Wildflower Vibe Batch #1 will be available online and for take-away/collection at our cellar door from 12pm (AEST) on Friday 4 August 2023.
Made from organic malted heritage Schooner barley (Coleambally, NSW) and raw organic spelt from Woodstock farm & flour (Berrigan, NSW). Hopped with organic Motueka and Pride of Ringwood hops. Fermented with our house culture of yeast and bacteria wholly foraged from flowers in NSW and partially aged in 500 litre puncheon for one year before being proportionally blended with a two-week version of itself at bottling. Conditioned in bottle for three months before release.
Topher's production notes
Ah I am really excited to finally have this one out. I've been making spelt beers since the early days of the brewery. The first one was Solera... which ran for 3.5 years, pulling half of its volume every six months. We eventually stopped that project as I was perceiving the acid line in the finished beer to be a little too mean and out of character with our Gold and other beers for that matter.
That was a real shame though because I really love the grain and the spice it lends to a finished beer. I was initially intrigued by it thanks to the Brasserie Blaugies beer Saison d'Épeautre.
Vibe is a blend of ideas from that beer as well as the various spelt beers I have made since... namely Solera, The Vibe of the Thing and Spelt Beer. If you are paying attention, you'll recognise there are two themes going on with our green bottle releases... one is a focus on a specific grist or grain for each one while the other is a single word riff on a Castle quote.. Serenity -> organic raw sugar, Dreamin' -> wheat, Vibe -> spelt and the yet-to-be released Poolroom -> rye.
So Vibe carries this sort of theme along while also blending a technique we have only portrayed in Good as Gold to-date, it's a biere de coupage. We brewed a small batch of Vibe in May 2022 which we then aged for one year in puncheon and blended it with freshly brewed Vibe (May '23) in equal parts to bottle Vibe #1, with those puncheons being backfilled with the Apr 2023 batch.
Clearly I am neither brief in my descriptions of beer nor my intentions for making them so it's no surprise that I am drawn to these old methods which I can only imagine would have been utilised by the necessarily agricultural brewers of yesteryear in freshening up last year's overflow of spelt beer with this year's. I suppose in a way it has a non-vintage element to it all... hmm maybe this beer will be popular amongst some of the modern Barossa producers.
Luke's tasting notes
Spicy earthier aromatics combine with pear skins, grape and sweet stone fruits. A touch of funk and whiff of oak. Fresh palate but with structure... earthy grains and orange citrus in abundance. A sweet fruit mid palate before a moderate bitterness to close. Delicious.
Like all our beers, Vibe Batch #1 is best enjoyed when decanted off a settled natural yeast sediment at cellar temperatures (10-12°C).
Enjoy.
