The Session – Doppelbock

These sessions are getting harder and harder. There are few quicker ways to make my eyes glaze over and none more effective at inspiring me to words not out of place in a Spitfire ad than to mention German beer to me. I have little interest in German beer, when I can avoid it, I do.

Doppelbock of course isn’t the worst beer style in the world, however when I drink it I cant help but think ‘this would be so much better if you swapped the lager yeast for an ale one and the German malt and hops for English’ lovely ! a Strong ale, sorted. Alright, enough with my prejudices I should give this a stab.

Outside of judging the only bock I have had in the last year was related to the cheese beer tasting I ran last summer, I have had no doppelbock at all in the last year. I was looking for a match for Meyer Old Gouda, not surprisingly there was an abundance of ale styles already pencilled in for the tasting and I knew I should really find something that was stylistically from the continent. The beer I wanted to use was actually not from Germany but from a former German colony, Namibia. The Hansa UR-Bock is a pretty fantastic example of the style from the most unlikely of locations.

Namibian Breweries Hansa UR-Bock 7%

Pours a dark red with a white thick head. Aroma features bready malt, a tussocky/honeyish German hop note and some fruit. On the palate the bready character is continued, joined by sweet toffee and a hint of roast, the finish is malt accented but does clean out from the hops.

In the end Regional Wines couldn’t source enough UR-Bock for the tasting so we went with HB Maibock and that combination turned out to be one of the best of the tasting.

Fingers crossed that next months host picks a topic closer to my heart, cheers/