The unusual suspects

From here things get a bit easier, I think. Realising that I was not going to get around to blogging about these beers at the pace I was drinking them I started to take notes on a more frequent basis – and the purchase of an iPhone with handy “notes” feature helped facilitate this.

That being said, I think I made these notes straight onto the computer as I tasted these four Tasmanian beers I had bought back from Hobart. Just around the corner from the hotel I was staying in was the very decent  Gasworks 9/11 Bottleshop and I snuck over there in a few minutes I had to myself and snagged four local brews to take home with me. There now follows original notes and 2012 commentary.

47. James Boag’s Wizard Smith Ale

Photographing beer bottles isn't one of my strengths

Like a JS Amber Ale but less sweet. Aley aftertaste. Barley taste as it gets warmer. Not overcarbonated. 5% “special English Ale”. Pretty much.

“Pretty much” what? Pretty much a special English Ale I suppose. Who is or was “Wizard Smith”? There’s a (made-up?) legend that goes with this beer, of course:

“In 1929 the Great Flood swamped much of Launceston without warning. Wizard Smith, J. Boag & Son’s drayman, at great risk to himself sought to save the brewery horses. Riding his pushbike until he could go no further, he plunged into the rising floodwaters and swam into the stables, successfully leading the horses to dry ground. For his bravery Wizard was rewarded with a job for life.“

Yeah yeah. This James Boags beer will apparently be available on the mainland in February 2012. I’m looking forward to tasting it again.

48. Moo Brew Dark Ale

This one's better though

Roasty, hints of coffee, slight (rasp)berry flavour as it warms, flintiness (cf. Old) too, ruby dark colour, just off-white head disappears v quickly. Moorilla Winery. 5.0%. V nice but too roasty to drink all night. Old grown up.

As in Toohey’s Old grown up, not as in someone’s grandfather. I mentioned Moo Brew in my earlier Tasmanian post. Very nice beer, available in very selected outlets on the mainland and worth the boutique price.

49. Huon Dark Ale

I'm not sure what effect I was trying for here

Skunked.

As in “off”, not any other weird Urban Dictionary definition. Which was a pity (the offness, not the potential for definitional confusion). I suppose I shouldn’t really count this as a beer I tasted, but I did pay for it and was disappointed to pour out a flat, vinegary liquid. Someone needs to sort out their quality control.

50. Iron House Porter

Sigh...

Skunked, but not quite so much.

Maybe it was the bottlo – or just bad luck. But this was undrinkable too.

Bear with me.

What Canberra is and how it relates to the rest of the country can only be understood by someone who has lived and worked in Australia for a while. The basic facts are that it is the federal capital, conceived in 1908 but not properly functional until the late 1920s, sitting in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and forming the seat of the federal government. Around that government an infrastructure has been planned and developed based on public servants and good works. It has a reputation for being worthy but a bit boring.

Those are the basic facts. Explaining how it affects everyday life in Australia, how Australians respond to it and how it functions is much more complex. If you were to think of Australia as a basic family property, including a house and outside space, I would suggest that Canberra is Australia’s garden shed.

The garden shed traditionally is the domain of the father, the head of the household. Consider him to be the federal government and the public servants who work for it. It’s where he goes when he wants peace and quiet to consider the matters of the day. It sits within the garden area of the property but is a self-governing territory, much like the ACT within New South Wales. The rules there are also slightly different: for example, it’s fine to store pornography and fireworks within the shed but they are frowned upon, and indeed legislated against, in the rest of the property. Often the father will come out of his shed and inform the rest of the household that he has made decisions that affect them all. There may have been consultations but these are usually just an exercise in public relations and have no bearing on the final decision. The father has spoken.

The house and the garden are the domain of the mother. Consider her to be the state governments. She actually runs the property on a day-to-day basis, making sure essential services are running (cooking, washing, cleaning, homework, sports, pocket money). However, the father in the garden shed considers that he knows best and will proclaim laws that the mother does not think are in the best interest of the rest of the family (her constituents).  There is therefore a constant battle between the mother, who really runs things, and the father,  who thinks he does, over how the property will be run. And who can come and stay in the spare room.

