Category Archives: craft beer goodness

a pithy guide to the Australian beer scene in zine form

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Stubby Buddy vol. 1

Beer week continues! For your enjoyment today, we have a zine review on beer. It seems there’s a zine dedicated to just about everything!

As is usual whenever I’m browsing the Sticky Institute website, I start off by wanting to order one zine, and then leaving with seven or so in my online shopping cart. I was pretty gleeful when I saw a zine about beer and that it was selling for *one cent*. Mistakenly, I assumed it was going to be pretty bad but hey, who can complain at one cent, really?

Stubby Buddy is excellent, and the people who write it are articulate and clearly know what they’re on about. Their information is current and addresses issues in the beer industry that affect consumers right now. The first piece discusses the phenomenon of ‘low carb’ beer and cider and how commercial breweries are pushing these ‘products’ as the next big thing to snare the punters. Judging by this discussion, the zine was written just before summer 2009 got started.

The meat of the zine is devoted to beer reviews and there are plenty, mainly from various craft brewers around Australia, with a few international beer reviews peppered in between. Both Buzz and Bumble (the nicknames of our humble contributors) rate each beer out of five and state that anything with a three or above is “a fine and decent drop”. They also have a couple of cider reviews – hopefully they’ll have a few more next issue.

After the reviews, a brief history of Australian beer is given. I was quite surprised to learn that “at first beer wasn’t that popular. Rum was the preferred method of getting shitfaced.”, like in the West Indies (my father tells me that there rum is cheaper than beer so everyone drinks rum ‘back home’). This article had me giggling all the way through.

The column ‘Barfly’s Rant’ is spot on. Barfly goes on to list ten drinks that are overrated but are continually ordered by misinformed party animals. There are some pretty dodgy suspects on the list, and one item used to be an old fave of mine *winces*. It’s kind of cool, looking into the mind of a bartender and finding out what their bugbears are. If you ever read the zine and guess what my old fave is, I’ll buy you a beer.

Stubby Buddy can be purchased online or instore at Sticky Institute, city, Melbourne. I purchased volume 2 with this first one and will be keeping an eye out for future volumes as it’s of an excellent standard, and lots of fun. Stay tuned for a review of volume 2.

the local mountain goats got me

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vats

This coming week is going to be a BIG beer related event week for me, so here begins the first of three posts for the week – two will be on breweries, and one will be a zine review (yes, people write zines about beer! How cool is that?). Don’t worry, there’ll be lots of food action to go along with the beer because good food does go well with good beer.

After accidentally sleeping in due to a disco nap, I (legally) raced on over to the Mountain Goat brewery in Richmond one rainy Friday evening. I may have driven past it a few times…in the dark, you can’t really tell what it looks like as it blends in perfectly with all the industrial buildings around. Once inside, it’s actually rather classy – pretty much a converted warehouse with big communal tables and lots of space to encourage bike-riders to bring in their modern-day chariots. The photo above is of the vats, and it reminds me of that scene in Goldeneye where Bond has to bomb similar tank-like things after Trevelyan has crossed him. Um, I remember it so well because of the game on Nintendo 64, don’t judge me!

I’d never been before to the Mountain Goat brewery and was lured by the promise of their beer ‘Rapunzel’ being served three ways – regular, oaked, and ‘Randied’, which meant ‘hopinated’. Yes, beer is very technical…to be honest I’m not exactly sure what the hopinator does – I just know that the beer is rendered hoppier by being run through it with fresh hops. Don’t worry, you don’t get any floaties in your beer. The beer being run through the hopinator changes every time the brewery is open to the public (generally Wednesday and Friday evenings from 5pm).

Randall the hopinator

Sadly, only oaked Rapunzel was available when I arrived. Here’s more info straight from the brewery’s blog about her:

Rapunzel is brewed in the style of a true Belgian Abbey beer. In the days of old monks used to brew these beers with the help of the almighty (we assume). We’ve taken a leaf from their book and combined Pilsener Malt, German Hallertau hops and a Belgian Yeast strain to produce a full-on, 7.7% alc/vol slice of Flanders. This current 2010 version also comes with extra baggage – there’s an Oaked version. Last May we filled a chardonnay barrel with 2009 Rapunzel, and we let it sit for 9 months. The French Oak has imparted distinct vanilla, apple and honey characters that just can’t be delivered other than by oak. We blended it back with a little of the 2010 Rapunzel, and whammo. It’s really something out of the box (barrel?).

Ooh, she was yummy – quite alcoholic for a beer, and not quite like wine, but possessing some characteristics thereof. The barrel definitely left its mark on the beer. Hopefully I’ll be able to compare to Rapunzel regular when she’s on tap at the Local Taphouse in St Kilda.

