Beers - A Very Beery Christmas wrap

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas...as ours was indeed delightful, full of delicious Australian craft beers.

All praise and love goes to my wife (our first Christmas together as a married couple!) who had the original thought some time back to create a Christmas Day menu focused around cooking with beer. And then...she did all the real work to research, prepare and cook the beery food.

Our Very Beery Christmas Lunch started with a Welsh Rarebit on beer bread. Inspired by the Red Hill Brewery rarebit with their masterstroke of including leek in the ingredients (thanks again for the recipe, Karen!), the beer used in the rarebit sauce was the 2 Brothers "Growler" Brown Ale.

Toasted under a grill on slices of wholemeal home-made beer bread, which used a full bottle of Bridge Road Brewers Beechworth Pale Ale in the dough mixture, the result was just excellent and enjoyed with Red Hill Brewery Bohemian Pilsner.

The main course of the day was a barbeque beer can chicken. A 2/3rd full can of Anderson Valley Brewing Company Poleeko Gold Pale Ale was placed inside a seasoned chicken and cooked on a closed bbq for a little under 2 hours. (Can not express my gratitude enough to Biero Bar for supplying the AVBC can!)

It was our first attempt at a beer can chicken, which we were initially concerned about due to the small size of our bbq. However, it worked beautifully in the end, with the help of the Bar-B-Chef Beer Can Chicken Roaster that we picked up at Barbeques Galore a few weeks back. A very helpful tool! I probably cooked the chicken a little too long overall, drying it out a little, but the result was still delicious...and I look forward to doing it again with an even better result.

Complimenting the chicken roast was my wife's sensational Scotch Ale Potatoes, which used the Red Hill Brewery Scotch Ale...

Balancing the meal was a Beet, Fennel, Rocket & Nut salad with a Blond Ale Vinaigrette. Half a cup of the Red Duck "Black Heart" Belgian Blond Strong Ale was used in the vinaigrette.

Finally, dessert was the Chris Badenoch inspired Beeramisu, using the forever awesome Holgate Brewhouse "Temptress" Chocolate Porter.

We thoroughly enjoyed dessert with the spectacular Red Hill Brewery Double Barrel Aged Christmas Ale (as well as the regular Christmas Ale), which formed my final 12beersofxmas blog that you can read here...!

Throughout the day we mainly drank the Red Hill Brewery Bohemian Pilsner, which suited the weather and food perfectly. However, we also enjoyed some Stone & Wood Pacific Ale and Holgate Big Reg. A great day all round.

Cheers and see you in 2011!

12 Beers of Xmas - On the twelfth day of Christmas...

On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...a Red Hill Brewery Double Barrel Oak Aged Christmas Ale...

My love for Victoria's Red Hill Brewery knows no end. Therefore, it is pure joy to end our beery Christmas with the sublime and super potent Double Barrel Aged Christmas Ale (2010 release)!

A brilliant clear amber-almost-red colour, with a bit fruity flavour, medium-to-low carbonation and a very low body, this is a marvellously dangerous sipper because it is so easy to drink yet super potent with its 10.1% ABV. The complexity of this brew is fantastic...and I definitely prefer it to the regular Red Hill Brewery Christmas Ale.

The brandy character from the barrel ageing is clearly present in all aspects of the beer...aroma, taste, body and...awesomeness. The finish is reasonably short...but the depth and complexity of this beautiful and well balanced Belgian Strong all is all you need after a day of Christmas drinking!

Oh yes, I believe that this beer is the PERFECT alternative to a Christmas evening whisky!

Beer Joy.

I will be cellaring our second bottle for drinking on Christmas Day 2011.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Red Hill Barrel Aged Christmas Ale with a Holgate Temptress BEERimisu dessert!!

Alt Christmas Song of the Day: "Christmas Night of the Living Dead" by MXPX

12 Beers of Xmas - On the eleventh day of Christmas....

On the eleventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...a Bridge Road Brewers Chestnut Pilsner...

According to Wikipedia, "The Christmas Song" (aka "Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire") was written during a blistering hot American summer by Mel Tormé and Bob Wells in an effort to "stay cool by thinking cool".

Therefore, considering we are heading for a warm Christmas Day here in Melbourne (for once!)...the Chestnut connection has some validity in my 12 Beers of Xmas posts...I think?!? Not that we will be roasting any over a fire...but here is a way to at least enjoy the Chestnut element via a Summer appropriate Australian craft beer - the Bridge Road Brewers Chestnut Pilsner - a beer that is definitely best enjoyed cold.

Originally released as a "Chestnut Lager" for an Autumn seasonal, this beer was sidelined due to the lagering time and space required, which was beyond the capacity of this microbrewery's extensive regular range.

However, this year Bridge Road Brewers received an $18,800 Grant from the Victorian Government through the "Food Industry for a Sustainable Tomorrow" Innovation Initiative, which aims to grow regional development by supporting innovative and enterprising agricultural projects. This allowed Ben Kraus and co at the Beechworth microbrewery to install 3 more 2.4 hectolitre tanks and another Brite tank, providing the capacity to brew a Chestnut beer all year round. With the some tweeking of the Lager recipe (more chestnuts, different yeast strain, altered salts and hops) the beer was relaunched this year as a Czech Pilsner.

