Hot summer days need long cold beer

There’s something about the smell of summer that really captures the imagination. Clean cut grass, a salty sea breeze, the smell of snapper and sausages on the barbeque all combine to flare the nostrils and send your right hand fumbling for your nearest and dearest – that special beer that exemplifies all that is good and right in the season.

Eternal favourites such as Heineken, Stella Artois and Steinlager will always suit a day at the beach, watching the kids play cricket, or even a relaxed day on the veranda. All suit a wide variety of foods and can cure summer-itis: that insatiable thirst after a miserable day at the office. Lion Nathan’s new kid on the block, Steinlager Pure, has continued to smash all sales predictions both here and abroad, providing that clean, preservative-free Kiwi taste that will leave any holidaymaker’s urban woes behind.

‘Limited release’ brews have fast become market staples over the past few years, exemplified by the Mac’s and Monteith’s ranges. Their summer seasonal releases, Mac’s Sundance Summer Ale and Monteith’s Summer Ale, are popular with good reason: Sundance brings a lovely citrus tang to the tongue, perfect for everything from salad through to shellfish, while Monteith’s Summer Ale is a Rata honey and spice beer brewed with four different malts, adding a little zest that again screams ‘Deckchairs. Outside. Now!’

Mexicans know the ‘hot’ season inside out, as you’d expect from a country that effectively doesn’t have a winter as we understand it. With this in mind it’s no surprise that beers like Corona and Sol do a rip roaring trade this time of year (or in Corona’s case, everywhere and all of the time), with their smooth, subtle flavours sparked up by a lemon slice in the neck. These Mexican brews are rapidly becoming a traditional part of the Kiwi summer.

The seasonal fuss over these lighter beers may appear to kick the ‘heavier’ stouts and dark lagers out of the limelight till the winter seasons, but once a giant rack of Moroccan lamb is on the barbie and inch thick porterhouse steaks are bleeding onto your plate, only a truly grunty beer can compliment the experience. Monteith’s and Mac’s both offer bold, dark beers as do a lot of the boutique beer brands such as Epic and Moa, but hidden gems like Invercargill Brewery’s handcrafted Pitch Black will also stand out. Stout in every sense of the word, Pitch Black’s signature coffee and dark chocolate bite is perfect for desserts, cake and is fantastic with seafood.

Summer 08: gone are the days of mindless beer-chugging. Like a fine wine, matching the right beer with the right food is a fun and rewarding experience, and can turn your next summer event into a revelation for all involved