SOBA NHBC Champion Beer launched

Society of Beer Advocates (SOBA) Inc.

Thursday, 24 February 2011

SOBA NHBC Champion Beer launched

This year’s SOBA National Homebrew Competition was won by Dale Cooper for his Belgian Pale Ale.

The prize for winning is that the lucky home brewer gets his or her beer commercially brewed at Hallertau under the watchful eye of Steve Plowman, owner and brewer.

Dale had only been all-grain brewing for a year when he brewed the beer, and experimented with both NZ floral hops and hops found traditionally in a Belgian Pale Ale before deciding the NZ-hopped beer was best.

For those of you who don’t know, a Belgian Pale Ale is typified by malt-forward, fruity character with a low hop aroma. The malt is biscuity and toasty and the beer may have a distinct floral or spicy/peppery taste. For those of you who don’t care for back-of-the-bottle fluff, it’s bound to be a good beer as it beat about 300 beers to win.

The official launch of the as yet unnamed beer will be for SOBA members at the Hallertau Brewbar and Restaurant in Riverhead, Auckland on Sunday 27th February. Look out for the beer appearing at your local craft beer bar soon after.

Special thanks should go to Steve Plowman for stepping up to brew the winning beer again. After last year’s coconut porter created by Andrew Cherry, we’re all looking forward to drinking and enjoying Dale’s NZ-inspired Belgian winner.

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