Emerson's get cute on classic style
Plus how to save hospo, beers for the roller-disco, container deposit scheme
Gidday beer lovers, I hope you’re all feeling great today. I’m a little tired after an epic St Patrick’s Day party last night. When you’re married to an Irishwoman you’re not exactly obliged to celebrate St Patrick’s Day, but it’s a good excuse to have a few friends around, eat some Irish stew and drink a few good beers. There’s lots to read here this week, so let’s jump in.
How to save hospo: a brewer’s perspective
We’ll start this week with an opinion piece written by Ralph Bungard, founder of Three Boys brewery in Christchurch:
Here’s one for you: A customer walks into a bar. “I’ll have twelve starters, twelve mains, twelve deserts and twenty-four pints of beer please, waiter”.
“Oh, are you expecting company?” The waiter retorts. “No, it’s just me today”, says the customer, “I didn’t manage to make it out much in the last couple of years and I’m just catching up!”
A most unlikely scenario, right? And not even a funny joke! At the heart of the sentiment though is the guts of why hospitality and all those peripheral to it are amongst the hardest hit in these times.
I’m not saying that other businesses are finding our new Covid world easy. Far from it. But the difference for hospitality compared with say painting your house, is that your house still needs painting when the crisis recedes. In other words, that job effectively stays “in the job bank”. Unlike a night out on the town. That financial opportunity for hospitality is gone with no return.
Beer recommendation #1
Emerson’s Brewery have released a flight of new beers, including the 20th anniversary edition of their Taieri George Spiced Ale. For a long time, the annual March 6 release was seen as an Easter beer because it had all the flavours of a hot cross bun. But the beer comes out each year to mark the birthday of George Emerson, the father of Emerson’s founder, Richard. George, who was a de facto CEO of the brewery in the first 10 years, died 20 years ago and Richard released this beer in his honour because it was something they’d been working on together before George died. To mark 20 years since George passed away, this “vintage” is a special 9 per center full of cinnamon and nutmeg. And the name? Well, George was a driving force in the creation of the Taieri Gorge railway. Get two, one to drink now and one to save.
The other beer that’s causing a stir though, is this one:
As you can see from the label they’ve described their Weissbier as a “German Style Hazy”. This has caused some minor conniptions on social media platforms, with suggestions that it’s a marketing ploy or that they are trying trick committed hazy lovers into trying a old world beer that, under normal circumstances, they wouldn’t bother opening the fridge door for.
However, your honour, in Emerson’s defence I offer up this piece of evidence from a time before hazies were even a thing:
A “cloudy wheat beer” you say? They’ve been at it for years, using this cloudy / hazy marketing nonsense to fool people into buying beers!
All jokes aside, the new iteration is an absolute banger. I love it to bits. And as an aside, while looking for this image of the Weissbier, I stumbled on Alice Galletly’s old Beer For A Year Blog which is still worth reading more than a decade on.
Heroes of the week
Hats off these good guys at 8 Wired Brewing for their Kegs For Ukraine fund-raising effort to support Ukrainians made homeless by the Russian invasion.
Beer of the week #2
I did not pick Liberty as a brewery that would jump aboard the milkshake sour craze but I’m glad they did. Liberty have made their name with punchy hop-driven beers like Yakima Monster, Knife Party and Citra. This is slightly left-field for the Helensville brewery but it’s also on-brand in the sense that Raspberry Roller (6.4 per cent ABV) captures a real Americana milk bar feel that ties in with the Statue of Liberty of look on the cans. So it works. And so does the beer. The raspberry flavour is densely packed in on a lactose-rich body and they’ve avoided the temptation to deliver a vanilla hit, which sets this apart from a lot of others in this field. Remarkably, given the lack of vanilla, the lactose and berry sweetness perfectly offsets the sour background — and in many ways the kettle souring serves as an aid to the silky smooth texture rather than flavour. In short, it delivers what it sets out to do, it is a delicious raspberry milkshake beer.
