough to be sitting around a table with Epic Brewery pair Luke Nicholas and Kelly Ryan when Nicholas cracked the top off an Oude Gueze a Belgian lambic beer where fermentation is sparked by wild yeast.
In this case the brewery, Drie Fonteinen, blends one, two and three-year-old beer. It's the only brewery in Belgium still practising this ancient technique of blending. The distinctive lemony sourness of Geuze is coupled with an underlying cidery taste and a fizz in your mouth like sherbet. If you didn't know to expect such a sour starburst you'd wonder what was going on, but once you get your head around the taste it becomes more alluring with every mouthful.
FebFun continued after work on Saturday night with an Emerson's Pilsner in downtown Auckland and Sunday's beer was a delightful gift from my wife who'd gone to Matakana on Saturday and returned with an Annah Stretton dress and bottle of beer from the Leigh Sawmill Brewery a dopplebock known as the The Doctor. This dark ale with its toffee and chocolate undertones went perfectly with some barbecue lamb.
Waitangi Day concluded with an India Pale Ale from the Twisted Hop brewery in Christchurch a whoppingly hopped beer that lashes your taste buds with a bitter orange lushness. Some weighty malt, it delivers a pillowy padding to absorb the bitter kick, making it one of the most well-balanced and complex IPAs I've had this summer.
February 7 concluded, after golf, with an interesting little bottle of Wild Plum Ale from Three Boys in Christchurch. Brewer Ralph Bungard likes doing his seasonal brews and this one is an off-pink, delightfully dry, tart and refreshing beer with only the tiniest hint of plum.
A great end of a sunny day drop.
A week into my FebFun and I've been through an array of spectacular beers that only reinforces the silliness of going without for a month life is just too short to have 29 days without drinking beer.
I was like that when people started talking about FebFast where you're supposed to be all holier than thou and take a month off alcohol.
I tried that once before, going without alcohol for a wellbeing story that appeared in the Sunday Star-Times. I can forgive you for forgetting all about it it was, in fact, a forgettable exercise. Nothing happened, that I could tell. No tangible benefits.
So when various PR people started wittering on about FebFast, which must be for some cause I cannot be bothered looking up, my anti-establishment genes kicked in and I vowed to make February the opposite of FebFast. I'll call it FebFun and drink a different beer every day, including the bonus day of the 29th.
Not that I drink much. One beer a night will do me fine, two or three if it's a Friday night. Not that I'm a big ``everything in moderation'' fan it just seems to suit me to have a little bit on a regular basis.
February 1 started with a Golden Rye Ale from Kaimai Brewing in Tauranga. It's unusual this, because, as the label suggests it is made with malted rye as well as malted barley. Rye was a common brewing ingredient, especially in Bavaria, until 1516 when the Germans came up with their ``purity law'' and declared beer could only be made with malted barley, hops, water and yeast. It's said rye went out of favour because it was an unreliable crop and the German purity law was one way of saying, ``stuff this carry on with rye, let's lock down barley instead''.
Rye gives a grainier texture to beer and the Kaimai golden ale was very smooth a light and slippery sensation. I had another Kaimai rye beer on the 3rd this time the Porter but sadly it was infected. It's a shame because I'm told the Kaimai Rye Porter is a spectacular drop.
Most commercial beers will never be infected because they are sterile filtered and pasteurised, but in a bottle-conditioned beer like those made by Kaimai, the living yeast continues to ferment sugars after the bottle has been capped. The risk is that a rogue bacteria or yeast can get in to the bottle and cause a mouth-puckering sour taste.
Now sour is not always bad when it comes to beer. Between my contrasting Kaimai experiences I was lucky enough to be sitting around a table with Epic Brewery pair Luke Nicholas and Kelly Ryan when Nicholas cracked the top off an Oude Gueze a Belgian lambic beer where fermentation is sparked by wild yeast.
In this case the brewery, Drie Fonteinen, blends one, two and three-year-old beer. It's the only brewery in Belgium still practising this ancient technique of blending. The distinctive lemony sourness of Geuze is coupled with an underlying cidery taste and a fizz in your mouth like sherbet. If you didn't know to expect such a sour starburst you'd wonder what was going on, but once you get your head around the taste it becomes more alluring with every mouthful.
FebFun continued after work on Saturday night with an Emerson's Pilsner in downtown Auckland and Sunday's beer was a delightful gift from my wife who'd gone to Matakana on Saturday and returned with an Annah Stretton dress and bottle of beer from the Leigh Sawmill Brewery a dopplebock known as the The Doctor. This dark ale with its toffee and chocolate undertones went perfectly with some barbecue lamb.
Waitangi Day concluded with an India Pale Ale from the Twisted Hop brewery in Christchurch a whoppingly hopped beer that lashes your taste buds with a bitter orange lushness. Some weighty malt, it delivers a pillowy padding to absorb the bitter kick, making it one of the most well-balanced and complex IPAs I've had this summer.
February 7 concluded, after golf, with an interesting little bottle of Wild Plum Ale from Three Boys in Christchurch. Brewer Ralph Bungard likes doing his seasonal brews and this one is an off-pink, delightfully dry, tart and refreshing beer with only the tiniest hint of plum.
A great end of a sunny day drop.
A week into my FebFun and I've been through an array of spectacular beers that only reinforces the silliness of going without for a month life is just too short to have 29 days without drinking beer.
