Beer and Wine Tasting While Turning 40!

Welcome to my second beer review while in Adelaide! Last week, the wife and I visited Adelaide to spend some time with family while celebrating my 40th birthday. As part of the celebrations we visited some local wineries and a brewery in the Adelaide Hills. I love the wineries of the Adelaide Hills, and have visited many of them before. But I had never been to a brewery in the Adelaide Hills before, so was very excited to visit the Lobethal Bierhaus. And it also gave me a great opportunity to write up my weekly #BeerSaturday entry.

_{The view from Pike and Joyce Winery}

The Adelaide Hills is a beautiful place. If you're ever travelling in Australia, it's well worth the visit. The wine regions in South Australia are spectacular, and the Adelaide Hills wine region is often overlooked.

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Lobethal Bierhaus and their Specialty Beers

The Lobethal Bierhaus was established in 2007 and has won a few awards since opening their doors. They have 12 different beer styles on tap at any one time. Given that I don't get to visit often, I decided to try one of their 2 beer paddles on offer. I chose the paddle that gave me a chance to try their specialty beers. I love a good beer paddle (who doesn't right?), and this one did not disappoint at all.

tripadvisor.com has a lot of positive things to say about the the Lobethal Bierhaus. However note that these reviews are just as much about the location and food as they are about the quality of their brews

I deliberately chose the specialty beers as the Lobethal Bierhaus does some pretty creative beers. I was excited to see that they still had their Christmas Ale on tap, which really sounded interesting with its Christmas pudding flavours.

The paddle came with an impressive selection of eight of their beers. All of these beers were very fine examples of the breweries range of beers and creativity in the brewing process. There are beers in this selection that were brewed with lentils, right through to beers that taste like creme brûlée.

_{mmmm paddley}

So read on! Here's my summary of each beer on the Specialty Beer Tasting Paddle. At the end of this post each beer will be rated out of 5.

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The Lobethal Bierhaus Specialty Beer Tasting Paddle

Fresh Hop

This is a very hoppy beer, as you'd expect from the it's name. The beer is very refreshing with hops on nose and palate. The hops are very prominent and dominate the flavour with a reasonably low bitterness.

Lentil Pale Ale

The combination of hops and lentils in this beer is just strange. But weirdly the beer is still nice, refreshing and definitely on savoury side. The lentils come through more in the aroma rather than on the palate. This was a strangely enjoyable beer however maybe not one that I would drink by choice.

Single Malt

This beer sounds like a whiskey but really wasn't. It did have a nice and malty aroma however. The beer was very low on bitterness and hops flavours and was simply a very light and malty beer. This was definitely one of the stand out beers of the selection.

Irish Style Red Ale

This really was just a nice and traditional red ale so I'm not sure why it was considered a specialty beer. It had hops malts on the nose which followed through to the palate. The beer came with more bitterness than the previous beers but was still light and refreshing enough to be a session-able beer. This was quite a pleasant red ale.

Extra Hopped IPA

This is a very hoppy beer both on nose and palate which isn't at all surprising given the name. It was weirdly low bitterness though, which makes this beer quite a favourite of mine. The citra hops added a lovely fruitiness to the beer. I’m a huge fan of this beer. Very drinkable and one that I will definitely come back to again.

Creme Brûlée Dessert Ale

Now we're really getting into the creative selection from this brewery. This really was a strange beer. There were hops, sweetness, and a slight bitterness on the nose with lots of sweetness (think caramel and candied sugar) on the palate. There were definite notes of vanilla on the palate as well but the vanilla wasn't easily identified in the aroma. This really was a strange beer. And even now, 24 hours later, I'm not sure if I enjoyed it.

Liquorice Stout

I'm not a stout expect but this came across as quite a light stout compared to what I have had in the past. The beer was low on bitterness with subtle notes of hops. There were light notes of liquorice on the palate and nose which wasn't overpowering. This was a very pleasant beer. I was quite surprised to find that the liquorice flavours came through in the aftertaste which made for a nice finish.

Christmas Ale

Wow. This beer was a surprise. The beer had complex aromas of sweetness and spices and was a very sweet Christmas beer compared to the ones that I tried during the Christmas season. There were some hops on the nose which was quite pleasant. The flavours definitely included the candied sugar that was included in the brewing process. The spices made this a very complex and enjoyable Christmas Ale and this was definitely the best Christmas ale that I’ve had so far.

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_{The Tasting Notes}

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The Beer Data

Beer	Type	Origin	ABV	Rating
Fresh Hop	Pale Ale	Lobethal, SA	4.2%	3.5
Lentil Pale Ale	Pale Ale	Lobethal, SA	5%	3.0
Single Malt	Pale Ale	Lobethal, SA	5%	4.0
Irish Style Red Ale	Red Ale	Lobethal, SA	5.6%	3.5
Extra Hopped IPA	IPA	Lobethal, SA	5.9%	4.5
Creme Brûlée Dessert Ale	Dark Ale	Lobethal, SA	7.6%	3.0
Liquorice Stout	Stout	Lobethal, SA	5.8%	4.0
Christmas Ale	Stout	Lobethal, SA	7.8%	4.5

_{All ratings are out of 5}

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