Since I first started going to Indian restaurants I realised the importance beer plays in the enjoyment of a good curry. There’s something about the coolness and crispness of a cold pint of lager which brings out the flavour of the spices whilst cooling the palette long enough to shovel a couple more mounds of mouth-searing heat into your mouth. For some reason, anaesthetising yourself before trying to eat the hottest curry you can find is a tradition amongst blokes throughout the world – but for many, it is just a match of flavours that are as intrinsically linked as salt and vinegar, scones and jam, or beef and mustard.
Occasionally I come across a chilli beer which allows all the enjoyment of the spice and refreshment that would normally come with a curry and half a dozen lagers in one punchy little bottle; And this week I was lucky enough to find a real winner! Sunshine Coast’s Chilli Beer is indicated as being ‘hot’ by the evil, jagged looking chilli on the front of the bottle, and the pointy, red lettering reinforces the idea that this might be a little bit vicious. And it does not disappoint at all!
Not only is this one of the more ferocious chilli beers I have had the pleasure of enduring, it is packed with flavour from a lovely smack of spice and gorgeously refreshing beer. For the connoisseur, that fiery capsaicin flavour associated with such demons as the scotch bonnets and birds eye chillies is immediately apparent, as is all the depth of character and subtle smokiness of good raw chillies or angry hot sauces. The beer itself is a pale ale brewed in Australia and infused with Queensland birds eye chillies. Each bottle comes with a big fat chilli bobbing in the neck for a little bit of extra style, and once poured into a long glass it tantalisingly floats at the top, begging to be eaten.
I have to say that enjoying at least a few mouthfuls of the delectable amber ale before chomping down on the little red bastard is a must, because afterwards a lot of the subtleties of flavour will be a little bit masked – because although the beer itself is full of heat, the chilli adds another component altogether. That being said, waiting until you’ve finished the beer will mean you aren’t able to enjoy the extra heat that the chilli will provide as you continue to drink down the beer, which will dance across the tongue the cast of the musical ‘Stomp’ but in bigger boots. So if you do wait until the end of your bottle to munch down on the vicious red bugger, I’m sure you’ll want to follow my lead and grab another one of these beers straight away!
Enjoyed at Chapel Street Cellars, Melbourne.