The father, although he makes sorties into the rest of the property when he has to, is under the impression that the garden shed is a fantastic place to be and, if he had his own way, he would be happy to stay in there all the time. Everything is within easy reach, he’s built all the facilities he needs – indeed they’re often of a better quality than their equivalents in other parts of the property – and while it can be a bit cold on winter mornings, it soon warms up in the sun.

The mother and the rest of the family, although they pop their heads in when they have to, would prefer to spend as little time as possible in the garden shed. You have to walk down a long path to get there, its character – clean lines, dull efficiency – reflects only the father’s view of things, and all the exciting toys are back in the house.

Garden sheds often house homebrewing facilities and Canberra is a big enough garden shed to house two forty gallon plastic bins and their associated plethora of tubings, in the forms of the Zierholz and Wig and Pen Breweries. The Wig and Pen is quite possibly the greatest brewery in Australia, certainly my favourite, and I will discuss it in a later post.

The Zierholz Brewery is not too shabby either. Based out in the only suburb of Canberra I know of that has two porn warehouses, Fyshwick, Zierholz is run by German-born Christoph, a man who knows how to make Bavarian beer and make it well. The Brewery runs as a small-scale industrial-chic beer hall (with an excellent pork-based menu) but also supplies a few favoured outlets within the ACT, one of which being The Pork Barrel Cafe, located just around the corner from Parliament House. I was in Canberra for business and took the chance to have a beer with my brother-in-law, one of the people who help Dad create the Garden Shed rules (I may be stretching this imagery too far: he’s a public servant).

My first drink on this rather warm evening was 43. Zierholz German Beer, which despite it’s rather generic name is a version of the classic Kolsch from Cologne. Dry, appetising, and just the thing to quench a thirst but get the tastebuds raring for more. I then moved on to  the intriguingly-named 44. Zierholz Swill, which they don’t appear to make any more, but from memory was a sessionable english bitter-style beer, probably close to their amber ale. Having now exhausted the establishment’s Zierholz taps, I thought I’d give Redoak another go, given that (at the time anyway) one rarely saw their beer on tap outside of their own premises. 45. Redoak Bitter was malty, biscuity and perfectly ok, but probably no better than the far less pretentious Little Creatures Rogers Ale, which I thought it closely resembled. I finally got to the actual Zierholz brewery in early 2011 and can highly recommend it. They are now selling five-litre kegs of six of their beers to take home. I’m wondering if I would be able to take one on the plane back to Sydney as hand luggage. The little Dash-8s that usually do that route aren’t pressurised: would this cause a mid-flight beer explosion?

Speaking of flying back to Sydney, the next day when I did so I apparently drank 46. Cascade Light in the Qantas Lounge and in the plane. Why, I’ve no idea, as full-strength beers would have been available. Perhaps I was poorly.

cricket ground behind me

I’ve been lucky enough to get to Hobart twice with work, but unlucky enough for both times to be in the dead of winter. Winter in Tasmania means daytime temperatures of 10 degrees celsius and the nights reaching freezing point. Mind you, the summers are hardly the blazing hot sunfests that are seen as typically Australian, so it doesn’t make much difference really. The small corner of Tasmania I’ve seen leads me to believe that it’s a very pretty island, with geography not unlike the softer parts of the north of England. Hobart itself is more like a regional town than a capital city, but it has a pretty harbour and the mountains form an attractive backdrop, laced with snow both times I was in town. When I visited for the first time, in June 2009, I was lucky enough to have a meeting at the Bellerive Oval, which has one of the most beautiful backdrops of any Test cricket venues in the world. It also has a very ugly oil painting of Ricky Ponting and a statue of David Boon in its grounds, proving that for each positive there’s at least one negative.

I don't think this is how Moo Brew is produced. But you never know.

