Cargo Cult Lager Trouvé

Are the Gods crazy? Outlier Cartel has crash landed its cargo from all around the world right here on the Shaky Isles. The natives have gone wild for this lager trouvé, a dry japanese style lager made from salubrious brown rice, German braumalz and 2 types of organic hops from beautiful British Columbia, then brewed with rain water from West Auckland. Not only that, its processed with an en. Discover the clean, crisp taste of Cargo Cult that beckons those long fine spells and primordial nights of summertime!

Featuring Mt Hood and Hallertau Hops from Lillooet BC from our friends at Hoohhops.com. ABV 4.5%

This beer came about after many a conversation at our favourite Japanese ‘soul food’ restaurant in Auckland, Genta. While contemplating life over tempura, gyoza and cool crisp glasses of Orion, we said to ourselves – we’ve gotta make a rice beer. However good things take time.

Nearly a year later, we saw a documentary on the Melanesian Cargo Cults, followed by the timeless classic ‘The God’s must be Crazy‘. We imagined what it be like if a transport plane full of Outlier kegs crashed on a remote island full of previously un-contacted natives – how would they react? With that concept in mind, we embarked on creating a beer that would be both worthy of a cargo cult and show that the gods may have a few too many toys in the attic!

First of all – this isn’t a true lager, hence we call it a Lager Trouvé, or ‘Found Lager’. Its actually a lager hybrid called a Kölsch, which is warm fermented then conditioned by traditional lagering at cold temperatures. To top it off, we made this out of brown rice source locally so it would have that ultra dry taste you get from those amazing Japanese rice lagers.  We had the good fortune to get in touch with Sam Quinlan over at HooH Hops (Harvesters of Organic Hops) in British Columbia, Canada, to give the beer floral notes which you won’t get in most rice lagers.  Besides our international hops, our malt comes from Germany.  For that ultra fresh taste, we used rain water from out in the bush of West Auckland. Rounded it off, we ran a special enzyme, to reduce the Gluten.

We had the pleasure of working with Geordan Moore again, who did our Sophisticated Yeti label. He did an incredible job with the basic concept sketch we sent through (below).  We are proud of what’s on the packaging, not just because it looks great, but because we feel it mentions the entire community (and it’s actually a global one!) that help this drink to fruition.

Cheers! Carlos, Mark & Alvin