Our beer brewing friends at Lion Nathan are offering a great new promise- ‘beer brewed in compliance to the Natural Beer promise’. Their big brands- Tooheys New, Tooheys Old, XXXX Gold, XXXX Bitter, Swan Draught and West End Draught are now only being brewed using natural ingredients and no nasty artificial additives or preservatives. Similar to the Purity laws in Germany Lion Nathan have rules which only allow five natural ingredients in these beers, malted, or unmalted grains, hops, yeast, water and cane sugar- that’s it nothing else- no artificial colours, preservatives, flavour enhances or any other nasty chemicals. It’s usually the chemicals like preservatives and colourings like sulphur dioxide which give you that nasty head after a big night- not the beer. This is great news for beer lovers and hopefully it will extend to more of the Lion Nathan brands and all other beers for that matter- there is nothing better than natural ingredients, they taste better and they are better for you.
For more information: http://www.naturalbeer.com.au
on Jan 5th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
I just had my first sixpack with this black label on it.. spew! tasted like salt water.. It is not fourex, niot the 4x I know. And it will be the last..
I looked at the label, it said brewed under licence! Whats that? Chinashit?
Am I being poisoned..
I gotta let the company know.. This does not sound like Castlemaine .. who are you?
Really pissed off, and i bet others will be as welll .
argh the rotten taste is still in me mouth..
Philip.
on Mar 6th, 2009 at 12:08 am
The German purity law includes only FOUR ingredients, not five. Note than cane sugar is never an ingredient in German beers, nor is any grains apart from malted barley (unless a wheat beer).
Cane sugar, and random malted & unmalted grains are just cheap ‘filler’ ingredients to make alcohol without contributing to a full flavored, full bodied beer.
Whilst it is good that the loopholes in Australian alcohol legislation are being addressed (note that manufacturers do not have to label any additives in wine or beer) this ‘natural beer promise’ is pure promotional crapola.
Try Coopers for a natural beer product, try a german beer, or try brewing your own, it’s relatively easy!
PS…
I’m not sure what Phil is on about, but it always says ‘brewed under license’ on those beers. What does he mean by ‘Chinashit’? Did it say the beer was brewed in China? I think not.
on Mar 6th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Yes Dion, you are right about the cane sugar it is not one of the German ingredients, we were duped, and should have known better writing this article.
Thanks for pointing it out. It’s sometimes a bit to easy to get caught up in the marketing hype.
As far as XXXX being brewed under licence, my guess is it is made a non QLD brewery- probably a Toohey’s one in Sydney? VB for example is made in Queensland as well as Melbourne and we all know the deals on most of those “imported” brands- if only they were!
If anyone knows where else XXXX is made would they drop us a line.
on Jun 10th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Dion (above) really knows what he is talking about.
Because of the preservative plague, the only beers worth drinking in Australia are imports from the old beer brewing countries, like Belgium and Germany.
In Australia I found Cooper’s and Little Creatures Pale Ale, they have no preservatives.
In Canada they have never brewed beers with preservatives. That’s right, you can walk int a liquor store, choose any beer, and there are no preservatives.
Maybe it’s time Australia (and the United States, for that matter) caught on and started too? You are only 500 years behind;)
on Jul 15th, 2009 at 3:04 pm
There aught to be a law!
I don’t agree that we should limit ourselves to 4 or 5 ingredients. Think about wheat beer and naturally flavoured beers. We can keep more creativity in the brewing process, and appreciate the flavour of a well crafted natural brew, but restrict the use of chemical additives and preservatives.