In late May 2010, heavily delayed flights on Boganair had caused NFFEF and I to arrive at our harbourside hotel, the Grand Chancellor, tired, cranky and too late to face walking out into town for food, so we hunkered down in the hotel bar for a couple of stress-relieving beers and whatever snacks could be provided. I was really pleased to see that one of the beers on tap was 40. Moo Brew Pilsener. Moo Brew is a range of beers from the Moorilla Vineyards in Berriedale, Tasmania, some of which I’d seen before on my travels as they come in very distinctive bottles. My impression of their Dark Ale, drunk a year previously, had been good and the draught Pilsener didn’t disappoint either – not overpoweringly hoppy but nicely bitter and refreshing. Moo Brew’s range is becoming easier to find in NSW but is still a bit of a rarity up on the mainland. However, it’s worth a taste if you can find some.

Once we’d finished moaning about budget airlines and finished our respective beers (she drank Corona, you won’t be surprised to hear) we headed off to our respective rooms and I decided to hit the minibar for a nightcap. The best choice in the fridge was 41. Boags Draught (erm, in a bottle), a reliable if dull 4.6% lager from one of Tasmania’s duopoly of brewers. Boags (independent until 2000 but now part of the Lion Nathan conglomerate which in itself is part of the Japanese Kirin company) is brewed in Launceston, Tasmania’s “other” city and home town of the only Tasmanian I know well enough to call a friend. The other big brewer in Tasmania is Hobart’s own Cascade (independent until the nineties and now owned by Fosters) and there’s quite a rivalry between the two. My Tasmanian friend ducks out of all this by drinking only Coopers Pale Ale. A wise choice as far as taste goes, but he may find himself in trouble next time he goes home. Mind you, he is as big as a house and knows martial arts. I think he’ll be ok.

Anyway, the Boags Draught was a bit of a let-down after the Moo Brew, being only a notch above Tooheys New, but it did the job. I was relaxed enough to sleep.

The next day we went to our meetings and then endured the long cab ride out to Hobart airport, which appears to have been built far enough out of the town to allow for a lot more development than has actually happened. It’s a funny old airport too, in that the Qantas Lounge is actually situated before you go through security, which means that when the flights are called there’s a flurry of businesspeople trying to get through the metal detectors in time while normal people, who’ve had to pay for their beer and newspapers in the normal departure lounge, get to the front of the queue to get on the plane for a change. The other odd thing about the Q Lounge there is that it’s the size of someone’s front room and has no bar staff – there’s a fridge with beer in it and you can help yourself. Still on the quest to get something I couldn’t get elsewhere I chose 42. Cascade Draught (erm, in a can) as this is not available on the mainland. I can report that residents of the other five states and two territories are not missing anything, despite it being Tasmania’s biggest selling beer.

Look ! Melbourne Hipsters!

On my travels again, accompanied by NFFEF again, this time to the trendiest place in the world, Melbourne, where if your jeans aren’t tight enough and your haircut isn’t of just the right asymmetrical design they openly laugh at you in the streets and suggest you push off back to Surry Hills where you belong.

In order to avoid open ridicule we went for dinner to Lygon Street, the heart of Melbourne’s Italian community and therefore a haven of timeless style and good food. But for some reason I fancied an English-style beer with my dinner and, luckily, Little Creatures Rogers Ale was on the menu. Hoppy, biscuity and only 3.8% abv, if this wasn’t so fizzy it’d be an ideal session ale. I’m pretty sure NFFEF drank Corona, but then it’s pretty much a 50% chance on any given session that she will do. After a couple of bottles each we dodged the fashion police and went to the James Squire Brewhouse in the middle of town for a cheeky last pint (or two). Nothing I hadn’t had before though.

Google "Darwin Beer" and this is the number one image you get

In Darwin

38. Pure Blonde

I’ve said it before, but one of the perks of working where I do is that I get to travel around Australia quite a lot, and get to places that I wouldn’t ordinarily get to. Having said that, doing Darwin in 24 hours (get in at 2pm after a five hour flight, leave about the same time the next day) is a stupid thing to do and shows a lack of foresight. I’ve now done this twice, but to my credit, the third time I visited I went up for four days. I got much more out of the trip, the people I saw hopefully thought I was less of an east coast blow-in, and I didn’t feel like death when I got back to Sydney. Well, actually I did, but at least I had the weekend to recover.

