Brew Day & Tasting Notes North Shore Brewers 2025 Q1 Australian Sparkling Ale

When Australian Sparkling Ale was the style pulled at random for my club, the North Shore Brewers first in-club competition of the year, the reaction was “huh?” and “what?”. That is because nobody had ever tasted or brewed an Australian Sparkling Ale. 

That’s is partially true. I brewed an extract kit from Northern Brewer back in 2015. While my initial tasting notes were positive, I recall not finishing the batch and dumping some of the bottles. The recipe kit has since been discontinued. The Pride of Ringwood hops used in the kit and by Cooper’s Sparkling Ale are also no longer available from any homebrew retailer in the US at least that I could find. 

Back to the drawing board it was. 

During January’s virtual club meeting we were chatting with Charlie Cummings, Head Brewer at Remnant Brewing. Charlie raised a fair point, is a style with one main example really a style? For Australian Sparkling Ale, the example is Coopers Australian Ale. I had that beer one time at a bar in New York City. The bottle was badly oxidized and provided no insight into formulating my own version. 

The BJCP guidelines mention that the style was originally brewed with a blend of 2-row, 6-row, and cane sugar as an adjunct to dilute the protein in the grist, while the modern version is made with 100% Australian 2-row. Prairie Malt does import some Australian malt for distribution to commercial brewers; homebrewers will never find it. American 2-row would be an adequate substitute for an all-grain batch. 

I was of two minds with what I wanted to do with this batch. In addition to being the brewery that produces Sparkling Ale, Coopers also produces malt extract and beer kits. A fresh, well-made Coopers Pale Ale beer kit is probably as close as anyone in the club would get to tasting the real thing. Instead I made my own recipe with Coopers malt extract instead which is sold in the US under private label as Brewers Best.

After researching the style a bit, my takeaways were

• The beer should be golden, to light copper, but not caramelly, toasty, or overly bready
• If Pride of Ringwood isn’t available, the hop flavor should be rustic as opposed to tropical and modern
• Fermentation should be fruity
• The beer has to finish dry
• Carbonation must be high, even if that means bottle conditioning 

No grain at all used in this batch.

Manufactured in Australia by Coopers Brewery Ltd.

Two cans of Light Malt Extract is all I needed for the malt color and flavor. If I converted this recipe to all grain, I would probably include 5% Caramalt in the grist. Brewing with extract, my options to adjust the fermentability of my wort were limited. To dry the beer out, I added a big charge of cane sugar. A solution that was both practical and a nod to tradition.

Brewers Gold is an old variety, lets see how it works here.

Color looking perfect.

Some brewers swear that using Australian Ale Yeast like WLP009. I ended up choosing a dry English strain I knew would attenuate well, and hoped would provide the desired esters. For hops, I used some homegrown Brewers Gold. Buying the LME on sale, using one sachet of dry yeast, and homegrown hops, made this one of my less expensive batches in awhile.

Yeast pitched and batch at fermentation temp. 

With my recipe, I thought one hop charge at 30 minutes and a smaller one at flameout would provide the hop flavor the guidelines call for. A short boil with no steeped specialty malt made this a very quick brew day. After a week in a six gallon carboy, I needed to harvest the yeast to re-pitch in a new batch, so this got racked to a secondary for two weeks of aging before bottling. The whole batch was quite old school. 

Rackng to a secondary might get me cancelled by some brewers

Yes, I bottle conditioned this batch. Getting the carbonation right was too important for this style. If I was going to keg this beer, I would need a separate regulator to maintain the carbonation level. I targeted 3.0 vol C02. That is the highest I’ve safely carbonated a batch in regular beer bottles. Any higher, I’m bottling my beer in champagne bottles, or Belgian bottles with corks and cages. 

Five gallons ready to carb up!

I was oddly excited about this batch. Maybe it was because I made a new recipe for a style I wasn’t familiar with. I wanted to see if the vision in my head translated to the glass. I was so anxious I opened a bottle before it finished conditioning; that’s something I had never done before, not even our first ever batch. 

When the beer was finally carbed up and ready, I felt I ticked most of the boxes for the style. When popped open, the bottles make a loud and inviting hiss. The beer pours deep gold with a thick, foamy white head. It is also quite clear when decanted carefully. The high carbonation does kick up sediment when the bottle opens; the last 2-3 ounces are a hazy and yeasty. 

The high carbonation is prickly on the palate. This is a beer that needs to be poured into a glass to be de-gassed of noting else. Even with the low finishing gravity and high carbonation, the body is medium. When the guidelines specified “medium to medium-full body” I wasn’t sure how that was possible, but it is and this is. 

