The Hoppiness 100 — our best beers of the year
A journey around 22 taprooms to see out 2022. Why there's a carbon dioxide shortage. How Sierra Nevada gambled on a hazy IPA and won. Can you drink non-alc beer at work? The rise of hot beer & more
As this is the final Friday Night Beers of 2021, I’m gifting everyone the un-paywalled version. If you like what you see, maybe think of subscribing next year (we resume auspiciously on Friday, January 13) or gifting a sub to a friend.
There’s a lot to get through so I’ll hook straight into it with our Hoppiness 100. I asked our contributors to come up with a list of their best beers, including a top pick. The link to the full story is below, but here is what I will call the Hoppiness Top-10, the beers our team named as their personal faves.
North End Bones of the Land Saison
Bach All Day Hazy Non-Alcoholic IPA
McLeod’s Dortmunder Export Lager
Epic Rooster Cold IPA
8 Wired Kohia Wit
8 Wired Gorky Park Imperial Stout
Chinchiller Tart Side of the Moon #6 Lemon with Burnt WhippedCream
Duncan’s Whippy Milkshake IPA
Liberty Firestarter West Coast IPA
Brave Brewing Tigermilk IPA
Based on the views of our contributors, I also had a stab at a brewery and beer of the year.
Brewery of the year: Garage Project
It’s not just revealed in our writer’s picks — where Garage Project popped up almost universally — but also in awards this year. They took out the champion large brewery trophy at the NZ Beer Awards and a swag of gold medals. They also had an unprecedented four of the Top 30 at the New World Beer & Cider Awards. If in doubt look at the highest-rated New Zealand beers on Untappd. There’s occasional cracks in the list where other breweries get a look in. A dominant performance and a year to savour for the team in Aro Valley.
Beer of the year: North End Bones of the Land Saison
By virtue of being the only beer to appear in three separate “best” lists, this superb Kiwi tribute to Saison Dupont captures the enigmatic beauty of a nicely hoppy, spice-perfumed, dry and zesty saison. And there are magnums available on North End’s website now! Go, get one. This also doubles as my Beer of The Week No 1.
Most improved brewery: Beer Baroness
Beer Baroness have made good beer for a long time but this was the year they got noticed in competitions. They scored a perfect 13 out of 13 medals at the NZ Beer Awards and their Sunshine & Spaceships Hazy IPA scored a Top-30 in the New World Beer & Cider Awards and a gold at the Australian International Beer Awards.
Up and comer of the year: Chinchiller
This is a slightly subjective pick based on nothing more than a “vibe”. There are some facts. A solid three beers in the Top-100 “highly commended” at the New World Beer & Cider Awards plus one of the best smoothie sours I’ve tried at Beervana is enough for me to put Chinchiller on the “watch” list.
Destination of the Year: Brave Brewing, Hastings
This is totally based on the feeling of emptiness and jealousy I get every time I see someone posting a picture of Tigermilk IPA from Brave’s taproom.
22 Taprooms for 2022
Speaking of Brave, their taproom features on my list of a “22 taproom” road trip around the country.
Naturally I couldn’t do justice to the sheer volume of amazing spaces on offer, but to help with further inspiration, the team at Beervana have created an interactive map of destinations based on exhibitors at the festival.
The Island in the sun
Hoppiness contributor “Crafty” Mark Gower took a trip recently to Papamoa to have a look the recently refurbished brew bar, The Island. It sounds like a destination to visit if you’re in the Bay of Plenty area this summer.
Hoppiness hats
Just a friendly reminder that we have Pursuit of Hoppiness hats available. If you order today, I’ll ship on Monday but even that might be tight for pre-Christmas delivery.
Can you get fired for drinking NA beer at work?
I thought this was a great question raised in a press release from Employsure, a consultancy firm that helps small and medium businesses.
My first answer was “no” — surely drinking regulations at workplaces are about behaviour (i.e. if not outright drunkeness then enjoying a party vibe). But then I thought about the whole “beer” element of it and felt non-alcs were still in that space where you have them as an alternative to alcohol but within the same setting you’d normally have a beer (ie they come with a vibe of winding down, relaxing). So they’re not quite like a soft drink, are they? And it could be viewed that non-alcoholic drinks create an undesirable tone in the workplace, potentially encouraging others to drink a real beer. So my answer is now: I wouldn’t have one as to me they still fit within a drinking environment.
“This is a question we are starting to hear more with the rise in non-alcoholic beers and wine consumption”, said Laurence McLean, Associate Director of Operations at Employsure. “While the act of drinking non-alcoholic beer at work on its own is unlikely to justify a dismissal, with certain context it may be a contributing factor”.
It’s a question we might hear raised more of as non-alc beers carve out a bigger space in our lives. And any doubt about the growth of this market is dispelled by Grant Caunter from State of Play.
A hazy little thing called love
It seems crazy to think about it now, but around five years ago the brains traust at one of America’s most respected breweries wasn’t entirely sure about releasing a hazy IPA.
When Sierra Nevada’s leaders first began discussing a hazy IPA, not everyone was enthused about the idea... The style itself was controversial. But beyond that, the company’s executives were worried about how well Hazy Little Thing would match up with its reputation and what long-time Sierra Nevada consumers would think.
What they found was a new bunch of drinkers — including those who were new to craft beer altogether — and what they liked about Hazy Little Thing was that it was inviting and friendly, rather than intimidating and exclusive. And from it a whole sub-brand of beers has sprung.
This resonates with a lot of what I hear from “normal” people (ie not craft geeks like me!). Hazies, as much as they may be a bane for those who pine for the good old days, are the new gateway beers. And I don’t see that slowing down anytime soon.
