…by giving you a fantastic selection of craft beer!
The Royston Hotel is located in Richmond and is a mere hop, skip and a jump from the Mountain Goat Brewery, many of whose brews we’ve discussed on the blog aplenty, and imbibed even more.
It therefore made perfect sense to hold the second meeting of the Australian Beer Writers’ Guild at the Royston where we could not only have awesome local craft brews, but some damn fine pub grub too.
It was bloody freezing the night we went and I hit the stouts early under the notion that it would warm me up a little. On tap, was the delicious Mountain Goat Surefoot Stout (though if you wanted, they did also have longnecks of it in its Rare Breed incarnation, yum!).
As soon as we moved into the dining room, we pored over the menus and even more imbibing began – this time, mainly going with what was available in bottles. It wasn’t easy to choose what to have for dinner but I went with the braised lamb shanks with mash, barley and vegetable jus. Just perfect for the chilly winter’s night! The meat fell off the bone as it should have and it was a very generous serving. Indeed, I didn’t end up finishing my mash.
To drink, I chose a Renaissance Stonecutters scotch ale – a brewery from across the waters in New Zealand. Haven’t had a bad drop from this lot once. Mmm. Really, really sorry about my crappy mobile phone pics – my phone had just enough charge to take bare minimum of photos required.
The T-dawg ordered a very satisfying looking seafood claypot. It was humungous!
Both him and I agonised over a good beer match with his dish – he eventually decided on a passable Emerson’s 1812 pilsner. Nothing to write home about, I’m told. Fellow guild member Jourdan supported this assessment, having drunk it on its homeland New Zealand.
Personally, I wish the weather had been warmer so I could try out some of the ciders they had on offer. An excellent excuse for a repeat visit. The other diners went with the burger and the big-arse steaks on the menu. While the menu has many delectable options, I was a little disappointed to see that there wasn’t much in the way of vegetarian options that looked as equally delicious as the meat and seafood ones.
Then the ABWG got down to business, not before The Crafty Pint and probably Beer Blokes‘ Prof Pilsner managed to get us all a round of Stone and Wood’s draught ale with their beer gravitas. There was a glint in every punters’ eye at tasting the oh so familiar passionfruit note that the S&W draught ale is famous for! All Ale The Big V was indeed a most excellent secretary, reigning in us young roustabouts and unfurling the guild’s official logo.
The night finished with a blissful pot of Moo Brew’s stout for just about all of us. Well, when we could finally get Crafty and Prof out the door, those old timer beer folks do love a good natter. And rightfully so, as the staff are very sympathetic to the craft beer cause, and know quite a bit about it. It’s a wonderful pub and worth the trek even if you don’t live in the area.