Australian Sparkling Ale
When Australian sparkling ales needed a little something to brighten them up, along came fun, funky, down-under hops. With some creative hopping, these are worth your time. We will walk a fine line that includes warm mashing and fermentation, atypical hops, and a salts addition— but trust the recipe and trust the process, and you’ll get something fun. Style: The commercial examples on which the Australian Sparkling Ale style is based are driven by good ol’ Coopers: the jet-lagged pale ales that I sampled in 2008. The style itself, when we review it, doesn’t sound too bad, so let’s not assume that the versions we can get shipped in are representative. Somewhat contradictorily, the style is both “light and drinkable” (at less than 5 percent ABV and pale in color) but also has a “large flavor dimension” (I’m not exactly sure what that means, but we’ll assume that it means some malt and hops flavor are okay). In terms of malt, the guidelines reference using Australian 2-row, but if you believe what you read, the Coopers recipe was—for quite a long time—based on an English pale ale malt, so there’s some room for interpretation. As for hops, they recommend the traditional Pride of Ringwood and its cousins, but we’re going to ignore that in favor of something more interesting. However, we will be sticking with the herbal character and minimizing floral flavors.
But this beer, in many ways, is about yeast activity. It’s fermented on the warm side, giving it a distinctly estery profile. It’s also—unsurprisingly—highly carbonated, which adds a fullness to the mouthfeel. Recipe: Begin with a 50/50 split of Pilsner malt (or Australian 2-row, if you can get it) and Maris Otter. To that we add 40L Caramel malt and…that’s it. This one’s pretty straightforward in the grist, and you should land at about 1.046 OG.
For hops, you have some choices. On the one hand, you can play it straight and use Pride of Ringwood. Or you can sit at the cool kids’ table and go with Pacific Jade or Galaxy. I think you know which I recommend! Whichever you pick, work out however much you need to yield 25 IBUS from a 15-minute addition. That should ensure a fair amount of flavor and aroma survives to color up your palate. If it doesn’t, add a whirlpool addition of half an ounce of your hop the next time out (and this is also a good excuse to blend some regionally appropriate hops, too—just stay away from anything that says “floral”).
Finally, for yeast, we want something with character that isn’t a massive flocculator (goodbye, London Ale III), but isn’t super-downy either. Wyeast 1098 (British Ale) is a good choice, and it does some really fun things when fermented warm (without getting out of control or turning your beer into a butter bomb). Process: Since the style mentions mineral, metallic flavors more than once, this is a good style to brew if you’re rocking pretty hard water. If you’re not, hit your mash with a quarter teaspoon of gypsum to add a flinty flavor (and if you don’t like it, it mellows over time). This is also a solid beer to mash warm: it may result in a beer with a bit more body and mouthfeel, but even if it doesn’t, the carbonation level should help, too. Boil as usual, chill, and pitch your yeast.
Ferment this beer, start to finish, warm. Not hot, mind you—this isn’t saison—but at a respectable 68°F (20°C) to start, ramping up to 73°F (23°C) or so after a day or two of fermentation. I’ve never yet gotten an ester that wrecked it at that temperature, but one pitch gave me so much berry I swear it was like we added fruit (we didn’t). It should finish quickly, and don’t bother cold crashing to clear it. Just get it in the bottle or keg and crank up the CO2 to 2.5–3 volumes. That will give us the full mouthfeel and carbonic bite that the style requires and that we’ve already backstopped with our gypsum and warm mash.
Drink it young, too—this one doesn’t age all that well.