Large, medium and small champions of the 2014 Australian International Beer Awards will be brewing a "collaboration beer" on April 16. The beer will be released at the awards presentation on May 21 as part of Good Beer Week.
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In early March representatives from CUB, Thunder Road Brewing and 3 Ravens visited Victoria's Ovens Valley to source hops for the beer. Also included will be an English yeast strain, an old English malt variety, refined sugars and Pride of Ringwood bittering hops.
The beer, to be called Girt by Three, will combine traditional and modern brewing approaches. That seems to mean a "fresh, young beer with a hint of old, sherry-like beer", says 3 Ravens brewer Brendan O'Sullivan. "When the penny dropped that all three of us have skunkworks involving aged beers it seemed like too good an opportunity to refuse," he said.
Badlands U-boat Marzen
★★½
500ml
$7.98
U-boat ticks many of the boxes of the German marzen style it emulates: the red-orange colour, the creamy texture, the rich maltiness and the low level of hopping and bitterness. However, the foam subsided quickly and, despite mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, refused to bounce back.
Wolf of the Willows XPA Extra Pale Ale
★★½
500ml $9.85
The cloudy gold-amber-brown colour failed to excite the senses and the first sniff revealed naught but hops – not a beery smell, but rather a smell comparable to hop flowers or pellets. Fortunately, rich malty flavours on the palate temporarily halted the march of the hops. Then the hops stomped on. And on. And on.