Longboard Island lager
Brewed by Kona Brewing Company (Craft Brew Alliance – AB InBev)
Style: Pale Lager
Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, United States
Kona Brewing Company is a brewery in Kailua-Kona, a town on the west coast of Hawaii Island (the Big Island!).
Founded in 1994 by Cameron Healy and his son Spoon Khalsa. Yes his name is Spoon! The pair had a vision to reflect the spirit, culture, and beauty of Hawaii in a collection of locally produced island craft beers. This extends to the way the beers are brewed, harnessing solar energy to power their brewery and brew pubs, use recycled water, and even leftover grains to bake into the pizza crust for their Kailua-Kona bar and restaurant. They also love giving back to the community by supporting local organizations that display an appreciation to the Hawaiian culture and history.
From the 1st of October, 2010, it has been owned by Craft Brew Alliance, a larger brewing company from Portland, Oregon, which itself has been purchased by an even bigger fish, multinational giant, AB InBev!
They mostly produce IPAs, Wheat Ales and Seasonal brews. Kona’s beers are available in most places in the United States, and on occasion you might be lucky to find it further afield. Like myself, picking it up in small town Switzerland in the local supermarket!
Review: 355ml bottle of Longboard Island lager: 4.6% vol.
Available all year round this quintessential beach beer comes in cans and bottles, and on draft in Hawaii.
Longboard is the name given to a very long surf board ubiquitous on the waves this side of the world! As they say on their site……the Longboard Island Lager was crafted as a tribute to those who continue to practice the tradition of longboard surfing.
Cool logo on the bottle, of surfers on low tide, the problem with this is that it doesn’t look like a beer at all, more like something that advertises a fizzy pop. Bottle top is cool though as it has a pic of a lizard, the emblem of the company.
On pour I get a standard looking lager, clear golden colour with a nice frothy white head, which diminishes fast enough. Typical lager look.
The smell is very light, of grains and sweet malt, it is ok but very faint and weak……..
Nice crispy mouthfuls initially on the taste, a good start and a refreshing intro to this beer. Tastes like a regular lager and does the business for sure, smooth and easy to drink.
But was a little disappointed as the price was a bit high compared to the many decent supermarket discount beers that can taste about the same or even better…….
Hops are on the very low level and any flavours are barely noticeable in the taste, the malts do make an appearance as you would expect, and it is a clean beer but is far too thin, a bit tasteless to be honest. I can’t imagine it would even taste any better if I was on a beach in Hawaii as the sun shines down on me head.
A simple light lager, ok to drink but nothing extraordinary in an otherwise very crowded market…….something my mother would like to sip at I think! Not terrible just disappointing…….
Originally all their beer was brewed by contract by Matt Brewing Company, it was here that they first developed their famous Brooklyn lager. Other beer types were developed in time, a Weisse to an exciting Black Chocolate Stout to a more standard East IPA.
The brewery are at the forefront of culture, sponsoring festivals, concerts, food tours and more. They also offer beer education courses in The Art and Science of Brewing with the Culinary Institute of America. Now that’s a course I could get into, a full curriculum on beer which includes the science and practicalities behind brewing and the business and social aspects to it. Beers are produced as part of the course. 
On pour it looks fantastic, a good sized frothy head, some nice carbonation and a lovely dark golden colour, very appetizing, game on! Very good lacing. 
Made by Boon Rawd Brewery, a well-known Thai brewery and beverage company founded by entrepreneur Phraya Bhirom Bhakdi (Boonrawd Sreshthaputra, his birth name), the county’s first brewery. Boonrawd toured Germany and Denmark to learn how beer was made. On his return, he constructed his brewery in 1933, and the first bottles rolled off the assembly line in 1934. The brewery remains under the management of his descendants, who use Bhirom Bhakdi as their family name.
The colour is a pale golden yellow with a small white head, that does die a death very quick. Some carbonation and the general look is ok.
As a barman and manager of a small bar in Basel, North Switzerland, Fabian could get a birds eye view of the US craft beer imports and see what made them click with consumers. He started to create a few of his own beers with highly aromatic hops and made with innovative brewing techniques such as dry hopping. He worked from an empty kitchen hence the name of the brewery……Kitchen Brew! His customers were kind of like his guinea pigs, testing his new beers and seeing if North American craft beer trends could catch on in this part of the world. 
Bought in Swiss supermarket Coop, bottle comes with nice big lettering which stands out, showing that sometimes simplicity does work, no flashy logos or silly imagery, plain and simple, I like that. Calls itself a Swiss craft bier.
The initial taste is one of a lagery feel, wheaty and all the hops detected. 