Beer of the week No 2
I didn’t intend for a mini-theme to develop in this newsletter, but there you are. The second beer of the week is also a saison. Sawmill’s Super Saison (8.5%) has become something of a Christmas tradition at the brewery, with a version coming out each year since 2016. What I love about this one is the grain bill. In contrast to the all-pilsner malt of Bones Of The Land, this one has everything they could lay their hands on: with rye, wheat and flaked barley contributing to a lively (frothy!) mouthfeel. Super-hoppy with tonefully appropriate European varieties, it’s an immensely satisfying beer. It definitely fell into that camp of once I’d finished I immediately wanted more.
The beauty of English hops
Speaking of European hops, it feels to me that this year we’ve seen more beers with English hops to the fore. Or possibly just more English-style beers such as ESBs, earthy-malty English IPAs and sessionable pale ales.
I think English hop varieties can be under-appreciated, or as writer Matthew Curtis put it: “I used to think English hops were rubbish.”
But Matt discovered a new side to English hops in this story, which gives a fascinating insight into the industry there and explains why their often delicate hops don’t generate the same excitement as American and NZ varieties.
Gift a subscription
Just a reminder as we read on, that you can gift a subscription of Friday Night Beers to a friend. All you need is their email address and $50. A great gift that keeps giving all through 2023!
Garage Project co-founder nominated
I was pleased to see Garage Project co-founder Jos Ruffell among the semifinalists for the innovator at the year at the annual New Zealander of the year Awards. Ruffell is among 10 contenders for the innovation award based on his work with GP as well as Phantasm, the intriguing thiol product made from Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc grapes.
Speaking of innovation…
I get all sorts of emails across my desk about various products, and usually I’m a little skeptical. That was the case initially with a pitch from Parker’s, a beverage company based in Hawke’s Bay, that said they were making a probiotic drink from old beer. It didn’t take long to figure out the “old beer” was brewed for the now defunct brand Deco City, and my inner scientist was also quickly hooked on the process of turning beer into vinegar and using it as the bassis for a kombucha-style health drink. The product is called Hop Pop, and the process is quite cool, something you could even try at home!
CO2 Shortage Explained
I don’t think I’m alone in wondering how the hell the world ran out of manufactured carbon dioxide. Literally the thing that’s ruining our planet because there’s too much of it but when we want to put it into beer, there’s not enough of it. Reminds you of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner … “water, water everywhere nor any drop to drink”.
Anyway this story from Craft Brewing Business is deep dive into the subject that helps explain things well.
Rising costs to impact
Increased carbon dioxide costs are just one of the myriad “inputs” that have gone up for brewers this year. Those rising costs are reflected in higher prices for punters, who in turn are being pinched by other cost of living jumps and higher mortgage rates. The question for consumers — and maybe dear reader you could answer this for me — is this: are you spending less on beer?
The situation here doesn’t yet feel as bad as it does in the UK, where a number of breweries have recently closed, nor America, where the craft market is incredibly competitive.
I read a good story on all this in Good Beer Hunting, Costs Rule Everything, which contained the following knock-on effects of price increases:
There’s more opportunity for customers to switch brands within craft beer while still buying a relatively similar product, like Double IPA.
But at some point, that brand-switching reaches a potential end point: A customer could go from a local $22 four-pack to a $13 six-pack of a national brand, but prices may eventually still be too high, causing a need to switch styles or categories altogether to save money.
As the cost of items continues to rise, small breweries are in turn being hit by higher prices for malt, aluminum, and cardboard than large breweries, and at a faster rate. (Large breweries typically have long-term contracts with suppliers for these products and are able to use scale to negotiate better rates.)
Because of this disparity, if beer prices continue to follow the rising costs of materials, the pattern would lead to a widening gap between macro beer and craft beer prices in the long run.
While the NZ market is entirely different to the US model in terms of their third-party distribution model, and what constitutes a national brand, that mutability of consumer choice and the narrowing of options towards well-priced big brands is happening here to a degree. I know many breweries are hoping for a long hot summer to claw back some of the winter downturn and we’ll be watching this space with an eagle eye next year.
Hot beer
I’ve been reading a lot about hot beer lately. Apparently it’s a trend in China and of course hot beer was part of the English Wassail tradition.
What I didn’t realise was that it was also once popular in Belgium, with, of all things, hot lambic.
In Brussels historically people celebrated the end of one year and the coming of the next with a “Kalibabou” – a hot cocktail of lambic, rum, sugar and eggs, writes Eoghan Walsh in his Brussels Beer City blog.
Eoghan also explains that the Americans once had Hot Ale Flips, which were made by mixing beer, rum, and sugar (eggs were later added), heated by thrusting a red-hot poker into this mixture. The heat from the poker would warm the drink, caramelize the sugar and cause frothing, or “flipping”.
Of course many of you might remember Garage Project doing something similar at Beervana back in 2013.
I now expect hot beer to on someone’s menu next winter — c’mon brewers don’t disappoint me!
Beer(s) of the week No 3
I will leave you, and 2022, with a whopper of a deal from New Zealand’s No 1-ranked brewery on Untappd, Derelict. They are justifiably proud of their top-ranking, and are celebrating another year in at No 1 spot with an Untappd No 1 Box (Still NZ’s Top Ranked Brewery) As I’ve previously mentioned I don’t get any kickbacks or whatever for mentioning these things — I just advocate for what I think is great. This box is pricey at $199 but it has 23 beers in it and some of them are huge. Plus it comes with free shipping, so if you love Derelict or want to know what all the fuss is about … hook into it. I really love how Derelect own their No 1 Untappd status. They deserve it. And you won’t be disappointed.
Thanks for reading and see you again in 2023.
