Tuatara: Bavarian Hefe (New Zealand: Hefeweizen: 5.0% ABV)
Visual: Pale cloudy yellow. Thin white head.
Nose: Light raspberry pavlova. Dried banana. Cloves. Wheat. Bubblegum. Dough. Palma violets.
Body: Lemon. Slight sherbet. Barley and honey. Dried banana. Bubblegum. Coriander.
Finish: Light ground up peanuts. Banana. Vanilla. Wet feel.
Conclusion: Not bad. Despite being called “Hefe” this, however, doesn’t rock the full hefeweizen character to my mind. Flavour wise it is pretty close with nice banana and clove notes, but both to the eye and in mouthfeel it cleaves closer to the more filtered Kristalweizen style.
In fact the kristal influence does seem to show up in the weakest parts of the beer – with a slightly neutral malt tone in the middle of the whole thing; A kind of absence of character that the beer needs to fill before it can be what it could be. Despite that weakness they manage to pack around that a decent set of notes – a light coriander spice that calls to the Belgian wit and a nice lemon freshness.
Overall I think I will have to paraphrase my craft beer sis who put it best – it isn’t bad, but it is something that you get because you can easily find it in a NZ supermarket, not because it is one of the better beers. Thanks craft beer sis!
There, that saved me having to think up some pithy way of rounding off the notes.
Background: New Zealand beer! They have a nice wee craft scene over there, so I have been glad to see more of their beers turning up over here. This one grabbed from Independent Spirit. I am aware that I have it in the wrong kind of wheat beer glass, but it is only 330ml so looks silly in my big german weisse glasses. Incidentally the bottle looks kind of like a ribbed dildo, though that was not the only reason I bought it. Weisse beers were one of the first things that got me to try different and tasty beer, so I have long had a soft spot for them.