The malt and yeast character were also dead on. The only thing I thought was lacking was “medium to medium-high” hop flavor and “lingering bitterness”. The hop flavor is medium low to medium if I’m being generous. Hop bitterness is sufficient but doesn’t linger at all. This is a recipe problem. I needed a bigger bittering and late hop addition. The last sentence of the BJCP’s flavor guidelines is “ Should not be bland.” and I was afraid maybe this was a little too bland. 

Happy to find any fresh commercial example.

As luck would have it, a local brewery Granite Coast Brewing did brew an Australian Sparkling Ale. To my pleasant surprise, I was able to do a commercial side-by-side. 

Aroma

Swanston Street (SS) - Soft grain and green apple esters, very low hops

Homebrew (HB) - Fresh cut grass

Appearance 

SS - Yellow with brilliant clarity. Thin head, had to be poured hard to form. 

HB - Thick, fizzy head that fades. Gold with decent clarity, some yeast made it in from the pour. 

Flavor

SS - Low grainy malt balanced with moderate hop bitterness and flavor. The hop flavor is iron-like which the guidelines describe. Fermentation throws off notes of pear and pepper. 

HB - Malt flavor more bready than the commercial example. Hop bitterness is sufficient but lower. Herbal hop flavor is low. Esters more floral than fruity. 

Mouthfeel 

SS - Medium body and carb, slightly creamy. Finish dry and crisp. 

HB - High carbonation prickles the tip of the tongue. Body is medium. Finish is clean

Overall

When I first tasted my beer, I thought the hop flavor was completely lacking and I had missed the mark for the style. Doing the side-by-side the commercial beer has more hop flavor, but it’s not a huge difference. 

Reading the Granite Coast can, I am impressed how they used new-school Pacific Gem hops, and still made something that feels rustic and traditional. 

At the club meeting, my beer finished second. This was the first time that I was able to pick out my beer right away. It was the one beer in the flight that came out with a huge frothy head even in a 2oz plastic cup. 

I had a couple people tell me they thought my beer was the closest to style. It probably was, but the beer ear won had the biggest hop flavor and was probably the most enjoyable to drink. 

This is a style I may want to take another crack at sooner rather than later. This beer feels close and only needs a couple tweaks. 

Recipe: North Shore Brewers Q1 2025 Aussie Sparkling Ale
Brewer: Jason Chalifour
Style: Australian Sparkling Ale
TYPE: Extract

Recipe Specifications
--------------------------
Boil Size: 3.27 gal
Post Boil Volume: 3.02 gal
Batch Size (fermenter): 5.50 gal   
Bottling Volume: 5.25 gal
Estimated OG: 1.047 SG
Estimated Color: 4.8 SRM
Estimated IBU: 34.4 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 0.0 %
Boil Time: 30 Minutes

Ingredients:
------------
Amt              Name                                             Type          #          %/IBU         Volume        
3 lbs 4.8 oz     Light Malt Extract (Coopers) [Boil] (4.7 SRM)    Extract       1          43.4 %        0.28 gal      
10.5 oz          Cane (Beet) Sugar [Boil] (0.0 SRM)               Sugar         2          8.6 %         0.05 gal      
1.50 oz          Homegrown Brewers Gold CY21 [8.50 %] - Boil 30.0 Hop           3          33.1 IBUs     -             
0.25 tsp         Irish Moss (Boil 10.0 mins)                      Fining        4          -             -             
3 lbs 4.8 oz     Light Malt Extract (Coopers) [Whirlpool] (4.7 SR Extract       5          43.4 %        0.28 gal      
0.50 oz          Homegrown Brewers Gold CY21 [8.50 %] - Steep/Whi Hop           6          1.3 IBUs      -             
1.0 pkg          London English Ale Yeast (APEX #2336)            Yeast         7          -             -             
5.5 oz           Cane (Beet) Sugar [Bottling] (0.0 SRM)           Sugar         8          4.5 %         0.03 gal      


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Medium Body, No Mash Out
Total Grain Weight: 7 lbs 9.6 oz
----------------------------

Sparge: If steeping, remove grains, and prepare to boil wort
Notes:
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LME BBD 7/30/2026, Yeast BBD 10/1/2026. More hop absorption with whole cone. Squeezed cones thru funnel screen and rinsed with top-off water.
Racked 1/25 - Color deep gold, no crystal malt addition good idea.