In a further sign that Australia’s craft brewers are pushing flavour boundaries, not to mention blurring stylistic ones, Beechworth’s Bridge Road Brewers has created a new beer it describes as a black Belgian IPA.

Released to celebrate the brewery’s fifth year of brewing, the beer — named B2 Bomber — is described as having a rich, dark colour with roasty and chocolate malt characters, fruity Belgian yeast esters and a nice punch of bitterness and hop influence.

Head brewer Ben Kraus says he settled on the style as a result of some experiments in blending the brewery’s other beers.

“Our Bling IPA came about as a result of us blending our Pale Ale and Celtic Red Ale at the brewery, just for ourselves,” he said.

“We liked the way the hops in the pale worked with the malt from the Celtic and made a beer with those characters.

“With the B2, we had played around with blending the Galaxy (single hop IPA) we made last year with our robust porter. We liked it and made a beer along those lines.

“We decided to do it a little differently though and so introduced a Belgian yeast and so it has the influence of the malt, a hop influence and nice yeasty esters as well,” Ben said.

It’s a novel approach to developing a beer style, but Ben says he likes to do things differently.

“We could just do the same beers from one year to the next, but that would become a little boring for us.”

The finished beer is weighs in at 8.5% abv and will be available on tap at select venues around the country, including the Local Taphouses in Sydney and Melbourne and the Grand Central Hotel in Brisbane.

Only have about 600 bottles have been brewed. Orders can be made via email info@bridgeroadbrews.com.au or over the phone the brewery directly on 03 57282703.

www.bridgeroadbrewers.com.au