Bit O’ Meat was at the brewery beforehand and got to sample more of the produce, to put it rather finely. I got to taste some of his Riwaka Pale Ale, some of the Randied Galaxy IPA, and the Steam Ale on tap. Steam Ale tastes a little bit like Coopers Sparkling – but not so in the bottle. The Riwaka was hoppy, but not nearly as much as the Galaxy, nom. Amusingly, he also made new friends – some lovely engineering/dancing types. They were capital fellows. It was like walking into an episode of Cheers or something. My last drink was the Surefoot Stout, which was more like a really robust, smoky porter, though very much a stout in colour. To have this with oysters would have been a damn treat. If you don’t like dark beers, or stouts, I still think you should give this a go. Perfect given the day had got so chilly what with all that rain.

If you check my personal Twitter profile, it says that I’m a beer, cheese and prosciutto assassin, and so I ordered a pizza so that I could indulge my appetite for my culinary holy trinity – a prosciutto and cheese pizza. Imagine it – pizza slice in one hand, pint glass in the other. Is that not the perfect Friday night? It’s bittersweet looking back at this because my loves are also my vices, and I’ve been instructed to drastically cut down my appetite for all three (with great success, I might add).

cheese & prosciutto pizza

Richmond’s not too far from the city centre and it’s excellent fortune to have a brewery in a metropolitan area. As soon as I went, I caught myself starting sentences with “Next time I come here, I’m going to have…” and the like. I’m puzzled as to why so many people (and I’ve definitely been guilty of this myself countless times) go to average pubs and order pint after pint of the commercial swill when we have places like this. I admit it – I lost more than my fair share of brain cells on Carlton Draught jugs (yeah, not pints, but JUGS) at the weekly social night for a musical society I’ve previously had dealings with. Is it that we’re cheap, or stupid? Probably both!

Mountain Goat Brewery on Urbanspoon

nuts about brown ales

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April’s Ale Stars at the Local Taphouse in St Kilda was devoted to nut brown ales. Not exactly one of the most exotic styles of beer, but for some reason it always conjures up images of colder weather. Probably because I think of conkers…the colour of them, and the weather. It’s actually a fond childhood memory.

Apparently, it’s not a particularly popular style. The Northern English style is lighter and hoppy, whereas the Southern English variation is rich and sweet. On this particular evening, we were only going to be having examples that adhered to the Northern English tradition.

As is usual pre-session, I tried some beer I’d never had. First up, the Bridge Road Bling IPA.

Bridge Road Bling IPA

Nice and bitter and hoppy. I liked a lot of the Bridge Road tipples tried when I last went to the microbrewery showcase. This was no different. Was a bit surprised that it got such a poor review in the beer zine Stubby Buddy vol. 1 because those folks are more knowledgeable about beer than me, and I really liked it – it’s rich, bitter and very characteristic of the IPA style. Though my photos of beer are generally taken with my mobile phone, this captured it well – rich, creamy, aromatic head, while the liquid itself was cloudy. I don’t think I can call hoppy beers ‘manly’ anymore, because I now love hoppy beer. One less gimmick up my sleeve, damn!

Afterwards, I had a glass of the Feral Smoked Porter. This is autumn in a glass. Beautiful and dark with a medium body and a less creamy head than the Bling above. The smokiness – wonderfully fragrant and savoury. I want to drink this and slug down smoked oysters. You can see by the lacing on my glass that I perhaps imbibe a little too quickly…

Feral Smoked Porter

The first brown ale for the evening was the Newcastle Brown Ale. I was quite surprised to see that it’s in a clear bottle – it having virtually no hops means this is okay? I found it quite watery, having a hint of bitterness and smelling of Horlicks! Not surprising, given brown ales are malty. Post-2001, this beer now has caramel colouring added to it. I didn’t particularly dig this beer, it was too…well, I think I’ve had better homebrew than this, honestly. I’ve been challenged by a lot of beers I’ve tried at Ale Stars, but up until now, this is the first one that has really failed to impress me.

Newcastle brown ale

The second beer on the list was the Samuel Smith nut brown ale. I’ve actually tried this before. It has seaweed as a coagulent! Is that why it smelt like socks to my nose? Thankfully, it doesn’t taste anything like socks – it’s heavier in body than the Newcastle Brown Ale and but was more bitter to taste.

Samuel Smith nut brown ale

The third beer is where things began to get and feel special. I think this was the special to the line-up? It’s from Colorado. I didn’t make many comments about the taste in my notes, except that I loved it, and it’s very roasty, with a little bit of bitterness. Also, who is the Surgeon General?

Avery Ellie's Brown Ale

The last one was from the American Rogue Ale Brewery – a hazelnut brown nectar. Doesn’t that sound mouthwatering? It was indeed delicious. I found it very caramel-laden and roasty in taste. I wouldn’t be able to choose a favourite between the Avery and this one.

Rogue hazelnut brown nectar

This Ale Star session was very much a good deal more…sober than last month’s affair. When in doubt, blame the this bock at 12% ABV. Good to see that they’re also serving us more pizza too!

Hot off the press! The Local Taphouse, both St Kilda and Darlinghurst, can now be found on ze twitterz! St Kilda is @localtaphouseSK and Darlinghurst is @localtaphouseDL. About blooming time lads, welcome! Teach them how to use hashtags and stuff, hehe.