The brewers add locally grown chestnuts to the mash, using chestnuts sourced from Victoria's Beechworth region, the home of Bridge Road Brewers. Further, the Galaxy hops used in the brew are also grown close by at the Rostrevor Hop Garden. Hence, it is very much a unique Australian beer.

(Apparently, there are only two other commercially available chestnut beers in the world – from Corsica and Italy.)

Pouring the Chestnut Pilsner into a tall glass, its colour is a cloudy straw-like yellow-brown, maybe somewhat browner than most Czech Pilsner, with a small white head that reduces quickly with little lacing.

The aroma is very much the classic Pilsner smell of citrusy hops (the recognisable Galaxy hops), some thin grassy pine and a little spice.

On first taste the nutty character is actually very evident and a great twist to drinking a Pilsner, but it passes quite quickly. I am not a fan of many Pilsners, but the underrated Chestnut flavour in this beer makes it a much more interesting and well rounded over the commonly sharp and thin characters of many Pilsners. Whilst this beer is readily open to be rated as a fairly pedestrian Pilsner on terms of taste and texture, the innovation of using chestnuts in this beer is a local masterstroke in the craft of making good beer.

The body is medium-to-light and carbonation is also medium, so the mouth feel is very good. Definitely an easy drinking beer.

Right here and now...this is a perfect example of the right time and place for a beer. I probably would not be so complimentary of this beer on an average day or in comparison to some of the highly regarded international Pilsners. However, on a warm and sunny Christmas Eve, with the temperature and weather appropriate Pilsner combined with the festive Christmas character of the Chestnut and the overall "Australianess" of the product, the Bridge Road Brewers Chestnut Pilsner fits perfectly!

Alt Christmas Song of the Day: "Spend Christmas Day With Me" by Darren Hanlon

12 Beers of Xmas - On the tenth day of Christmas....

On the tenth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me...a Moon Dog Gingerbread Imperial Brown Ale...

Moon Dog Craft Brewery in Abbotsford announced its arrival on the local craft beer scene with an impressive Imperial Pumpkin Stout, brewed especially for Biero Bar's "Fright Night" Halloween Party back in October.

Today, their second beer hit the Biero Bar taps...and it is a MONSTER! Brewed specifically for tonight's "Nightmare Before Christmas Party" event, this Christmas-themed brew - a Gingerbread Imperial Brown Ale - used 11ish kilos of home made gingerbread and possess a huge 12% ABV (give or take 0.7%)!

If memory serves me correct, Bar Manager at Biero - Ray Kent - baked 26 kilos of his grandma's special homemade gingerbread recipe for the 50L batch of this beer.

And wow...this makes 2 from 2 on the scoreboard of FREAKIN' AWESOME beers from Moon Dog Brewing!

Lush, deep dark brown in appearance with a small tan head, this beer looks...enticing! The robust aroma is sugary sweet with a clear hit of gingerbread and something a little malty choc-banana.

The taste provides a serious punch of gingerbread (it is indeed like having a mouthful of liquid gingerbread!), dominated by a big molasses hit and followed by some malty butter. To me, on first taste it was like drinking crushed up dark-liquor-chocolates in a beer! This beer has an excellent full body without being thick and the medium carbonation was perfectly suited.

Fantastically, the 12ish% alcohol was no where to be seen in the flavour and texture of this beer! Even with the extremely high sweetness factor, a blind tasting could have you believing that this was merely a 6%-7% ABV beer. Although, the alcoholic effects of it are quickly evident. Two pots of the Moon Dog Gingerbread Imperial Brown Ale...and that was all I needed, as it was quite clear that I was well sauced from sipping down this amazingly unique beer. Nonetheless, two pots of this is all you need to be fully satisfied.

With a long lingering finish...overall it was just brilliant in an almost wrong kind of way. A true gingerbread experience and a brilliant dessert beer for Christmas!

I have never been more beer-nerdy excited about the arrival of a new local brewery. After several chats with Moon Dog's Josh Uljans, Jake Uljans and Karl van Buuren it is fantastically clear that they are some switched-on blokes with a seriously cheeky twist and a deliciously irreverent brewing philosophy.

With their obsession for big beers, you can expect the Moon Dog team to seriously mess things up (in the best way possible!) with some out-there, challenging beers...once they begin full time production in early 2011.

Just check out their tag line - "quality beer from Abbotsford..." - which I'd say refers to the fact that the only other beers coming out of Abbotsford are the (quality-less) Carlton and United Breweries (CUB) beers.

WELL DONE MOON DOG...you have brewed us another quality WOW beer that will be the talk the town for many Christmases to come!

Another brilliant beer night at Biero Bar. Unfortunately it had to end too soon for me...as I have to get up early and work on Christmas Eve.

...haha...thanks Ray...boneheader!

Alt Christmas Song of the Day: "Mr Hankey The Christmas Poo" from South Park