This particular trip was my second visit, and also my second in the company of a nearly-famous female ex-footballer. NFFEF likes a beer, but tends to restrict her choice to either Pure Blonde or Corona. The bar we found ourselves outside, Monsoons on Darwin’s notorious Mitchell Street strip, advertises itself as a “restaurant and party bar”. Well, at early lunchtime there was no party going on and the menu looked basic, but they served beer very cold and in pints and we were building up quite a thirst walking the 400 metres from our last appointment to the cab rank so we decided to make a pit stop.

I chose Pure Blonde for three reasons (1) it was advertised as being dispensed at virtually sub-zero temperatures, (2) I thought I should meet another low-carb enemy face on, and (3) NFFEF would have called me out if I’d have ordered anything approaching “boutique”.

It was cold and wet and gave me a slight buzz. It went down in no time flat and I had another before we ventured out into the sweaty heat.

Crazy Horse, The Cat, Sniffer and pals

Well, back home in Sydney, not Blighty, but it’s always worth posting a picture of the 1970 England World Cup Squad playing “Touch The Truck“. Or touch the Ford Cortina in this case.

35. Coopers’ Extra Stout

An old favourite, thick, black, roasted barley taste. 5.8% so don’t drink too many in a row. I’m sure it used to be 6.2 or 6.3% when I first drank it back in 2006, but I may have imagined that. I think these bottles were drunk at home, based on the scanty evidence to hand. When Old is just too light, get yourself one of these. Never seen it on draught anywhere, although I’m hopeful I might do somewhere in Adelaide when I finally get to spend some time there.

36. Mildura Wee Heavy

I have no memory of this. I probably bought it at Dan Murphys’ on a whim. It appears this has now been rebadged as Mallee Bull. The brewery looks like an interesting place to visit, being as it’s in an old cinema, so if I’m in Mildura at some point (unlikely, I know) I will drop in and remedy my omission.

At Redoak

37. Redoak Oatmeal Stout

Ah, Redoak. A brewery that never misses an opportunity to say how many awards it’s won and yet still can’t actually get beer right. It has two main problems: 1) it tries to brew too many different styles, but masters none, and 2) it serves them all too bloody cold. Now, this isn’t an Englishman abroad’s usual lament about getting his bitter too cold – it’s a serious point.  Serve your german lager styles cold, that’s fine, but ales and stouts need to be served at 10-12 degrees Celsius. Stout should not be served at 4 degrees as if you do that you can’t taste it, and all the roasty flavours you spend half a paragraph going on about in the tasting notes can’t be discerned. One of the blokes at the Brewery says that they serve them cold as that’s how Australians expect their beer and you can always let it warm in the glass if you prefer it that way. This is wrong on all counts. If an Australian is going to brave the copper shrine to beer and beer/food matching that is Redoak’s swanky bar/restaurant in the heart of Sydney, they’re likely to either be someone who knows about beer or someone who is open to being converted. And if they’ve been dragged in against their will there’s three or four cold lagers on tap to keep them happy. In 2011, in the middle of the most culturally savvy city in the country (ok Melbournites, we’ll fight later), don’t treat your customers like philistines. And, more importantly, if you let your Oatmeal Stout warm in the glass before drinking you notice that it’s rather thin and uninspiring. Give me Samuel Smith’s version any day, which you can buy in discerning bottlos (Jim’s Cellars in Crowie has it) in pint bottles for less than the cost of Redoak’s “award winning” brew.

Picture actually taken in Sydney in December. But the attitude to the beer stays the same.

32. VB
33. Carlton Draught
34. Platinum Blonde

Perth’s a funny place, probably my least favourite of the Australian state/territory capitals. It just feels so…soulless. When I’ve been there for work I’ve always tried to spend my evenings in Fremantle, Perth’s port town, which has something approaching life in the evenings and a couple of good book/record shops plus a couple of worthwhile breweries. But more about those in a later post.

The first time I went to Perth in 2010 (which appears to have been in late February so I have got my beer chronology slightly out of order) I had other plans for the evening, which involved being driven into the inner suburbs by a man I’d never met who would only answer to the name of MegaMike. It was all to do with a music-related project which has stalled slightly (must get it back on track) but it involved a very pleasurable evening in the company of MegaMike, his mate Dion, and a strange Welshman. A mysterious man with only one hand made a brief appearance too.

