One of the side benefits of Little Creatures opening its new base in Geelong is that White Rabbit Dark Ale will now be brewed into open fermenters there, opening up capacity at Rabbit's Healesville home. This will allow Jeremy and his team of brewers to take some of the frequent mini-experiments they carry out onto a far larger scale. Visitors to the cellar door or the Little Creatures Dining Hall in Brunswick will have come across all manner of weird and wonderful things in kegs and firkins, with the Porter the latest. There were only a few kegs brewed (and we're a little lax in popping this up so there may be little of those left), but should you find some we're told it "has a fairly solid hopping with whole New Zealand Pacifica and Rakau, and the malt backbone is comprised of pale, Munich, Midnight wheat, roast barley and a touch of dark crystal." The beer has been barrel fermented with the same English ale strain as the brewery's dark ale in "a little bit of French oak but not too much". The result is "sweet and high-bodied which balances out a fairly high bitterness level and helps contribute to some really nice chocolate character sitting well with some great stone fruit and green orange from the generous Kiwi hopping."
If we have left it too late and missed the boat on the Porter,we're told that next up is a series of four single keg Belgian pale ales. Each one has received a different dry-hopping: Styrian Goldings, Pilgrim, Glacier and Citra.
Published December 11, 2013 2013-12-11 00:00:00
