Weird Beard have been a little late to this particular party. We have kind of dipped our toes in a couple of times, with the very successful Boar Oat of Hell, brewed with local home brew club Beer Boars. And more recently Mariana on Mango, the amped-up version of our flagship Pale Ale, Mariana Trench, with added Mango purée. A couple of others have come close, Bat Oat of Hell and The Dodo. But we have never done a full-on hazy, juicy, what I would call a hype beer.
Why has it taken us so long? Well, anyone who really knows me, will know that I am just not a fan. Never have been. To start with, there were just too many people trying to rip-off other breweries that had mastered the style. Which to me meant there were just too many bad versions out there, meaning drinkers never quite knew what they were in for each time they ordered. And these beers in particular, all tasted the same to me. They all tasted like beer straight from the fermenter, with the yeast still in suspension. When I sample beer from the fermenter, it always tastes dulled to me. The hop characteristics were masked by the yeast. So when drinking beer that had this taste, it just felt unfinished to me.
I never really got over this. And still when I try these beers, I personally don't get that big juicy thing everyone talks about. I usually get yeast and hop burn. I also like my beer bitter, which is why my favourite style always has been West Coast IPA. Not what people are calling West Coast now. People have forgotten what bitterness is. I mean those big, 100IBU, piney, dank, clean, clear, resinous beers. But I digress. Essentially, I am not the man to brew these hype beers, as I can't really monitor their progress and judge if they are any good. But for now, if I don't like it, I know I'm on the right track. And if the rest of our fine team like it, I know we are on to a winner.
As much as I try and tell myself I am brewing beer for myself - that we are a craft brewery, doing things our own way, and for our own reasons - the harsh reality is that we are a business, with employees we need to pay. People want hazy, juicy beers. People are only rating these beers on popular rating sites. And as much as I wish I could deny it, these things are important. These things influence peoples buying habits, and these all contribute to paying the bills. To paying our staff. Far too many breweries have gone out of business this year alone. And that is not even taking into account Covid19.
So we, or should I say I, have bitten the bullet. I have drunk more of a style of beer I don't care for in the last few months than I have since the scene started. I have honed my taste buds and expanded my knowledge. But more importantly, I have jumped on the hype train, and am walking down the aisle with my little trolley to present to you our 2 new hazy beers...
Reformatory – A 4% hazy pale with very low bitterness and big juicy hop characteristics. We went with loads of wheat and oats in the mash, as you would expect. This along, with a high mash temperature, adds to the mouth feel. Yeast-wise we blended Belgian and English ale yeasts, and fermented at a temperature that will help bring out the juicy hops, while leaving enough in suspension that combine with the protein from the oats and wheat to cling onto the hops. And which hops i hear you ask? We only went and threw loads of Mosaic and Ekuanot in.
Social Anti-Social Social Club - A 7.7% Double Dry Hopped Double IPA. You can't sit with us! Hell, right now you can't sit anywhere, with anyone. This beer has been in the pipeline for some time now, it just so happens the name really works in the current climate. But the name is more a nod to the way I felt the 'Hazy DIPA' thing has developed. As mentioned before, I have not been a big fan of these styles of beer. And because of this, I have felt slightly outcast from the 'Craft Beer Club'. So to me, the Hazy DIPA Club was a very social movement, but also very unwelcoming to people who maybe didn't hold the same views. This is stronger, slightly boozier, with more of a Belgian characteristic from the blended yeast, but only subtle. Again, we went with a classic hop combination of Mosaic, Ekuanot and Amarillo.
Another thing you may have noticed is our decision to put these into a 440ml can. This was the sales teams picking at me over time, wearing me down. They told me that if we were brewing a hype beer, like everyone else, we had to package it like everyone else. Now, we have been doing this for a while now, we are one of the older generation of 'craft breweries', putting our first beers out in 2013. And back then, we packaged anything below around 6% in a 500ml bottle, remember them? But there came a time when these simply were not cool. So we changed to 100% 330ml bottles, to the annoyance of the CAMRA posse. And then came along cans, which I have no objection to at all, I like cans for so many reasons. They are the new cool. But what I can't get my head around is why the new cool packaging is embracing the seemingly uncool when we were all in bottles. Why are 330ml bottles cool, but not 500ml, when 440ml cans are cool but 330ml less so? I like 330ml cans. They are cheaper for the consumer to buy for a start. They fit into all my craft beer schooner glasses. Am I getting too old for all of this?
