Cascade Spring Fest

[Doc]

Has anyone seen or tried the new Four Seasons Cascade beer (Spring Fest) ?

It is supposed to be similar in style to a Bavarian Helles.

I haven't found it at my local bottleshop yet.

Beers,
Doc

 

[Gough]

Yeah, tried it about a fortnight ago. Read the review from Willie Simpson in todays SMH. I basically agree with him, a 'nice' beer, quite malty and tasty enough, but no real hop 'excitement' as he put it. I just called it a little bland. 7/10 on the Goughometer with some of those points for bothering to try something differsnt! Always a positive from one of the big breweries.

Shawn.

 

[PostModern]

Believe it or not Gough, it's the home brewers like all of us here that make the big breweries do things like seasonal beers. The HB industry in America led to the birth of the microbrewery industry over there, and in turn that led to the macros lifting their game. All power to the HB! Homebrewers revived the Porter for one thing. I can't recall/don't know of other styles similarly rescued, but I'm sure there are others.

So three cheers to homebrewers!

 

[Gough]

All good points PM. Just out of interest I'm going to the "Inaugural Newcastle Exotic Beer Club Dinner" on Saturday night where we will be trying a selection of 8 specially chosen beers to go with the food, and will also be trying some new brews from a new local microbrewery. I'm not part of the club and for all I know it could turn into a monumental wank, but hopefully not. The bloke who is organising it writes the beer column for the Newcastle Herald and has some interesting ideas, but when I emailed him to book my seat and told him I was a homebrewer his reaction was one of amazement that I'd be interested in trying different beers because homebrewing to him was only about "cheap piss". Mmmm. He was surprised (and interested) that there was a community of us out there brewing for quality and difference, not just price. Should be an interesting night...

Have you or anyone else been to one of these kind of nights? I'm interested in people's thoughts.

Shawn.

 

[Trev]

I got hold of a 4 pack last week and tried a couple. I enjoyed it and in thinking back, I guess I'd agree that there wasn't any strong hop flavour to it. The malt showed through quite nice. I have 2 left so I must take the opportunity to knock them off as well.

Interestingly, I also picked up a 6 pack of HB Octoberfiest. Worth a try and nice and easy drinking, probably a good session beer. I hadn't really tried one before and was expecting something with a much bigger flavour and mouthfeel. Still got another 2 of them as well

Trev

 

[Doc]

I went to a beer dinner as part of the Sydney Good Food month (Sept) that was hosted by Chuck Hahn.
Was a good night.
The food was fantastic (Salt restaraunt) and there was a good selection of beers. A couple too many Hahn (hahn and Malt Shovel) ones but good nevertheless.

Beers,
Doc

 

[Jazman]

i tire done of those hb (german one) octoberfest beers i thought it was very good may make one next year when i will be making largers

 

[Barry]

Good Day
A helles should be driven by a pils malt aroma and flavour with just enough nonle hops to balance the malt. If it had more hops to spice it up it might be a nice beer but it would not be a typical Munich helles. I have not tried this beer yet but I hope I can buy one soon. Does anyone know where I can get it in Sydney?

 

[PostModern]

All good points PM. Just out of interest I'm going to the "Inaugural Newcastle Exotic Beer Club Dinner" on Saturday night where we will be trying a selection of 8 specially chosen beers to go with the food, and will also be trying some new brews from a new local microbrewery. I'm not part of the club and for all I know it could turn into a monumental wank, but hopefully not. The bloke who is organising it writes the beer column for the Newcastle Herald and has some interesting ideas, but when I emailed him to book my seat and told him I was a homebrewer his reaction was one of amazement that I'd be interested in trying different beers because homebrewing to him was only about "cheap piss". Mmmm. He was surprised (and interested) that there was a community of us out there brewing for quality and difference, not just price. Should be an interesting night...

Have you or anyone else been to one of these kind of nights? I'm interested in people's thoughts.

Shawn.

That's a surprising response from the beer writer. I'd imagine specialist journalists would be familiar with all of the culture surrounding their field. The "kit and kilo from Franklins" crowd still seem to have the numbers or at least hold public perception of the hobby/craft.