When in MegaMike’s house, do as MegaMike does, so the beer drunk that night was a succession of longnecks of VB, Carlton Draught and Platinum Blonde. VB is the biggest-selling beer in Australia, but I’ve yet to find anyone who has a kind word to say about it. Even Victorians: I went to a wedding in the Dandenongs where VB was the only choice of beer and everyone else on my table, Victorians all, declined to drink it, declaring it “piss”. The only real difference between VB and Carlton Draught is that the VB is slightly darker in colour and has a slightly stronger taste. On a hot night in a room full of heat-emitting technology, both of them did the trick.

Platinum Blonde was launched by Woolworths (owner of Dan Murphys, Liquorland, BWS and probably many more bottlos) in 2008 as a cynical attempt to take the “low-carb” market away from Pure Blonde and its imitators, and therefore increase their already frightening hold over the entire retail scene. “Low-carb” beers are huge in Australia, sold to gullible fools as somehow less fattening than normal beer, and easier to session drink. Some even maintain that they give you less of a hangover too. It’s all bollocks. There may be less carbohydrate in the beer, but that’s not what makes you fat – it’s the calories in the alcohol that make you fat. And “low-carb” beers are not low alcohol beers – Platinum Blonde is 4.6%, the low end of full-strength. If it’s easier to drink and less likely to make you feel bloated, that’ll be the relative level of carbonation. Or all in your head. Like the fact that your hangover is less strong.

Anyway, after the VB and Carlton Draught, this tasted crisp and even a bit citrussy, a pleasant surprise. I tried it again a few days later, with a clean palate and a clear head, and it tasted horrible. Sometimes context is everything.

Her milkshake brings all the boys to the yard

Studio A at 2MBS, last week.

And busy drinking too. But somehow the list of beers I’d drunk overwhelmed me and inertia took over as far as writing any of them up properly. But I kept that list going, and made some notes along the way. Rather than attempt full-on reviews of all of them, here’s part one of a whistle-stop tour through that list, with the occasional comment/picture to shed light where it exists.  Eyes down for a full house…

24. Old Admiral

The Lord Nelson Hotel maintains that it’s the oldest pub in Sydney. It probably is, but it’s only been brewing it’s own beer since 1985. Does some good stuff too. Did I go in there in 2010? Not sure, but I bought a six-pack of their Old Admiral, one of the two beers they make available in this way, Three Sheets being the other. A thick, strong (6.1%) porter, Old Admiral is a nice way to finish an evening. They serve it too cold in the pub though.

25. Hatlifter Stout

I reviewed this in my stout taste test in 1999. My views haven’t changed.

A Friday at The Marly

The Marlborough Hotel, Newtown

27.  James Squire Mad Brewers Orchard Ale

I drank these both at The Marlborough Hotel (aka The Marly) in Newtown with Louise and her two tallest friends. You don’t often get the porter on draught outside of the James Squire Brewhouses, so this was a nice treat for me. Like a creamier, more vanilla-y Old.

The previous Mad Brewers release I’d tried was really awful, so I was pleasantly surprised by the Orchard Ale. I’m a sucker for a saison (which is the base for this beer), and the apple taste worked well. I’d like them to make this one again. I had it on draught (I think the Marly was one of only a handful of pubs to have it that way) but it was released in longnecks too.

A Friday at The Local Taphouse

Nude (1930) by Edwin Holgate (1892-1977)

28. Holgate Road Trip IPA

29. Feral Barrel aged Saison

The Local Taphouse opened in Darlinghurst in early 2008 and I’ve not been there nearly as often as I should have been. It’s on the wrong side of town for me, which is part of the problem, and if I went here frequently I’d have no money or liver left, but I think the main reason I haven’t been more often is that I don’t feel 100% comfortable in here. I like beer, but not at the level that these guys do. I feel a bit intimidated. Still, it’s doing really well and I’m glad it’s there. Maybe it’s me that needs to do the work.

