Call it the beer-lovers beer of choice. After all, to be voted top beer by the country’s most avid consumers must mean something.
Panhead Custom Ales’ Supercharger – a super-hoppy American pale ale – topped the voting at the annual SOBA awards for the best beer of 2015.
SOBA – the Society of Beer Advocates – votes each year on the best beer, brewery nationwide as well as the best bars and restaurants for beer around the country.
The fact Supercharger came out on top this year marks a subtle shift in the drinking preferences of the country’s most avid fans: at 5.7 per cent alcohol, Supercharger marks a definite step down from the two previous winners of the best beer title. Last year Panhead’s The Vandal (8 per cent) supplanted Liberty Brewing’s C!tra (9 per cent).
It might not seem a lot on face value but a 2 to 3 per cent drop in actual alcohol volume is a relatively massive decrease in alcohol consumed. In this instance, Supercharger has 28 per cent less alcohol than its Upper Hutt posse mate The Vandal, and a whopping 36 per cent less than C!tra.
And that means a hell of a lot for the car-driving pub-goer – or anyone who wants to have that extra drink without feeling too much worse for wear.
Despite the lower alcohol, Supercharger is a hi-revving hop beast – as much because the relatively lower alcohol impacts perception of sweetness and jacks up the perceived bitterness. So much so, some online reviews reckon it’s almost too much of a hop hit. As the label suggests this beer has “more bitterness than a Palm Springs divorce”.
But that’s also an injustice to aromatic hops which take you to a grassy glade strewn with pine needles.
At around $21 in the supermarket for a box of six 330ml bottles, and a cool-looking box it is too, Supercharger is great value for money. (As an aside, one trend in the craft beer segment is better value – especially for six packs. As smaller breweries like Panhead increase production the higher volumes inevitably lead to lower pricing. At just over $1 per 100ml there’s great value here.)
Despite the obvious popularity of Supercharger, however, Panhead couldn’t topple Garage Project as the country’s favourite brewery – a title they’ve won two years running.
Full results: www.soba.org.nz
Disclaimer: the author is a paid-up member of SOBA.
