Review: I drank a 4000-year-old beer from an Egyptian tomb

The thought of drinking a Brisbane beer made from yeast found in a 4000-year-old Egyptian tomb might give many the ick, but our fearless reporter gave it a go. Here’s how she got on.

An industrial backstreet in Capalaba is not the first place you’d think to look for a beer made from 4000-year-old yeast from an Egyptian tomb.

Yet Bacchus Brewing has created just that.

I’ll be the first to admit the prospect of tasting a beer made from ingredients pulled from a 4000-year-old Egyptian tomb – yes, a mummy and artefacts-type tomb – gave me the ick, but I knew it was something I couldn’t miss.

After we drove 35 minutes out into a heavily industrial area towards Brisbane’s port, I was definitely more sceptical than ever.

I wandered into the brewery on release day of ‘Sekhmet’s Rage’ to try a sample, and was absolutely certain it was going to be unpleasant.

So, imagine my surprise when this beer turned out to be perhaps one of the nicest beers I had ever tasted.

Ross Kendrick from Bacchus Brewing Co.

Don’t get me wrong, I am partial to a cold one on a hot summer’s day, but am quite particular in my tastes.

So as I took in the strong, yeasty aroma of Sekhmet’s Rage, I was pretty sure this one would not be to my liking.

As I took that first sip, though, I was completely taken aback.

I’m not sure what I expected: A dusty, cobweb taste maybe?

Instead, the ale, made to replicate beers of the era, was fruity and tangy, though still had a little peppery bite to it that balanced the tartness of the pomegranate, and was completely drinkable – not at all that thick “beer-y” flavour I had been expecting.

The first taste was pleasantly surprising.

In fact, it would have been easy to forget it was a beer at all.

You wouldn’t go so far as to describe it as a sour, it definitively isn’t, but it had a tang that had me taking more than a few sips as I learned about the origins of such a drink.

Ross Kenrick, owner of Bacchus Brewing, took part in a museum exhibition and was subsequently gifted one of just six bottles of beer made by a scientist using this yeast.

Sekhmet’s Rage from Bacchus Brewing.

Kenrick forgot all about the bottle, left abandoned in his fridge, until he was asked to participate in another exhibition, which sparked his memory and led to the creation of the very limited edition ‘Sekhmet’s Rage’.

If you missed out on one of just 350 bottles of Sekhmet’s Rage, Kenrick assured me they had more unexpected beers down pat, including a ‘cock ale’ beer, which has been fined or clarified using whole chicken carcasses.

They also have a mud crab beer, which used whole mudcrabs and then the powdered shells.

Not sure I’ll be giving that last one a go, but maybe it would surprise me just as much as tomb-beer did.