Hmmm. Lately, I feel like I'm seeing a lot NEIPAs that let absolutely no light through. Perhaps the Haze Craze is moving over, making way for the Opacity Audacity.
Modern Nature is one such beer – obviously, otherwise I wouldn’t mention it – and its opacity seems to be a clear statement: this beer contains many hops. Cryo Mosaic, Cascade and Cashmere flood your nose with candied fruit, fresh rockmelon, almost overripe tropicals, and sweet pine. Imagine a big glass bowl of fruit salad, but one of the ingredients is chopped-up pieces of a car air freshener sprinkled with crystallised sugar; try taking that to the family barbecue and see if Auntie Marge asks for the recipe. It all ends with an afterthought of herbal bitterness and alcohol warmth to keep you on your toes.
Am I imagining a touch of coconut? Possibly.
Am I surprised that Sunday Road made another very solid hazy? Not even a little bit.
Am I going to admit that I thought this beer was called Mother Nature for at least the first three times I saw the name? No further questions.
The label of Après Ski Bavarian Hefe tells me to “get ready to indulge in quintessential European après ski culture”, but I don’t know what that involves other than schnapps and sitting near a fire.* The illustration also has a cool 80s aesthetic, which has me baffled. Is there a movie reference I’m missing? Did skiing in the Alps get invented in the 80s? I’m feeling very uncool right now.
Anyway, the beer is cool. The white head grows huge like a Hollywood avalanche,** and there’s a whiff of heffy sweetness on the breeze like someone’s making banana bread back at the lodge. In the mouth it’s ridiculously soft, like freshly fallen powdery snow. Not like the tightly packed "snowball" my brother threw at me when we first arrived at Perisher Blue because we’d never been to snow before and didn’t realise that the artificially created stuff basically compacts into a solid ball of ice and hurts like crazy when someone throws it at you.
This wheat beer is cotton-soft banana with a hush of baking spice, and definitely satisfying after any physical activity. I guess you’d pair it with schnapps and … sausages? Cheese fondue? Strudel? Strudel sounds like it’d go down well after a ski.
And, while we’re on Euro-style beers that are delicious and refreshing in equal measures, let’s give a shout-out to SR 10, the latest in Sunday Road’s Czech series.
I believe this style would traditionally be called a Světlé Pivo – pale lager – but the Czech words Sunday Road have decided to put on the can are Pivo Sládek: “brewer’s beer”. Brewers are always waxing lyrical about how pale lagers are the ultimate beer, so I’m not surprised.
But I think just about anyone who tastes this beer would sing its praises. A drizzle of honeyed malt sweetness carries the Saaz hops along, so their grass and spice and florals play out differently than they would in a drier beer. Kind of like when you see a grumpy-looking old man make funny faces at a baby. Even the bitterness has a nice malt sweetness to it.
SR 10 is a true delight, and is so popular that it’s all being sold at the brewery, and getting snapped up by locals like it’s no one’s business. So get in there if you can before it’s all gone. And if you can’t, well … I’m sorry. You’re missing something good.
Mick Wüst
*There is a reference to singing along to Queen, so I suppose that’s part of it. While I don’t get the reference, I am always on board for a Queen sing-a-long.
**And maybe a real one? I think it’s clear by now that this Queenslander is not very familiar with the specifics of what snow is like.
Published July 11, 2024 2024-07-11 00:00:00