BrewDog digging a deeper hole for themselves
The boss of BrewDog, James Watt, hired private investigators to obtain information about people he believed were taking part in a smear campaign against him and repeatedly accused one woman of being involved until she blocked him on social media, the Guardian reported this week.
According to multiple sources and evidence seen by the Guardian, private investigators who said they were working for Watt approached people to gather evidence about those who he appeared to believe had maligned him.
One subject of their inquiries, Rob MacKay, an ex-BrewDog employee, had appeared in a BBC documentary, The Truth About BrewDog, which made claims about the company’s workplace culture and Watt’s personal behaviour as an employer, including towards women.
A former colleague of MacKay’s says he was visited at work by two ex-policemen working for a company called Integritas Investigative Solutions.
“They said they’d been hired by James Watt and were serious crime investigators,” the former colleague said.
Integritas investigators also approached a friend of a female former acquaintance of Watt asking for details of their discussions, evidence reviewed by the Guardian indicates, after Watt became convinced that she was involved in online allegations about him that appeared on social media.
The woman, who asked not to be named, also received multiple messages from Watt himself, in which he told her he had “extensive evidence from multiple sources of what you and others have been doing” and warned she could face legal action.
Despite her repeated denials, he continued sending her messages by email and on Instagram until she blocked him.
In June last year, BrewDog apologised to former employees who accused the company and Watt in an open letter of fostering a “culture of fear” in which workers were bullied and “treated like objects”. Members of Punks With Purpose, the group behind the letter, took part in the BBC documentary, which aired earlier this year.
Watt was later accused of trying to “intimidate” people who appeared on the programme, after he issued a public warning in advance of the broadcast that they could be unmasked in court and that it was “not too late” to pull out.
He disputes the allegations in the documentary and has since lodged a complaint against the BBC with media regulator Ofcom.
Long weekend read: goodbye to grandfather geuze
If you enjoy drinking wild fermented beers in this 21st century you ought to be grateful to Armand Debelder. The “grandfather of geuze” spent decades doing the back-breaking physical labor of brewing, blending, and bottling Lambic during the beer style’s darkest times, says Breandán Kearney in Good Beer Hunting’s obituary. Debelder rallied his colleagues in the Pajottenland, establishing organisations and festivals which sought to protect the heritage of Geuze, many of which still exist today. And through his work ethic, obsession with quality, and his highly regarded palate, he created beautiful Geuzes which have thrilled people all over the world. He was a man driven by passion. He was open and generous. And he was a joyful conversationalist. His friend and colleague Frank Boon of Brouwerij Boon said: “There is no such brewer or blender like Armand.”
Beer of the week #3
Because of the Omicron outbreak, the 2022 New World Beer & Cider Awards judging took place this week across three venues (Auckland, Wellington and Nelson). That was basically so people didn’t have to fly anywhere and spend time at airports etc. As chair of judges for this event I was at the Auckland judging, which was kindly hosted by Urbanaut Brewing. After the event, in which the judges dealt with around 70 beers, including 45 hazies each, there was a definite appetite for a palate cleanser. So after the official proceedings, the team at Urbanaut poured their new champagne yeast-fermented hoppy imperial lager (6.5 per cent). Hopped with Nelson Sauvin and Riwaka, this lemon-lime citrus bomb was just the ticket. Great beer, and smashing label too. Combine this with the Liberty Raspberry Roller and you’ve got a roller-disco beer!
Is Guinness really good for you?
I did enjoy this article from San Francisco’s The Mercury News on St Patrick’s Day, in which they took a literal look at the old Guinness marketing campaigns (such as this advert)
They consulted the legend who is Charlie Bamforth, distinguished professor emeritus of brewing sciences at the University of California, Davis. As he notes, most beers contain significant amounts of antioxidants, B vitamins, the mineral silicon (which may help protect against osteoporosis), soluble fibre and prebiotics, which promote the growth of “good” bacteria in your gut. (Here in NZ you can’t say market beer by saying it has good things in it, as that’s against the law).
