Emersons Pilsner

Brewed by Emersons Brewing Company
Style: Pilsener
Dunedin, New Zealand

Pottle courtesy of beer_ledgend. Pours gold and slightly hazy with a nice rocky white head. Smells of straw, citrus, pepper, touches of honey and apples, strawberries, hay, hints of dry crisp malt. Tastes of citrus, caramel, nicely balanced by dry pilsner malt and some peppery splashes. Lots of earthiness as the beer warms. Mouthfeel is full bodied and yields moderate bitterness. Finish is refreshing with some caramel and fruity sensations. An excellent gem of a beer!

BIG Thanks to Engelsmann for this bottle. Best before SEP 07, it says. Huge white head, very strong retention, snow white in color and very dense/creamy, providing ample sheets of lace. Great clarity in the very pale-straw body, with faint bronze-copper tints. Unfiltered, but settled and carefully poured. Tiny bubbles rising methodically in the liquid. AROMA. Nose just blows up, surging forth with saaz and hallertauer dryness, but just enough light grass-like fruitiness and a very crisp lager yeast bite that dries things out even moreso on the end. Snappy, crisp, dry, highly aromatic, this is pilsener at its best. Further sniffing shows ripe green bartlett pears, mixing with a mildly sweet, almost tart white grape juice note. Malt is grainy, with minimal traces of sourdough, but it adds substance without butting in on the masterpiece that is the hops and yeast. FLAVOR. Pears and juicy white grape juice notes combining with lighlty sourish malts and crisp, snappy yeast, flow gracefully down the throat, with not-overdone carbonation. The dry, hay-like, sweaty and grassy hops keep things very dry, without overdoing the bitterness. Just a wonderful job with the finishing hops! Malt adds light honey that lets the crisp notes simultaneously nip at the palate and then sink in to a soft sweetness, only to be rinsed lightly by the engaging carbonation and then further cleared by the genuinely crisp yeast. No flaws whatsoever. Perhaps a little vacuousness in the middle, with some water and just a touch too round of a maltiness, but then, not all pilseners are bone dry. Oregano/dill and grass come in retronasal, quite pleasingly. Perfect carbonation levels, thanks to a superbly executed bottling job, especially for an unfiltered, delicate lager. Texture is supple, bit too round at times as stated, but it makes up for it by being wonderfully dry at the beginning and end. If this does indeed have American-style hops in it, they are certainly used sparingly and complementary.

MMMM dried apricots and passionfruit Marlborough hops, NZ is famous for its Sauv Blanc is that because not everyone has tried this beer?

an oddity for australasian pilsners in that it mimicks it’s Czech and German ancestors with the bitterness. deliciously refreshing.

Very nice drop and a true reward! Hard to get away from at times. I love the nice, hoppy flavour and head I get with it. (Germans like their head and I am born German!) Cheers Richard ;-)

a bloody great drop smooth tasting .a really good beer that i enjoy every time i go to the pub

What a surprise, in a very good way... It has a slightly fruity aroma. Good unclear golden color. It was surpriseingly fresh in taste, else the taste was hopsy and very delicious. All in all an extremly good pilsner.

The more times I try this, the more I like it. Probably one of the best pilseners anywhere in the world. Fantastic golden-yellow colour. Nice flowery hop aroma. Dry, crisp pils flavour with a nice bite. New Belgium’s Blue Paddle and Victory’s Prima Pils come to mind when drinking this beer.