Sunday, January 6, 2013

New Holland Ginger Kombucha

We tapped this on Friday (Jan 4th) alongside Night Tripper. I'm realizing that it takes about a month to complete a batch of Kombucha, and I'm going to try to stick to that, give or take. I had influence for this one from Unity Vibration, and the fact that we had extra ginger laying around our spice cabinet. Tasted Sunday afternoon at the pub!
Pint Served
4.5% ABV

Appearance: Pale blonde in color with a hint of opacity. Upon the pour, it retains a nice white foam head of about a 1/4" but after several minutes it is reduced to a white ring around the glass. Clarity is impressive for lack of filtration and crashing. The intermittent bubble can be seen rising to the surface.
Aroma: As the pint was put in front of me, I got an immediate whiff of funk acidity. The scent is interesting, faintly reminiscent of under-ripe "Red Delicious" Apples. To compliment, undertones of orange peel and coriander are present. Phenols run high.
Taste: The carbonation hits the palate quick, and lasts through the rest of the tasting experience. Interestingly I get a lot of lemon rind flavors, of which I DID add to this. This flavor is prolonged on into the finish. I get a lot of interesting esters from the preliminary fermentation of the yeast, which faintly give off a character of artificiality but also clove and obvious ginger. As the kombucha beer warms, more of an ester/cidery flavor develops, which is quite pleasant.
Mouthfeel: Carbonation is extremely fine, but nevertheless in high concentration as it foams up on the sides of the mouth and down the throat. Quite a light body in comparison to the Unity Vibrations Triple Goddess Ginger Kombucha, and finishes extremely dry and quenching.
Overall Impression: I'm pretty happy with this one, especially for the balance of spice, kombucha, sweetness and alcohol. For now, I'd like to focus on getting those esters down, which may mean making bigger batches and crashing the yeast out. In case you get to try this, I also added bitter orange peel, lemon peel and coriander, alongside a generous portion of ginger. Enjoy!

1 comment:

  1. Sounds goo man. I hear lemon and ginger parallels with Kombucha's acidity nicely

    ReplyDelete