As we all know, the craft beer world is one warm, fuzzy, all-embracing bear hug of a thing. Everyone loves everyone else. We’re all united in our mission to create a better Earth for our children and our children’s children. And, in the words of Starship: “Nothing’s gonna stop us now.”
From coast to coast, brewers are collaborating with each other, with friends from overseas, with bands, chocolatiers, coffee roasters – heck, even the postie and the guy that once lent their dad his drill. If we wanted to solve the problems of the Middle East, we could do worse than simply send in a phalanx of craft brewers and beer lovers; give it a few weeks and, um, well something would happen.
What we’re saying is we bet Marti Pellow was drinking a craft beer when he penned “Love Is All Around”, Bjork was sat in a beer hall when the inspiration for “All Is Full Of Love” came to her and The Beatles were high on craft acid when they started strumming the chords to “Love Is All You Need”.
But, wait a minute, what’s this…? An almighty beery battle on the horizon! And one that’s set to kick off during Good Beer Week… It turns out the instigator is the food and wine editor from Time Out Melbourne, Gemima Cody.
“We like a stoush as much as we like a beer at Time Out,” she says. “And having failed to settle the matter of which city reigned supreme at the annual Time Out Sydney/Melbourne Christmas party arm wrestling competition, we decided to make some beers.
“Thankfully, we managed to convince a couple of brilliant brewers to help us out. Otherwise, the beers would probably have been pretty shit… We’re writers, and so obviously we were trying to retro-engineer beers from names that amused us like ‘Salty Hooker’. But, what began as petty, drunken feather rustling is going to result in two really delicious beers. Although obviously Melbourne’s is going to better. And we’ll probably drink more of it, faster and with more grace than Sydney could. Just saying.”
The result is a pair of beers designed by the respective Sydney and Melbourne offices of Time Out with brewers from each city designed to represent each city. The former is the Bond-IPA brewed with Riverside Brewery; the latter is the Angsty Hopster brewed by Cavalier Brewing in conjunction with roasters Proud Mary (above). Both will be tapped at the Good Beer Week Festival Hub as part of the Crafty Curates tap lineup and we’re working on an online voting system so you, the public, can decide once and for all which is the greater city. In beer form.
We spoke to the parties involved to find out a little more…
Dave Padden, founder and head brewer at Riverside Brewery (pictured at top)
Why did you agree to create a beer to represent your home city?
It was a good opportunity for us as we want to get more people trying our beers down south, but I’m also a massive league fan so am into the whole interstate rivalry, whether it’s State of Origin or Melbourne versus Sydney. I have a very big competitive streak!!
Is there pressure involved in that?
A massive amount to be honest!! I didn’t think about it at first, but then realised this was to represent Time Out and the city as well… I wanted to get it right and it’s tasting beautiful.
How did you come to the beer you arrived with? And why does it represent Sydney?
The tough bit was to develop a beer that represented Sydney, which sounded easy when we first talked about it but was much harder when we were actually brainstorming. We went with the beachy, sunny lifestyle. We wanted a lighter style beer and something fruity – although I’m not sure what meaning you might want to attribute to “fruity”!!! – so went with a single hop Galaxy IPA, but we really wanted to accentuate the fruitiness, so we’re adding 10kg of passionfruit pulp in secondary fermentation.
Why is it better than the other one?
It had to be a beer that was drinkable, something that we hadn’t done before but also that we were confident would be drinkable and enjoyable. Usually the winning beers in polls are pretty sessionable, like Stone & Wood or Hop Hog, so we’re pretty confident this will have a wider appeal than the dark, brooding beer from Melbourne.
Heath Shirtcliffe, Cavalier Brewing’s marketing sensai
The Cavalier boys with stoush instigator Gemima Cody
Why did you agree to create a beer to represent your home city?
Firstly, we were honoured to be asked to represent our city by brewing a beer that encapsulates all that is Melbourne and we agreed because we love our city and everything that makes it what it is.
Is there pressure involved in that?
No.
How did you come to the beer you arrived with?
Melbourne is a Mecca for lovers of coffee and craft beer, so we decided to create a beer that not only speaks of Melbourne but represents our city for what it is known best for. Teaming up with Time Out Melbourne and one of our city’s most passionate, knowledgeable and hippest coffee crews Proud Mary, we have created the Angsty Hopster, a black coffee IPA.
Why does it represent your city?
Coffee and beer is not just something you consume in Melbourne, it’s something you savour and indulge in because of the quality of both on offer, so what better way to enjoy them by making a beer that combines the two.
Why is it better than the other one?
Because we made it with love.
Lucy Ward, Proud Mary
How and why did you get involved?
We have done a collab beer in the past with Sam Fuss when she was working for True South, that was such a fun project that when the boys from Cavalier approached us with the concept we jumped at the opportunity. To be honest I had been thinking about teaming up with another brewery for a while so the offer was quite timely.
What coffee did you use and why?
We are using a coffee from Ecuador called Jorge Chuquimarca. Coffee from Ecuador is not something you often see here in Australia which makes it quite unique. We are also looking for a nice fresh coffee (this one was harvested late last year) with plenty of vibrancy in it still.
Some delicious Proud Mary coffee action
The last criteria we were looking for in a coffee was something we thought could be value adding with such a massive beer as a black IPA. The challenge was to let a little coffee shine through without creating a battle in the cup over hops and coffee, or alternatively losing it altogether. Ecuadorian coffee has a unique mouthfeel that is silky smooth and quite robust. The aim was to make this the base note of the beer, rounding out some of those larger than life hops, and adding a nice balance in the cup. Paired with the Jorge Chuquimarcas flavour notes of peach tea, malt and cumquat we felt it was a good fit for the direction the boys wanted to take the beer.
How was it prepared and when was it added to the beer?
We brewed up a massive toddy of coffee, a cold brew. We ground the coffee quite coarse and submerged it in highly filtered water that reaches our specifications. After leaving it to brew like a big cup of cold tea, we filter the whole lot again and introduce the cold brew into the chilled beer, right at the very end of the process before kegging.
What does a coffee beer say about Melbourne for you guys?
Melbourne is a speciality beverage focused city. I don’t think there could be anything more quintessentially Melbourne than coffee that you could put in a beer and still have it palatable. AFL socks are just not going to cut it! But seriously, Melbourne people love coffee and they love big craft beers, a match made in heaven!
To me coffee beer has never achieved perfection and for myself and Cavalier this is our aim. Hopefully we can team up again in the future and refine our ways of putting coffee in beer focusing on really capturing the flavours that each individual coffee has to offer and really marrying the flavours.
So, who will win the smackdown? Head to the Festival Hub between May 18 and 26 to taste and vote!
