Aussie Hot 100

The Local Taphouse, Melbourne’s best pub (and soon to open a branch in Sydney), has compiled a list of the 100 favourite Australian beers as voted for by “hundreds of people… from around Australia”. I’d suggest that this was not a sample worked out to adequately represent every beer-drinking person in Australia, otherwise the list would have been very different. Still, it gives me a few names to conjure with, and something to argue with in due course.

The full list is here, but, to aid the lazy, here’s the top twenty without the need to click:

1 Little Creatures Pale Ale

2 Murray’s Icon 2IPA

3 Mountain Goat Hightail Ale

4 Knappstein Reserve Lager

5 Little Creatures Bright Ale

6 James Squire Golden Ale

7 Coopers Sparkling Ale

8 Coopers Pale Ale

9 Holgate Mt Macedon Pale Ale

10 James Squire Amber Ale

11 Jamieson ‘The Beast’ IPA

12 Murray’s Nirvana Pale Ale

13 Holgate ESB

14 Hargreaves Hill ESB

15 Murray’s Grand Cru

16 Nail Stout

17 Matilda Bay Alpha Pale Ale

18 Holgate Hopinator Double IPA, Red Hill Imperial Stout

20 Moo Brew Pale Ale

Looks like I picked a winner to drink on my first night out here, then! I’ve drunk 9 of those top twenty and, the Little Creatures Bright Ale apart, wouldn’t argue that they were decent beers.  I’d argue that James Squire Amber is superior to the Golden though. But anyway…

I think I run to 23 of the hot 100. Plenty of work for me to do then. Nice to see my session favourite, Toohey’s Old, sneak in at 99.  Oh look, no Cascade beers at all!

First Aussie Beer

Well, obviously not my first Aussie beer ever. I have been here before, and I’ve sunk the odd pint/stubbie of the stuff back in England over the years too. But this was my first beer as a visa’d-up resident of Sydney.

It made sense to make it a good one, so Louise took me to The Australian Hotel, deep in the heart of Sydney’s The Rocks. The Australian has a good range of draft beers, runs a beer festival (which I somehow missed despite being in town both days it was on) and attracts a good mix of tourists and locals. It’s also quite old, but don’t let’s start working out if it’s the oldest pub in Sydney or not as there are at least three others that claim that title and we’d be here all night. 

What to have? For some reason I chose Little Creatures Pale Ale from the eight taps in front of me. I’ve had the stuff before, but only in little bottles in the UK and I’d remembered being pretty unimpressed. But the only other beer on tap at the time that wasn’t a lager was Scharer’s Bock, and despite a recommendation from Louise I wasn’t in the mood for slightly sweet German-style beer. I wanted a bit of bite.

And boy, did I get it. Little Creatures Pale Ale smacks you round the chops with hops, and the grapefruit follows closely behind. It’s bitter and refreshing. You couldn’t drink it all night (especially not at $8 a pint) but it was just what the doctor ordered and worked well alongside an excellent chorizo pizza. Perhaps the one I’d had before was a bit old. 

tentative tasting

Little Creatures is a Fremantle, Western Australia, brewer and their wares are widely available in Australia and elsewhere. They’ve also started putting their Pale Ale into pint bottles, which is a sure way to win my approval. Read more on Australian beer quantities at Aussie Beer 101.