#22: Namibia

Namibia? For real?? Yes I was quite excited to discover a Namibian beer, "Windhoek", on the menu at a South African restaurant in East Sydney. Namibia is a large country in south-eastern Africa, almost as large as South Africa, yet with only two million people. According to my good friend Wikipedia, they fought a protracted war of independence against South Africa from the 1960s to the 1980s, eventually gaining independence, and presumably, some level of happiness. I only really know of it from when they played in the Rugby World Cup when it was in Australia, and to shore up the non-existent level of support for the team here, the organisers encouraged the locals to turn up and "Go Nuts for Namibia!". Which apparently they did, which is cool.

Anyway I wasn't expecting much from this beer (I figured it'd be similar or worse than the South African mainstay beer, Castle Lager), but was very pleasantly surprised! While on paper the beer style is pretty typical European lager, you can straight away taste the quality in this beer. This is up there with the better German mainstream lagers and pilseners. I had a brief look around the label and noticed to my surprise, it said the makers had brewed it, by choice, according to the famous Reinheitsgebot, or German Beer Purity Law! Very cool. There are probably some descendents of German and Dutch settlers in Namibia, and they've decided to stick to the old ways and make proper beer. Impressive! Anyway, while not really "craft" or unusual, Windhoek is a refreshing tasty beer that I can recommend to anyone fortunate enough to stumble upon it.


Name: Windhoek
Country of production: Republic of Namibia
Style: Lager
Taste: Crisp, slightly hopped Central European style lager
Cost: around AU$7 per bottle (it was at a restaurant)
Availability in AU: Extremely low
Cred: Very high (when did you last have a beer from Namibia?)
My score: 7.5 out of 10 protracted struggles for independence