“We showed that Guinness contained the most folate of the imported beers we analysed,” Bamforth said. Folate is a B vitamin that our bodies need to make DNA and other genetic material. It’s also necessary for cells to divide. According to his research, stouts on average contain 12.8 micrograms of folate, or 3.2% of the recommended daily allowance.
Because Guinness contains a lot of unmalted barley, which contains more fibre than malted grain, it is also one of the beers with the highest levels of fibre, according to Bamforth. (While beer is thought of as having no fibre, Bamforth said his research shows otherwise.)
Then there’s the whole area of stout for breast-feeding mothers. Beer in general has been regarded as a galactagogue, or stimulant of lactation, for much of history. In fact, according to irishtimes.com, breastfeeding women in Ireland were once given a bottle of Guinness a day in maternity hospitals. Modern research is divided on the lactation benefits and a nursing mother drinking any type of alcohol puts her baby in potential danger. So basically: no, don’t do this. And Guinness to their credit are making a stand about those old stories.
In fact, says Guinness Ambassador Domhnall Marnell, the company no longer claims any health benefits for its beer. “If anyone is under the impression that there are health benefits to drinking Guinness, then unfortunately, I’m the bearer of bad news. Guinness is not going to build muscle or cure you of influenza.”
That’s that then.
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Bottle collection boom
Finally, you may have read about the proposed Container Deposit Scheme introduced this week.
In short, the bid to get us better at recycling means single-use beverage containers (bottles and cans, mainly) will be worth 20 cents each if you take them to be recycled.
In the case of beers, breweries will pay the 20 cents up front (for every container) and will add that to the cost of the product, increasing the price for the consumer, who can redeem the extra 20 cents when the container is returned for recycling. For any containers not returned, that 20 cent “deposit” will stay in the system and help pay for other recycling efforts.
The government’s rationale is this: We drink from over two billion glass, plastic, metal, paperboard and other single-use drink containers each year and it is estimated that over half these empty beverage containers end up in landfills and unused stockpiles or littering streets, public spaces, streams, beaches and the ocean.
Environment Minister David Parker said New Zealand's current waste systems are inadequate.
"Every year New Zealand generates more than 17 million tonnes of waste. It's estimated that nationally only 28 per cent of materials are recycled and the rest goes to landfill. By contrast, Germany, Austria and Wales have the highest recycling rates in the world, with over 50 per cent of all waste being recycled," he said.
In theory a six-pack of beer retailing for $20 will cost $21.20 under the scheme, but those effected by the proposed scheme say it will add more cost than just the naked 20 cents as there are compliance costs and mark-up plus GST to be added on to the extra 20 cents (I don’t entirely believe this argument, put forward by Katherine Rich from the food and grocery lobby group but I’m also not an accountant).
Anyway, the argument is that it’s a hassle and it will drive up prices and therefore drive down sales, with the Brewers Association noting: “The cost benefit analysis that accompanies this proposal has stated there will be a 6.5 per cent reduction in consumption due to the increased deposit and management fee if passed on to the consumer. In a time where hospitality venues have been decimated through lack of customers in a pandemic a proposal that could further reduce those sales is just another blow to businesses.”
There are other arguments in both directions on this, with the pro-recyclers lauding the initiative. You can have your say via public submissions which are open now.
One for the road
I’ve just finished a seven-season binge-watch of Bosch, a gritty LA detective with a penchant for jazz. Based on Michael Connelly’s books, it shows a gritty side of Hollywood and has a fantastic soundtrack. You can watch it on Amazon Prime.
Given Bosch’s love of jazz, I was primed when Pursuit of Hoppiness contributor Tim Newman dropped a review of a beer called Brother Thelonius (as in Monk).
Thanks for reading and have a great weekend.
Michael