By Willie Simpson

It was the late English beer writer Michael Jackson who I first heard coin the phrase “beer geek” – which has been adopted by one of this week’s featured beers. He was referring to the earnest types who would frequently button-hole him after a gig, usually to inform him about some far-flung brewery or rare beer they had tracked down.

These are the sort of people who plan their annual holidays around as many brewery visits as possible, often with a reluctant spouse in tow. OK, it’s something I’ve been guilty of myself but, hey – I’m a professional.

I’m not sure, exactly, what the definition of a beer geek is, but readers who can answer most of the following questions correctly, probably qualify:

Have you ever paid more than $20 for a bottle of beer? How many Trappist breweries are there in Belgium and can you name them? What is the correct pronunciation of Marzen? What is the highly-expensive, special ingredient used in Mikkeller Beer Geek Brunch?

It’s not so unusual, these days, to shell out $20-plus for a bottle of imported beer – something like Chimay Grand Reserve or any of the Mikkeller range from Denmark.

In fact, there are six Trappist monastry breweries in Belgium – Achel, Chimay, Orval, Rochefort, Westmalle and Westvleteren. The latter is by far the smallest and its beers are never exported, while Achel is the most recent player, having coming on line in 1998.

Marzen is pronounced maer-tsen with the ae sounding like the a in “mad” rather than “Mars”. Marzen means March and such seasonal beers were traditionally produced in that month before the onset of hot weather made lager brewing problematic in Germany. Such beers were designed to be broached in October and this is where the Oktoberfest tradition arose from. The beer style terms Marzen and Oktoberfestbier are interchangeable for this type of strong, pale golden festive lager.

Little Creatures Marzen is the latest in their single batch releases and ticks most boxes on the style guidelines, and I loved the underlying herbal hop flavours which you don’t always find in the German brews.

Mikkeller Beer Geek Brunch is an imperial stout brewed with Indonesian coffee beans known as kopi luwak – made with beans which have been swallowed by a civet cat and later, ahem … retrieved from the animal’s droppings and roasted.

The beer is an intense, dark-hearted delight with the coffee character barely detectable in the complex and syrupy palate, and at $35 a 500ml bottle it’s the sort of beer squarely aimed at beer geeks. More accessible, is Mikkeller Beer Geek Breakfast – a smoother imperial stout made with lashings of oats and flavoured with less expensive coffee beans.

A true beer geek might well drink it with bacon and eggs for breakfast.

TASTING NOTES

ACHEL (8%)

Dark amber-brown, huge foam head which takes a minute or two to settle. Aroma: hints of raisin, spice and toffee. Palate: mouthfilling carbonation, complex mix of caramel, dark stone fruit and gentle spice; licorice hints emerge in the sweet-toothed, rummy finish.

CASCADE FIRST HARVEST ALE 2011 (5.5%)

Deep copper-amber. Aroma: delicate whiff of toffee, spice and dried fruit peel. Palate: caramel intertwined with spicy hop notes upfront; hop bitterness asserts itself in mid-palate; rounded out with a tropical fruit notes wrapped around lingering bitterness.

LITTLE CREATURES MARZEN (5.8%)

Deep gold. Aroma: rich malt, grainy with honeycomb and spice hints. Palate; full-bodied and mouthfilling; juicy, sweet malt notes with herbal hop undertones; finishes slightly sweet, balanced by grassy hop flavours.

MIKKELLER BEER GEEK BRUNCH (10.9%)

Jet black, brown-tinged foam. Aroma: inky with espresso, cocoa and dried muscatel notes. Palate: explosion of dark, bitter chocolate notes initially; crème caramel and Turkish delight notes float above the treacle-hearted centre with rich mocha undertones.