sour side THE
Beer writer and newly Certified Cicerone (pronounced pronounced "sis-uh-rohn" – like a beer sommelier), Denise Garland, explores the fruity versatility of a quenching sour brew.
s
our beers are always my favourite summer style. They can vary from fruity and slightly tart, to mouthpuckeringly sour – and hit every note in between. Sour beers provide brewers with the chance to be experimental; to try new flavour combinations using a sour beer base, and to give drinkers the chance to experience flavour combinations that are difficult to find in other styles. BERLINER WEISSE The most common style of sour beer sold in New Zealand is the Berliner Weisse – traditionally an incredibly sour beer of under 4% ABV founded in Berlin, which could be flavoured with sweet syrups to make them more palatable. Here in Aotearoa, the style tends to be a little stronger – often as high as 5% ABV. And while you can still find plain and very sour versions of the style, most brewers add fruit or dry hops to provide drinkers with more flavour in every mouthful. 30 THE SHOUT NZ – FEBRUARY 2022
The sour beer market has grown significantly in the past few years thanks to the Berliner Weisse, with its quick and easy method of souring in the brew kettle, allowing breweries to create sour beers quickly, cost-effectively and on a large scale. Until the style’s introduction in Aotearoa in the mid-2010s, finding a sour beer on tap at a bar was a rare occurrence, while supermarkets like New World say a few years ago the idea of a supermarket stocking sour beer was almost incomprehensible. But in 2015, Warkworth’s 8 Wired brewed the country’s first large-scale batch of a Berliner Weisse; a dry-hopped version called Hippy Berliner. 8 Wired’s owner and brewer, Søren Eriksen, says he decided to brew it because there weren’t really any available in New Zealand. “Back in those days most of the beers that we brewed were beers that you couldn't otherwise really find, and that's how most of our beers really came about in the beginning,” he says.
Denise Garland is a journalist and a Certified Cicerone with with a love of all things beer. She has been writing about beer for a decade and was the winner of the 2019 Brewers Guild Beer Media Award. She has previously worked in hospitality in Christchurch, Wellington and Edinburgh. Denise home brews – though not as often as she’d like – and has been a judge in several home brew and commercial beer competitions.
