BEER: White Rabbit Dark Ale

September 22, 2009

White Rabbit Dark Ale (Healesville, Vic)
$23 6 pack, 5.2%

The latest addition to the Little Creatures empire, this essentially artisan brew is produced in a spanking new facility in Healesville, located (suitably) next door to Little Creatures founder Phil Sexton’s Giant Steps megadoor (it’s not a cellar door, it’s a small village).
With a setup that was spared no expense, featuring brewing equipment trucked in from both Little Creatures Fremantle brewery and all over Europe, the framework was set for some seriously fine beer.

Production of this beer then sounds more like classic winemaking than brewing, featuring traditional open fermenters, whole hops and hands off methods, echoing the brewing of yore, yet coupled with modern technology to encourage consistency.

The end result, I’m happy to say, is simply great beer. A creamy and quite textural dark ale with excellent freshness, it had me thinking ‘session beer’ as opposed to ‘quiet contemplation’, largely thanks to its lightness and how quickly the beer emptied.

It’s not ultra serious, but it is made particularly seriously, which I have plenty of time for.

More please.

Beer, Yarra Valley

Andrew Graham was once voted the 23rd most trusted wine critic on the planet. A WCA Journalism Young Gun now old hack with 25yrs as a buyer, judge, journalist, marketer and too much more.

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7 responses to “BEER: White Rabbit Dark Ale”

Blogking

September 23, 2009 at 7:53 pm

So I, myself, am a wine taster. Been looking around for new types that I havent come across or have heard of before, and I thought I'd pass this along to see what you thought about JM Fonseca Twin Vines. Its a new wine, well, at least I havent heard of it in the past. Wanted to know if you've heard of it, and if you have and have tried it, what you thought about it. The URL is too messy to put up so I shortened it down.

http://tinyurl.com/meko65

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Andrew Graham

September 24, 2009 at 12:58 am

Sadly I don't believe this comes to Australia. Big fan of Portugese varietals though…

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Anonymous

September 24, 2009 at 4:36 am

Great easy drinking beer this. Almost too easy actually. Im looking forward to a trip to the Yarra Valley where the White Rabbit Brewery will be a definite stop.

Dave

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Andrew Graham

September 24, 2009 at 4:43 am

Cheers Dave,

A beer or three at the White Rabbit brewery, then some of the great 08 Giant Steps Tarraford wines next door, accompanied by the awesome Giant Steps pizzas.

Yum

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rm

October 6, 2009 at 11:29 pm

don't try it at the brewery, you'll never go back to the enormously inferior bottled version again.

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Tyson

January 13, 2010 at 12:45 am

Downed a six of this last night and I have to say one fantastic beer. I went to the shop looking for a good stout and got this instead; I was not disappointed ^-^

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Zombie Blogs

May 31, 2011 at 11:31 am

so guys i work at a micro brewery, and after weeks of trying to best figure out how to tell good beers apart from the excellent i decided id do the local taphouse hottest 100 beers and work my way through, check it out if you want, give me feedback, im learning so go easy but definately check it out!

cheers

ps: white rabbit came in at number 7 and is in there too!

http://100morereasonstodrinkbeer.blogspot.com/

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