We are very excited to announce that for the first time Wildflower St Abigail 2020 will be available online and for take-away/collection from 12pm (Sydney time) on Friday 2 October 2020.
St Abigail is an Australian Wild Ale refermented with white peaches. While the beer is named for Chris and his wife Emily's second daughter, Saint Abigail was a medieval healer and beekeeper from County Clare, Ireland. In 2020, this beer was made from golden mixed fermentation, barrel aged beer and 1,100kg of fresh, tree ripened white peaches hand picked from Thornbrook Orchard in Nashdale, NSW.
In 2019 the Wildflower family grew by 2 with the birth of Abigail and Walter into Chris' and my families respectively. While the safe and healthy arrival of each of these kids brought us joy enough, it was also pleasing to be able to offer two new fruit beers each year bearing their names as a result.
In 2019, we swapped damaged white peaches for apricots to make St Henry as the apricot harvest crop had been entirely wiped out due to hail, you can read more here. We really loved the resulting beer here at WF HQ and earmarked the fruit if and when we had another child to make a fruit beer for. With the birth of Abigail, sweet little thing, we thought this fruit was befitting and went to work.
On 19 and 20 February, Paula and her team at the orchard hand picked 1,100kg of white peaches for us which we brought down to Sydney and moved into stainless steel variable capacity vessels. By the time we racked beer onto the fruit, they were practically falling apart... absolutely delicious. We selected a number of aged Gold barrels, blended them with the fruit and allowed the two to macerate and go through a refermentation for 4 months. In late June we began washing the fruit, as is our normal process and blended it to be bottled on 8 July 2020. The beer was allowed to condition in bottle for 16 weeks before release in October.
We had a hunch this beer would be special at bottling, however at release, its full colours have come out and made it one of our favourite beers to have been made here. Peach dominant aromas, sweet perfumed ripe white peaches and peach fuzz. Vanilla custard, vanilla slice, vanilla cake. Soft, engaging and delicious.The palate reflects the nose with peach flesh the hero. The gold base sings, lending wonderful acidity, vibrancy and freshness. A sherbety funky peach finish that persists a long long time.
A real standout marriage of fruit and beer. We hope you enjoy it as much as we do.
