Well, bang goes my theory that all these beers come from the West Country. This one comes from Down Under (as you probably guessed from the pose I am adopting in the picture). In fact, Coopers Brewery is located in Regency Park, Southern Australia - not a place I have actually been to myself.
The bottle informs me that "Coopers beers and stouts are made using the centuries old top fermentation process". This is interesting as top fermentation is used for traditional English beers, while bottom fermentation is used for lager type beers. Most Australian beers are the latter so bottom fermentation would be the norm Down Under and Coopers must therefore be something of an exception. On the other hand, Original Pale Ale is an English style of beer so I suppose one would expect it to be top fermented.
Coopers is apparently a family owned business and the current Chairman is the fifth generation to run the company. You can find out more at their website - http://www.coopers.com.au/home.php
What about the beer itself? Well, it was pale in colour, almost golden. ABV was 4.5% It tasted pretty good compared to most Australian beers I know. However, it was not quite in the same league as the West Country beers that I have been sampling recently.
Is the Coopers bottle conditioned? My impression is my collection (a mere fifty!)had more bottle conditioned samples than the first time we tried this in 2000.
ReplyDeleteIt was bottle conditioned. On the admittedly limited sample so far, about half of those I have sampled have been bottle conditioned. I guess that is something I should mention in future commentaries.
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