I think I should use the term "craft brewer" to describe the type of hobbyist that makes the differences I mentioned rather than the generic "home brewer"... However, we all enjoy the same hobby, it's just a matter of immersion, so to speak

Anyway, no, I haven't been to any of those nights. I'm just a humble public servant with a family. Any night out for me takes months of planning for some reason. Part of the reason I took up the hobby actually.

 

[jayse]

just had a huge pint of this.
for anyone in adelaide the archer st hotel in nth adelaide has 650ml pints for $5.
anyway it was very much to me like a pils.it had that very dry malt flavour and feel.you could taste a nice balance with the hops.
but the main thing was the dry maltiness.
it is well worth a try it is by no means a original but it is a great drop.
iam not much a lager brewer but i would say it uses either the czech pils or bohemium pils yeast.pils malt and munich malt.the hops i would say maybe saaz or hersbrucker but iam not sure.

 

[Doc]

Cracked the bottle of Spring Fest I have tonight.
Not much aroma, nice and crystal clear.
Nice hop flavour in mine.

All in all a nice crisp clean lager with good hop bitterness.

I would also lean more towards a Pilsner than a Helles.

Not a lot of head though.

On the HB Oktoberfest; I bought one a couple of weeks ago and was very dissappointed. Was expected much more body and maltiness.

Beers,
Doc

 

[jayse]

i tried it again on tap yesterday.
this time against a real micro brew bohemium pilsner(made by some melbourne lot owned by the beer giants, they also have beers like the beez neez etc.)
Anyway the pilsner after the spring fest had alot more bitterness and maybe even a tad drier.

with the spring fest this time i noticed a real hersbrucker flavour to it but nothing like the bitterness of the pilsner.
I reckon you would lose a lot of this beer qualities if you drank it from the bottle the same as HB.

i love the HB dunkel but like most here i expected more from the oktoberfest. I'll be trying the oktoberfest again though and i bet now i will get a better taste for it. it amazing how your taste develops everyday when your spend most of your life dedicated to beer.

I'll be arking up the lager fridge now and give one of these brews ago.
it will be my first real all grain european lager of any type .

 

[THE DRUNK ARAB]

Did you try these at the Archer jayse?

 

[jayse]

yep the archer st hotel. Not a bad joint however they could get in even more aussie micro beers. i would expect them to have lcpa on tap to really beable to call themselves a premium aussie beer bar.
Even ship over some beers from the sail and anchor. to me the archer is a little to oreinted towards the beer giants beer.
i go in at least once a month too check out the changing monthly beers.
Too my shock and horror they have heinikin in one of their serving vessels this month.
That is really selling out.

 

[Trough Lolly]

Has anyone seen or tried the new Four Seasons Cascade beer (Spring Fest) ?

It is supposed to be similar in style to a Bavarian Helles.

I haven't found it at my local bottleshop yet.

Beers,
Doc

Sorry to bump a long dead thread, but I thought I'd pass on my impressions of the Cascade Four Seasons brew...

Went to a relatively new club here in Canberra (the Mawson Club) with the family and had a quick look at their beer range - not too bad, but hell it sure ain't cheap buying a beer nowadays, is it? :angry: $5 for a schooner of Stella - is that cheap or dusty? (Married with kids, so have no idea about bar prices nowadays! - that's why I brew B) )

Anyway, they had Cascade Pale Ale and Four Seasons on tap - as well as Tooheys, VB, other assorted swill beers, Stella, Beez Neez or something like that The bloody pagans even had Guinness in tall cans! :blink: Other than the Stella and canned Guiness :blink: there was very little O/S beer available - but the Austrian / Australian club is only 50 metres away :lol: :chug:

So I asked for a Four Seasons - IMHO, its a pils with perhaps a touch of wheat malt ?! and minimal hop profile to balance the malt and that's all - it looked great in the tall glass, good head retention, nice lacing, well carbonated and bugger all aroma but to be honest, it didn't knock my socks off I felt that it was a bit watery and the lack of hops made it a reasonable but not memorable pils - it was as if somebody had brewed a nice part mash pils at home and added 1 too many litre of water in the fermenter to bring down the post boil gravity!!

I hope I haven't offended any Coopers fans - sure, it's a beer for hot weather or the barbie but I wouldn't push the JS Pilsner out of the way to get my hands on a sixpack of this baby

Cheers,
TL