Little Emerson

August 19, 2014, by Crafty Pint

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Little Emerson

Other than play around with its younger sibling, White Rabbit, when creating the Little Rabbit beer for the 2012 Great Australasian Beer SpecTAPular, Little Creatures has kept its brewing mitts to itself. Yet a few weeks ago, we heard there were plans for a collaboration with another brewer, one that the staff at the brewery were excited about but keeping close to their chest.

“Who could it be?” we wondered. And when the answer was revealed it was one that made perfect sense: the Challenge was to feature Creatures and Emerson’s, the iconic Dunedin brewery that was bought by Lion in 2012, just a few months after the multinational took 100 percent control of Little World Beverages, owner of Creatures and White Rabbit. The first of two brews took place in Dunedin a couple of weeks ago, when brewers from Freo headed to New Zealand, with the return brew taking place in WA last week, where Max Brearley was on hand to ask what it was all about…

With Richard Emerson heading over The Ditch to brew at Little Creatures in Freo, you’d be forgiven for thinking that this was a collaboration brew. But Richard and Freo head brewer Russ Gosling are quick to point out that this is a Challenge brew.

“What’s a Challenge brew?” you ask.

Well, in this case, each brewing team threw down a style and hop varietals for the others to have a crack at, for what could become an annual trans-Tasman challenge. No pilot brewing allowed, with the recipe worked out and honed on the day.

While the two breweries are Lion owned, there’s a wealth of differences between their set ups that spice up the challenge, from largely computerised (Creatures) to old school hands on (Emerson). Emerson explains that “it’s a challenge to each other and to the brewers. It’s about what we can learn. We brew in isolation so the opportunity to learn from each other is what this is about.”

The New Zealand leg of the challenge saw Russ and Brett Shore head to Dunedin, where they laid down the challenge of brewing an Australian red IPA using Topaz and Ella hops. It’s not a style Emerson’s had attempted previously, added to which the hop varieties were also a new to them. For Emerson, this is what the challenge is all about. That and the odd game of brew house pool, where the rivalry really came out.

It set the tone for the return challenge.

Russ explains: “It’s a saison that Richard has challenged us with. Traditional and true to style, no going mad with hops [they used just East Kent Goldings and Czech Saaz].

“It’s a style that’s well structured and unforgiving. It’s a technically difficult beer, so it can be very right or very wrong. Of course it’ll be very right!”

Historically the saison is perhaps the perfect seasonal offering to take us from Winter to Spring, which is a good thing as both beers will be out in late October in keg and available at all Single Batch stockists, which can all be found at the Little Creatures website here.

There was one more unexpected challenge too: that of getting Richard back to New Zealand.

“We didn’t want to let him go,” says Creatures marketing manager Ash Cranston. “He was great!”

Max Brearley writes on beer for all manner of publications in Australia and overseas and is one half of Offshoot Creative.

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