Beer 3 Ravens Nat Rav Dixons Creek Cabernet Franc (2021)

For spring 2021, 3 Ravens are back collaborating and merging beer and wine once more, with the release of Dixons Creek Cabernet Franc as part of their Nat Rav range. The beer sees them team up with their mate JonJo McEvoy, of Cré Wines in the Yarra Valley’s Dixons Creek, with the brewery making use of fresh-pressed Cabernet Franc skins – a grape variety that’s rarely showcased solo in Australian wines.

The brewers took three base beers from four different French oak barrels to ferment with the wine skins, while also adding lavender and Curaçao, to create this dark red but somehow still glowing beer.

Inside the bottle you'll find a notable contribution from the kind of fruits you often stew: rhubarb is towards the top of the list, joined by quince – not quite the rich paste but more the drier and spiced aroma that comes off the fruit when you cook it down to make said paste. But even with those more winter-ready fruits, it's still a springtime beer that's in keeping with its 750ml clear glass bottle coming well-carbonated and with a lively mix of raspberry, blackberry and tart cranberry flavours. Add to that floral and balsamic notes plus underlying funk and a soft tannic character and you've got another complex member of this unique blur-the-lines series..

Will Ziebell