Beer Radar
By John Krüger
A New Creature. (Previously published in Wine Business Magazine in 2011)
Beer lovers rejoice! Western Australian beer superheros Little Creatures are continuing their war against bland beer. This time with another of their fine tuned “single batch” beers, and we couldn’t be happier unless the owner left us the business in his will. The reason for our extra jubilation is the direction Little Creatures are going. They basically created the first mainstream hoppy American style pale ale here in Australia with their pale ale, but they didn’t continue down a narrow path like so many bandwagon breweries have done since. Don’t get us wrong, supply tries to meet demand but Little Creatures have impressed us with their other single batch brews lately, like their simple but brilliant brown ale. Sure, the hop freaks were expecting another American style ale with a billion times more hops but the brown was a refined and balanced beer; in our opinion, one of the best beers released in quite a while. Now they’ve come up with their East Kent Goldings Ale. UK beer snobs will be going weak at the knees. Goldings hops grown in East Kent (EKG) are legendary. Known for their earthy, yet spicy character, they’re the essential ingredient in a plethora of classic English ales. This beer is sharp (33IBU’s) and spicy. It’s got a firm bitterness without hurting anyone matched with a mild malt character. There’s toasty malt flavours rather than thick caramel toffee which means a nice big pint goes down well without getting too rich and cloying. Keep an eye out for their abundant 568ml pint bottles of beery goodness. No dinky boutique hairdresser bottles here.
We’ve recently been given some amazing statistics about what it takes to get a cold beer at major sporting venues. A South Australian firm, Hoshizaki Lancer has been fitting out major venues with beer dispensing gear all over the world, from ANZ Stadium in Sydney to the new Wembly Stadium in the UK. ANZ Stadium has 396 beer taps. Behind them is 9kilometres of insulated beer lines. The lines themselves are filled with 49x 50litre kegs before any beer starts coming out of the taps. Their busiest night so far was opening night when patrons consumed 1800x 50litre kegs. That’s an impressive 90,000 litres of neck oil. 287kw of cooling is required to ensure the beer is served at the required temperature. Research is underway to minimise distance between the kegs and the taps as well as reducing refrigeration costs. It certainly makes our little Beer Radar office effort of 3 beers on tap seem a little underwhelming. The Yanks are that impressed with our icy flooded fonts and beer gear that Hoshizaki Lancer are about to show off the best of Aussie beer delivery in Las Vegas in the coming months.
