Easter Elixirs with The Grocer

This week the Grocer’s blog post comes from our beer aficionado, Denis Cooper.

Exciting times for brewers and brew imbibers alike! Along with the done-and-dusted St Patricks Day and Marchfest; the Nelson hop harvest currently under way, and the soon-to-be-accomplished “Great Kiwi Beer Festival” in Christchurch, there is a bit of malt madness in March. And squeezed in the middle is Easter where one of the most bizarre days of the year occurs: a day where everything is shut with nothing to do, and everything on the shelves gets one day older.

It’s called Good Friday, go figure?

If that’s not enough to wet your whistle and you’re still a bit hoarse then why not try Horsebox, Nelson’s latest brewery. Boasting two brewers who beerly cut their teeth on homebrew and took the horse by the bit, delving straight into brewing three quality beers, all sessionable but carry lot of clout:

• ‘Ronin’ is perhaps one of the better tasting Pilsners below 5% out there. Here you have everything you would expect from a flavoursome Pils. It’s got that inimitable character with a crisp, clean taste, tingly effervescence and a bite-of-a-lime finish.
• ‘Black Stallion Milk Stout’ has a robust body with easy caramel and liquorice tones nourished with scorched roasted malts. Leaving it to warm will bring out its milky smoothness from the lactose sugars. A lot of stout for 5%.
• ‘Storm Hopper APA’ has a thunderous dark berry hop aroma and tastes just like it smells. Dark berries with melon and tangelos and a bitterness from start to lingering finish. Bigger than its 5.7% might suggest, which is good as you might be able to sneak in another bottle without getting into too much trouble? This brew is most excellent with Sealord’s new “Salmon Cakes with Cheese Sauce” selected from the deep-freeze at The Grocer – FreshChoice, Nelson.

Keep browsing the Grocer\’s fridge for the soon-to-be released Horsebox ‘Vigilante’, a New Zealand IPA that promises bold bitterness, woo hoo!

See me @ Fresh Choice this Thursday from 3–6 pm for some exciting Easter elixir taste-teasers in the shape of stout stouts. Gallop down to the Grocer but no horsing around ’cause it ain’t open Friday!

Denis stout lout Cooper