The product of a blossoming brew-mance, the collaboration between The Monk Brewery & Kitchen Head Brewer Paul Wyman and Head Brewer Nick d’Espesissis, of Eagle Bay Brewing Co, is set to be one of the most innovative brews at this year’s Great Australasian Beer SpecTAPular (GABS) festival.
Wyman’s idea for the choc-banana flavoured brew came from a childhood flashback to the joys of choc-banana lollipops, an idea that d’Espesissis was on board with straight away.
The brew is based – unsurprisingly – on the Hefeweizen style with a bit of English Brown Ale inspiration thrown in for good measure. The English Brown aspects create the chocolately base for the brew, while a traditional Hefeweizen yeast provides the characteristic banana esters, and a final dry-hopping – or dry-husking if you will – with single origin cacao husks, from local Margaret River chocolate maker Bahen & Co, providing a definitive chocolate hit.
d’Espesissis has of course brewed with cocoa husks before when he was approached by
Nick was the perfect brewer to join forces with, as he had previous experience brewing Josh Bahen, of Bahen & Co Chocolate Maker, to see if he wanted to utilise his husks, which are a by-product of the chocolate making process.
The brew day took place at Eagle Bay. With, reportedly the A-Team – brewers Nick, Paul and Jack – in attendance, with a brewer dressed in a monk’s robe and Barry Manilow serenading “Copacabana” in the background thrown in for good measure.
The collaboration brew will be tapped at GABS as well as pouring at The Monk Brewery & Kitchen, Fremantle and Eagle Bay Brewing Co, Eagle Bay from late May to early June.