Ten Craft Brewers and Their Brews

Kiwis sure do love beer. In fact, as a country we consumed 289 million litres of frosty goodness just last year. In keeping with our growing thirst, the annual New Zealand Beer Festival is set to take over Auckland’s Queen’s Wharf this weekend with 120 different brews on offer from Invercargill to Waiheke and everywhere in between. In the lead up to Beer Fest, we’ve outlined nine local brewers (plus one Aussie) and some of their glorious brews you should introduce to your palate.

1. Yeastie Boys

As well as paying tribute to the Amercian hip-hop trio Beastie Boys, Wellington independent brewers Yeastie Boys also take on some of the hip hop attitude and translate it into bold, brash statement making flavours. The part time hobby has earned the two brewers two trophies for their flagship porter Pot Kettle Black.

Drink of choice - Rex Attitude

Taking out the Morton Coutts Trophy for Innovation at the Brewers Guild of New Zealand Awards, Rex Attitude is the world's first heavily-peated single malt ale and packs smoky flavor described as a “BBQ in a beer”. For those who can get past the initial shock, it carries subtle and beguilingly drinkable textures.

2. Harrington's Breweries

In response to overpriced brown ales, John Harrington set up his own brewery to provide real beer at a price that was agreeable to hard working folk. The beers are brewed according to the 1487 German Beer Purity Law which dictates that the only ingredients fit for beer are water, barley and hops. With one Harrington’s buildings destroyed in the Christchurch earthquake, a new building brewery is set to open this March so they can continue to pump out more of the sweet, sweet nectar.

Drink of choice - Big John Special Reserve

One for the dark beer lovers. Harrington’s Big John Special Reserve is conditioned in oak bourbon barrels for 12 months and its intimidatingly dark and opaque shade gives off whiffs of whiskey, malt and chocolate. It was listed in the book 1001 Beers You Must Taste Before you Die.

3. ParrotDog

ParrotDog was first set up as a home-brewing partnership out of a flat in Wellington, under the watchful eye of an Indian Ringneck parrot. The duo has since set up shop in the heart of the city and can count several beer awards to their name.

Drink of choice - BitterBitch

The brewer's first commercially available contract brewed beer, BitterBitch, has scooped accolades including the Best in Class trophy at the Brewers Guild of New Zealand Beer Awards and People’s Choice at Beervana 2011. It’s aggressive, tropical New Zealand-hopped aroma gives way to a rich, copper coloured malt base and a lingering bitterness to finish.

4. Invercargill Brewery

A father and son team inspired by a stint with a champagne-loving rugby team in France. Originally operating out of a dis-used diary shed on the outskirts of the Southland hub, the brewery recently underwent an upgrade and moved into a more central location, which houses a 2500-litre batch brewery. Their nearby bottle-shop can also be found around the corner featuring all nine of their beers on tap.

Drink of choice - Pitch Black Imperial Stout

Five years in the conceptual stage and six months brewing, the Pitch Black Imperial Stout is worth the wait. The brewers basically doubled the recipe of their gold medal Pitch Black stout and aged it in a Central Otago pinot noir oak barrel for three months, which ultimately developed hints of vanilla. The beer won the brewery the 2013 Australian International Beer Awards Bronze Medal.

5. Mike's Brewing

As well as being one of New Zealand’s smallest craft breweries, mike’s is actually the country’s oldest, brewing beers since 1989. For 25 years the family owned brewery has followed the ethos of “more flavour, less gas”.

Drink of choice - Premium Whiskey Porter

Mike’s Premium Whiskey Porter only sees a single brew each Summer and is left to mature in whisky and oak barrels through before being released in the depths of Winter. The aroma is intricate with roasted malt, toffee and smoky notes upon treacle backround. For optimum pleasure, the beer should be served at room temperature in a goblet. It packs a punch at 10.5% ABV.

6. Panhead Custom Ales

Upper Hutt master brewer and former Tuatara Beer employee Mike Neilson sold his family home and spent $750,000 to build Panhead - named after the Harley Davidson engine. The plant has the capacity to produce 280,000 litres in a year, with a plan to pump out 1 million. The company’s technique is to strip back a brew to its essence and rebuild it in a way that honours tradition as well as the alchemy of creation.

Drink of choice - Supercharger American Pale Ale

The Supercharger APA is a nod to Upper Hutt's motoring heritage, although you could say it gives more of a hat tip our country’s local fruit industry with aromas of passion fruit and citrus popping through the reddish colour. It uses a combination of American and locally grown hops.

7. Wigram Brewing Company

Wigram Brewing Company launched in 2003, ten year’s after its home suburb closed down one of the country's main Air Force bases. The brewery’s main mission is “to produce quality full flavoured beer and educate the New Zealand palate”. And they do so with a range of 15 beers that don’t contain any preservatives, artificial colouring or added sugars. They’ve picked up multiple awards, even for their bottle design - which features a pilot drinking a frost one in the cockpit.

Drink of choice - Czar Imperial Stout

The Wigram Czar Imperial Stout is brewed in the authentic historical style of an Imperial Russian Stout. It’s crafted from rich roasted and toasted malts, fermented with classic English ale yeast. At 8.5% ABV the Czar lives up to its name as an ultimate ruler.

8. Hallertau Brewery

Nestled amongst the rolling farmland of Riverhead in Auckland, Hallertau specialise in their own distinctive, unpasteurised and unfiltered craft beers. Their beer is crafted using only yeast, rainwater, and fistfuls of hops and is simply known by numbers to aide in easy ordering and to avoid misheard orders at the bar.

Drink of choice - #2 (Statesman Pale Ale)

I’ll have a number Two please. The Hallertau Statesman Pale Ale presents itself with a floral bouquet underpinned by notes of honey and citrus, plus a good dose of hoppy tang for good measure. It pours in a lovely shade of amber with a medium sized head.

9. Waiheke Island Brewing

The island’s only micro-brewery is under the control of noted microbrewery veteran and apparent eccentric, Alan Knight. Beyond casually brewing masterful batches Alan lives in an armed compound in Ostend, leading to kilt wearing, folk singing, gunfire, large scale home brewing operations and amateur theatricals.

Drink of choice - Baroona Original

Named after the old ferry that used to bring people to and from the island, Baroona Original is the first ever brew to come out of the island and since 1997 its recipe has never been altered. It takes its inspiration from the German beer by the name of Kolsch and uses locally grown Saaz hops to produce a light, golden beer with a malty palate and hints of honey comb and citrus.

10. Little Creatures Brewing

It’s only fair to feature one Aussie in the list. The Fremantle-based brewers take their name from the Talking Heads’ sixth album, as well as referring to the live yeast cells that turn the sugars in malt wort into alcohol. Initially only brewing one type of beer (more on that below), the brewery now features four different brews, as well as a cider, and pumps out 10 million litres of the good stuff every year.

Drink of choice - Little Creatures Pale Ale

Little Creature’s flagship beer the Little Creatures Pale Ale uses hops from all over the world resulting in intense citrus and stone fruit characters with notes of honey and biscuit. On top of that the brewers also submerge a giant tea bag full of hop flowers into the unfermented beer for maximum flavour.