How To Find Your Flavour

How To Find Your Flavour

28 Jul 2021

by Mick Wust

“I don’t know anything about art, but I know what I like.” - Orson Welles

If Orson Welles could create Citizen Kane, commonly called the greatest film ever made, surely he’s worth listening to on the topic of art. And the simple truth is that you don’t need to know anything about art to enjoy it.

The same is true of beer. There’s no shame for someone to say: “I don’t know anything about beer, but I know what I like.” You never have to feel bad about where you are on your beer journey, because beer isn’t there to judge you. Beer doesn’t care how much you know about beer styles, or the brewing process, or the science behind fermentation. Its sole purpose in life is to be enjoyed.

Only Craft Beer wants to make things easy for you. If you know what beer you want to buy, or what brewery you want to buy from, or what beer style you’re after - great!


You can search this online marketplace for independent Australian beers along these lines. You can also keep learning about different beer styles if you’re interested - check out the articles about lagers, pale ales, sour beers, dark beers, and IPAs.

 

But if you just know what you like, then we’ve got your back.

 

Hover over ‘Shop by Flavour’ at the top navigation bar, and you’ll enter a wonderland of options - a range of mouthfeel descriptions, flavour descriptions, hop flavour intensity and malt flavour intensity, all provided by brewers to help you find what you like.

 

You might want to try something tagged with Berries - have a click, and you’ll see there are two beers with this description. Blackman’s Patsy Wild Berry Sour is tagged as Fizzy, Berries, Strawberry, and Sour, with low hop and low malt intensity, while Ballistic IPA is tagged Fizzy, Light, Berries, Fruity, Pine with high hop intensity and fairly high malt intensity.


Which one sounds like it’s up your alley?


If your tastebuds can’t get enough hops, click on maximum hop intensity and just work your way through the beers - start with Exit Red IPA, then move onto Sunday Road 6 Ft & Offshore, Posso’s IPA, Mash Brewing’s Battle Cat… you’ll be busy for a while. 

Or perhaps you click on Vanilla because you have a sweet tooth, then decide to choose a beer based on the design on the can. One has a cow on the label, one has a skull, one has a French bulldog, and one has a fat nerd.


Which one tickles your fancy?


With over 50 descriptors for mouthfeel and flavour, as well as a 1-5 scale for both hops and malt, there are plenty of pathways for you to find those flavours you like.


Of course, no system is perfect - everyone’s tastes are a little different, and you might not know what to expect from Peppery and Clove in a beer (try Dad & Dave’s Belgian IPA to find out) or from a Smooth/Velvety pale ale with Caramel and Toffee Malt (such as Prickly Moses’ Otway Pale Ale).

But we’re confident you’ll find something you like - even if you don’t know anything about beer.