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SUPEREGO
Michael Garcia - May 30, 2016
There are a ton of microbrews out there and they are all trying to stand out in an increasingly crowded beer scene. While I enjoy a good microbrew, I'll admit that I also drink mainstream beer brands. I'm not "that guy" who only drinks microbrews and goes on and on about it. That guy sucks, don't be that guy. My biggest problem is that there is no way to know which microbrews are good and which ones suck. One strategy some breweries employ is mixing their beer with different exotic ingredients. Some use ancient recipes found in archaeological digs or else they just add coffee, chocolate, fruit, and other flavor ingredients. But Maris and Kristi Biezaitis, two microbrewers in Australia have added an incredibly expensive and disgusting additive to their Moby Dick Ambergris Ale: Whale vomit. Ambergris is a substance produced in whale's intestines that help them digest plankton. Every so often they puke it up. Ambergris is highly sought after as an ingredient in perfumes for some reason and a chunk of it can be worth a lot of money. The brewers thought that adding the waxy bits of whale innards to their beer would give them an extra edge at the Great Australasian Beer SpecTAPular.
But what does it taste like? It sounds gross. Maris and Kristi Biezaitis said,
"When I heard that ambergris was used in the perfume industry, I thought 'I wonder if that could be used to flavour or spice up a beer. It was a relatively fresh piece, quite a smelly piece, so it was airing and curing in the backyard before I got hold of it...It tastes a little bit like the sea, it tastes a little bit like marine animals. It's really interesting I think."
Ummm, no thanks.
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