Anyway, I was there with Lorkers, who’d just started his new job at UNSW so that dates it to early March 2010. I had a Trumer Pils to quench my thirst, German and so not to be counted. I’m sure it was fine. I have no notes on the Holgate Road Trip IPA or the Feral Barrel Aged Saison but I seem to recall being vaguely disappointed with the saison. They’re both breweries I’d like to visit at some point – I’ve enjoyed most of the Holgates I’ve tried, and Feral look like they do some interesting stuff.

A Monday at Beer Deluxe

Shirley Temple. Probably not drinking beer.

30. Temple Saison through a Randall
31. Temple Saison in a bottle

Looks like I was going through a saison phase. Beer Deluxe is in Federation Square in Melbourne, where I was on business. I was also just starting a bout of the genuine ‘flu, so my head was swimming even without the beer. Beer Deluxe doesn’t look particularly exciting from the outside, but it has a good selection of aussie micros on tap and a fridge full of bottled wonders so I always try to pop in here when I’m south of the border. They also have one of those randall things, a chamber between the barrel and the tap, usually filled with a beer-related ingredient, which the beer shoots through under pressure on its way to the tap and subsequently your glass. It was full of hops when I turned up, which they were putting the Temple Saison through. I had a schooner of the draught though the randall, and then a bottle of it au naturel, to see if I could tell the difference. I could a bit, but I was feeling rather unwell.

So unwell that when the barman had come over and showed me a 750ml $30 bottle of a rare saison and left it on my table, in my befuddled state I thought he’d given it to me to keep. As I staggered out of the door he came hurtling along to explain that it wasn’t a gift. I got in a cab, went to the airport and spent the next three days in bed.

League player in condoning drinking shock

I was on my way somewhere else.

That’s how you usually end up at The Paragon Hotel, one of two pubs at Circular Quay and the only one you’d really want to go into. The downstairs bar is pretty utilitarian but fine for a swifty when you’re waiting for a ferry, or as a starting point for a crawl through the Rocks. Upstairs is a bit posher but only just. Food’s standard but comes in enormous portions.

For some reason I’d forgotten that The Paragon does Coopers’ (but only on a tap around the corner) so I thought I’d go for a Resch’s Draught, which I’d been surprised to see Louise pick last time we were in here. “I want something thirst-quenching”, she’d said, and she certainly made the right choice. A 4.4% lager, crisp, bitter and with an overpowering taste of barley, it cleanses the palate beautifully and gets you ready for the next beer, whether it be another Resch’s or something more trendy.

Which is, let’s face it, pretty much anything on the taps.  Resch’s is the Toohey’s Old of lagers, in that it’s generally thought that no-one under the age of eighty drinks it by choice. It may be because the last time anyone spent any money advertising it appears to have been 1947, or it may be that it’s the last remaining beer from the old Resch’s Brewery, which officially took that name in 1906. The history of the brewery goes back to 1874, when the owners of West End Brewery in Adelaide set up premises in Waverley, Sydney. For the first two years it was called the Adelaide Brewery but they rather sensibly changed it’s name to the Waverley Brewery in 1876. Edmund Resch joined as manager in 1895, having run breweries with his brothers in rural NSW in the preceding years, giving the brewery (and the beer) his name eleven years later, moving it to Redfern in the bargain. Three years after his death in 1926 Resch’s was taken over by Tooth & Co. Of course, Tooth’s were taken over in their turn by Carlton United (Fosters) in 1983.  Why exactly (and where) Carlton keep brewing Resch’s is anyone’s guess – and you can get it in bottles too, both stubbies and longnecks – but I’m glad they do, not just from the heritage aspect but also because it’s a decent enough drop, one I’ll drink again.

2010 Resch's tap. See what I mean?

Thanks to ‘The Breweries of Australia: A History‘ by Keith M Deutscher (Lothian, 1999) for the above history lesson.

Phooey

Over at a certain Australian homebrewers’ forum people got very excited towards the end of last year about White Rabbit Dark Ale, a newish product from Little Creatures’ Victorian arm. I’m here to tell you that it’s nothing to get excited about. The brewery website may well go on about it not being “born to follow” and being fermented in open casks so that the yeast can “party” but really, it is not appreciably better than Toohey’s Old. And at $20 a six, compared to $14 or less for Old, I shall not be drinking it again, unless I find it on draught and there’s nothing better on. Most underwhelming.