Heavy Gyle is yet again a new type of beer for us, something only able to be experimented within the Collective.

In the canons of brewing there exists a type of wort production whereby a single mash of cereals is employed to produce two different worts of varying degrees. That is to say you use the same cereals to make two beers, generally a heavier one and then a lighter one (heavier meaning more sugar -> higher ABV and lighter less sugar -> lower ABV). There are a couple advantages of this parti-gyle brewing, but mainly an increased efficiency in the extraction from the grains. The downside is time... it takes a good while to do this, but back in the day brewers were more focused on thrift than production output.

With the new brewery soon to come online, I have been keen to attempt making a beer in this way to see if I could specifically make table beer as a lighter wort and make something else as the heavier one.

This beer, Heavy-Gyle, is the result of that test. A barrel aged Australian Wild Ale made from the first runnings of a large Organic Table Beer mash, hopped with Nelson Sauvin and Rakau.

The result is a great fun beer. Hop forward across the nose, punchy citrus and tropical fruits dominate but they’re backed by earthy spice. A soft creamy oak savouriness adds a lovely dimension. Similar palate... citrus line with juicy stone fruits of nectarine and peach. There’s a real textual element, sweet fruit and oak give weight and creamy depth to the beer. It’s bursting with flavour, low acid and bitterness makes its so crushable.

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