Anything but twisted a perfect night of beer and cheese

The opportunity to sample the great cask-conditioned ales at The Twisted Hop brewpub is usually reason enough for Pip and I to make a trip to Christchurch.

But last weekend the added incentives of the Ellerslie Flower Show and the 50th birthday of an old friend made a trip south irresistible.

While Pip spent most of her time shopping and doing things horticultural, the high spot for me was presenting an evening tasting of beers and cheeses at The Twisted Hop. Having invited the wonderful folk at Canterbury Cheesemongers (www.cheesemongers. co.nz) to select some of their favourite cheeses, I'd then picked some appropriate beers to go with them. It turned out to be a great evening.

We kicked off with Paki Paki, a goat's milk brie made by Te Mata cheeses in Havelock North, with Emerson's Weissbier, a German-style hefeweizen (cloudy wheat beer) from the famous Dunedin brewer.

At eight weeks old the Paki Paki had started to develop the distinctive yoghurt-like acidity and feral quality of goat's milk cheeses and these combined perfectly with the tartness and clove-like spiciness of the beer. The wheat beer's generous natural carbonation also did an excellent job of cleansing the palate after the cheese's rich creaminess.

Next up was the Twisted Hop brewery's mild but roasty Poplar Brown Ale, paired with Karikaas Vintage Leyden, a 30-month aged gouda flavoured with cumin seeds, from Loburn in North Canterbury. The combination generally worked well with the beer's nutty and caramel notes finding harmony with similar flavours in the cheese, but opinion was divided as to the effect of the cumin seeds.

The third beer was Twisted Hop Challenger, the house brewery's hoppy English-style best bitter. This was enjoyed with Quickes Farmhouse Cheddar, a delightful cheese from Exeter, Devon. The cheese emerges with a dry, chalky texture with suggestions of earth and mustard, but is not as sharp as many aged cheddars.

The pairing worked brilliantly; the cheese emphasised the toffee-ish sweetness of the beer and the palate concluded with a delightful combination of creaminess and leafy hop dryness.

The fourth pairing was Brescia Taleggio, a washed rind, cow's milk cheese from Italy, with Orval, a Belgian Trappist ale. Soft and very buttery, the cheese was typically stinky, with a pungent earthy, beefy character.

Orval is, by Trappist standards, notably dry, tart and hoppy, and has its own leathery earthy note the result of a secondary fermentation with the wild yeast brettanomyces.

While the beer's fresh, mandarin zest-like hop aroma contrasted with the gaminess of the cheese, the beer's inherent dryness and spritzy carbonation once again cleansed the palate for the next mouthful. Fantastic!

The tasting concluded with a sampling of the house brewery's yet-to-be-released Russian Stout, with Port Ahuriri Blue from Te Mata.

At 8 per cent, the beer pours the consistency and colour of used engine oil and is massively intense with a heady combination of dry, roasty notes, alcohol and mouth-coating hop resins.

The beer stood shoulder to shoulder with the full-flavoured, salty-sweet blue cheese and the pairing was narrowly voted best of the evening. Cheers!

- The Marlborough Express