Forefathers Willie Simpson Doppelbock Lager
Stone & Wood

From a 500ml bottle, pours a deep brown colour with a good tan coloured head.
Aroma dark fruits, earthy, chocolate.
Taste pretty much follows the nose of dark fruits, chocolate and earthy. Pretty tasty.

Stone & Wood Forefathers Willie Simpson Doppelbock Lager, sounds like a mouthful right? And as a Doppelbock (or “double billy-goat” in German [legit]) it should be a mouthful... in a good way. This is the style that is oft referred to as “liquid bread” for good reasons - Doppelbock has been used as a means of nourishment for monks while fasting... I suddenly have an urge to drink Doppels whilst fasting... another time perhaps. In any case I’ll be looking for a malty/bready/dark fruits-driven Lager with a decent medium body and a creamy carbonation. Let’s crack open this double billy-goat, cheers to Willie Simpson (Homer’s beer brewing Aussie cousin)!

Poured from a 500ml bottle into a stein.

A: Impressively the colour of the body is the same colour as the bottle - a deep chocolate brown (looks cloudy but hard to tell). Head presents as a 1 centimetre creamy tan that stands proud, again impressive stuff. 8/10.

S: Dark fruits forward (plum, fig, raisin) with your standard bread yeast centre and a finish that is both earthy and chocolatey. Smells like a real German-brewed Doppelbock... actually smells better than some German-brewed Doppels I’ve tried - damn solid effort from Willie/Stone & Wood. 9/10.

T: Big chocolate character upfront, followed by the above noted dark fruits, mid-palate is bready, but not quite on the Weihenstephaner Korbinian scale, earthy/medicinal hops round out the finish - which is a slight bit more bitter than Korbinian [i.e. my benchmark for a top-notch Doppelbock]. 8/10.

M: Medium bodied with a luscious creamy carbonation, it doesn’t get much better than this - gold star Willie/S&W! 9/10.

D: I do love a Doppelbock, probably because they’re a Lager in Ales clothing, and I’m definitely more an Ale than Lager man. This is one of the rare Doppelbocks brewed in Australia that I’ve tried and it’s actually up there with the best of the German ones. That. Is. Saying. Something. So what we have here is a Doppelbock that ticks all the “bockses” [Dammit with the puns Doc!] without beating the all-time Doppel champion: Weihenstephaner Korbinian. Let’s face it though no one from Australia is beating a brewery that’s been operating continually since 1040 AD - that’s 748 years before the First Fleet (and with it the knowledge of beer-brewing) even arrived at Port Jackson - they’ve had a fair bit of practice time there! 9/10.

Food match: I’m going to go all Aussie on this one and say: Kangaroo meat - cooked rare with a lemon myrtle and macadamia crust and asparagus with celeriac mash.