A case of Double Dutch (Oranjeboom)

Member Name: Newfloridian

Product:	Oranjeboom
Date:	30/10/03 (359 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: In Holland you may know what you are drinking

Disadvantages: In the UK who knows what you are drinking?

Oranjeboom - a name to conjure with. Well I remember the old days back in the late 1960s, this used to be a favourite tipple of my mother on infrequent trips down to the local hostelry. Then, for some reason, the label disappeared. I recall seeing and tasting it on isolated visits to Amsterdam but otherwise my curiosity was not sparked again until it reappeared on the shelves of our local supermarket late last year.

So, who or what is Oranjeboom. The name is Dutch for orange tree. It is clear that there is a long history of brewing attached to the name. I present below two varieties, with information gleaned from the relative web sites and other documentation. I will, leave you, dear reader, to make sense of it all.

First there is.......

SINGLE DUTCH.

Interbrew is one of the oldest beer companies in the world, and the newest global brewer. A public company based in Brussels (Belgium) (INTB - Euronext Brussels), Interbrew runs operations in 20 countries, across North America, Western Europe and the emerging markets.

The strategy of Interbrew, The World's Local Brewer©, is to build strong local platforms in the major beer markets of the world. Our strength is our brand portfolio, which gives us a number one or number two position in almost every market where we operate. This portfolio combines international premium/specialty brands - Beck's, Stella Artois, Hoegaarden, Leffe and Bass Ale - with the strong local brands which are at the heart of our operations, including Jupiler, OB Lager, Labatt Blue, Cass, Ozujsko, Klinskoye, Sibirskaya Korona, Chernigivski, Staropramen and Borsodi Sör.


Oranjeboom - Netherlands

The Oranjeboom brewery has been brewing a rich variety of beers since 1528. The brand stands for pleasing, thirst quenching beers of the best quality, with an honest, unpretentious character.

Among the Oranjeboom products are: Oranjeboom Premium Pilsener, a golden and refres

hing pils beer with an alcohol content of 5% vol. (the Netherlands), to be served at 4 to 6°C; Oranjeboom Oud Bruin (2.5%vol), a bottom fermented, old brown beer with a full bodied, sweetish taste, to be served at 6 to 8° C; and Oranjeboom Premium Malt, a refreshing, alcohol free beer (0.1% vol) with a golden colour, to be served at 3 to 5° C.


Then there is.......

DOUBLE DUTCH.

"The best draught lager in the world" according to judges at the 2002 Brewing Industry International Awards. A light interpretation of the Continental pilsner style, Oranjeboom has the full body and flavour you would expect of a lager with a heavier alcoholic content. Brewed by Shepherd Neame under licence from Brouwerij de Oranjeboom, Breda in Holland, this Gold Medal-winning 4.1% abv draught lager is perfectly placed to grow sales in the most dynamic sector of the UK lager market.
The 'quirkily Continental' beer takes its name from the orange tree which symbolises the Dutch royal family tree.
Tasting notes: An elegant, full bodied lager, which balances a slight toffee maltiness, with an apple-like fruitiness and a lingering hoppy finish.
(Tasting notes by Peter Ogie, Famous Beer Writer)

Containers: 11 gallon Keg, 18 gallon Kilderkin

Shepherd-Neame are also offering this online ......

ORANJEBOOM DOUBLE DUTCH COMPETITION

"To celebrate Oranjeboom Pilsener's new '568ml' Euro Pint promotion, we're giving away 10 weekends for two in Europe! We all remember what happened to the Sunderland greengrocer who fell foul of an EU directive and sold a bunch of bananas by the pound to an undercover trading standards officer. He was packed off to court and found guilty as charged.
So give us your Euro legislation 'wacky' idea's and you could be the winner of a Euro weekend for two!! Good Luck to the value of £300.00. All you need to do is register with the Shepherd
Neame web
site and we will give you an account. The account allows you to enter the competition and can also be used in the online shop or to send an electronic pint to a friend. "
[Reprinted from http://www.shepherd-neame.co.uk]


A TASTE TEST

It is not often that you get the chance to try two variants of the same brew. However, our local Tesco have the tall bottles on special offer at two for £3. Further down the aisle are four-packs of 440ml cans. Close inspection led me to believe that there may be a difference of origin between these products because the bottle is labelled 'Imported from Holland' and 'Distributed by Interbrew UK Ltd'. The can, on the other hand, is marked 'Brewed and distributed by Interbrew UK Ltd' but does not mention anything about importation. To confuse matters further the bar code on each label is prefixed with the number '8'.

Both are brewed to 5% ABV.

Anyway, to the test

We were a panel of three; friend Barry, my wife and I. The specimens had been stored together for a day at a temperature around 4ºC. I poured each brew into identical glasses. My colleagues did not know which was which - and Barry did not know that they were of the same label. We sniffed, sipped, tasted and swallowed and then compared and combined our findings.

The bottle:

This brew gave a pleasing hoppy aroma when freshly poured. It is a fairly pale golden colour with perfect clarity and no sediment. It has a good sparkle in the glass but does not raise a head. It has a fairly mild initial taste that has slightly woody and mellifluous hints. It remains smooth on the tongue. There is only a vague bitterness in the aftertaste.


The can:

There is no appreciable nose from this beer. It is slightly but noticeably darker in colour than its bottled counterpart but is also clear and without sediment. It sparkled well in the glass and gave rise
to rather more froth on pouring. The first taste is rather more sour and bitter, this persisting through to swallowing. The general impression was that the flavour was more pronounced but not necessarily more palatable. There was a stronger and lingering bitterness after swallowing.

We all chose the bottled lager the more preferable brew. My wife commented on it being a "good choice lady's drink". It is pleasant enough for drinking on its own - probably chilled on a warm summer evening - although it does lack the gutsy full blooded flavour of a Pilsner Urquell. It is not really full flavoured enough to hold its own against anything more than the blandest of food (unless possibly as an antidote for a strongly spiced Thai dish).


AVAILABILITY:

Oranjeboom 660ml bottles £1.75 (current offer at Tesco: 2 for £3). 4x 440ml can multipacks - prices vary.


CONCLUSION:

I can make no judgements about the draft beer as I do not know of an outlet here in the North East of England. I am not certain whether Interbrew (or some other agency) distributes a Dutch source of draft Oranjeboom which is not brewed under licence.

This is another case pleading a CAMEO BEER. I cannot be certain that the bottled drink is Dutch and the canned a counterfeit but our limited 'head-to-head' did strongly approve the bottle.

My award of 3* goes to the bottled brew. If pushed I would award the can 2½*

Summary: