Official Beer Taster

[Barbara Joppa]

In today's Herald there was a large ad for a brewery called Boundary Road. They are looking for beer tasting consultants - 999 people to try 3 lager recipes which they will deliver to your home. One lucky person will be chosen to be the Chairman of Tasters and receive a home brewing kit (this is the fancy one discussed in full on this site a couple months back - the bench top $6K one).

 

I have entered (what the hell - I like beer). Applications are being taken at TheChosenOne.co.nz

Does anyone have further info on this beyond what is in the paper?

 

[Haish]

Yep, I'm a taster too...

[Dougal]

Me too. I'm a little concerned that three bottles of NZ draught are being sent to me...apparently I have to like one of them.

[Ralph]

Gah, no reply in the positive or negative for me :(

[Greig McGill]

Sorry, I jump from irc, to twitter, to email, to here... I sometimes forget not everyone is the giant screaming nerd I am, and I use a lot of "internet abbreviations". Which is odd, as I can't stand txtspk and such.

[Hugh Grierson]

"screaming nerd" sounds like a good beer name. Maybe a loud american pale ale?

[Stu McKinlay]

Giant Screaming Nerd would have to be the imperial IPA.

But since we already did Nerdherder, you'd look like a planker if you used that name (that's me invoking the unofficial TM).

On that note: Nerdherder, on cask, June 13 at Galbraith's Ale House. Be there!!

 

ps. Hugh - love the new avatar. I've been there you know (not taking the piss here, to the place in Greece... and yes, I took a picture of the road sign).

[Hugh Grierson]

Beer named Vergina ! how could that not be funny. As for the nerd herder, a true geek would have called Nerfherder.

[JackoNZ]

OK here they are, the beers were in the letter box when I got home tonight. Chucked them all in the fridge to chill, probably try them tomorrow. They have obviously gone great guns on the advertising for all this, I just hope the beers are as good! You kind of wonder if anything this heavily marketed is trying to make up for something, we'll see.

[JackoNZ]

Tried each of the beers earlier on. Pretty disappointed with all three to be honest. Couldn't argue with the clarity of each, incredibly clear, that was where the good ended though. Beer A smelled a bit like apple and had an overly sweet taste to it like most mega swill beer does. Beer B was hopped a bit more I think, bitterness was up a level and some hop on the nose. A little bit of sweetness in the background but still couldn't finish a glass of it. Beer C was a weird one, little yeasty and wheat like on the nose. I thought I got some malt flavour with this one but it seemed to come and go. I'd probably pick C out of them all but certainly wouldn't be buying a 6 pack when they hit the market. 

What do the rest who got beers reckon?

[Stu McKinlay]

that's the wrong kind of geek Hugh...

[Chris Mills]

http://bit.ly/kG0CqN - www.business.govt.nz listing showing shareholders for BRB.

 

Is it me or does their URL look more like "Choose None"? Clever bit of viral marketing.

 

What I wonder is will the three bottles be the same beer but with different coloured labels?

[Dougal]

Tried mine tonight. I'd echo everything that Jacko said. 

All three were (very) slight variations on each other.

A was sweet, watery and cidery, a bit of sulphur, slightly like a thinner version of Mac's Gold.

B was watery, sweet, had a slight hint of hop flavour that wasn't so bad, but no malt or bitterness to back it up.

C was my pick (well you have to pick one apparently), for having slightly more bitterness, a bit of grain character and an odd lingering flavour I couldn't pick, almost dusty or mouldy. 

 

Given that I couldn't drink a glass of any, I decided to re-frame the exercise by adding option D...in this case a canned D.A.B. Dortmunder. The difference in sweetness and hop character was disturbing.

I'm changing my pick to option D, so hopefully Boundary Road will release slabs of ultra cheap Dortmunder very soon...