Easter report and a crisp lead-up

This blog will be out of action over the Easter weekend while I attempt to juggle a temporary funds shortage with a strong desire to set up camp at the Local Taphouse, after just receiving a text from them saying they've tapped their "April Belgian Ale Showcase". I mean, shit, that's worth ditching everything and driving there right now for. Actually, what I really wanted to say is it's like dangling donuts in front of a horizontally challenged individual but that's just not very PC now, is it?

So expect a very in-depth Easter report come Tuesday, or maybe Wednesday depending how much pain I'm in.

Until then, I'll leave you with Brains SA Gold Premium Ale (Wales). First Welsh beer I've tried actually, which is surprising (I'm part Welsh, y'see) and it does the job - a lovely crisp beer. Even pleasing to someone who's usually most interested in beers with creamier qualities. Tooheys needs to take lessons from Brains then they'd understand what "clean and crisp" is supposed to taste like.

See you on the other side of eating too much chocolate, drinking too much alcohol and doubling in size.

Spot the difference

Re; the drink to the left - You really do have to wonder about society sometimes. Well let's face it, all the time really.

Top six Melbourne bars (as of today)

Lambsgo bar (Fitzroy)
So my latest bar discovery. My housemate described it as having a "Mexican" vibe. A small bar, tucked away from the hustle and bustle and general crapness of Brunswick St bars. The best thing about it - a fridge stocked with 100ish imported beers, good lord, as you can see in the first image. The second image is the wall to the left of the bar - was very impressed to see the kind of beer posters they had up - and we were sitting in a comfortable dark position right in front. Lambsgo bar is then segmented into different rooms - the one where you enter has low tables and chairs to chill out, with a Galaga machine close by. Next room has a pool table, next room has dining table/chairs for the eating customers, next area is a smoking courtyard.

Small but with everything you need, more importantly dark, and most importantly they know their shit when it comes to beer - there's a friggin two page menu. They also have an old school bar tap and red telephone next to the bar. Brilliant.

The Standard (Fitzroy)
Aside from the Corner which I talk about below (and whose presence I can't help but let into my world on a daily basis) The Standard is the next pub I consistently find myself at. Now the trick here is to perfectly time your arrival to The Standard to ensure you get a beergarden table. I'm not revealing the trick, work it out yourself. You don't want to miss out on a beergarden table, it's worth fighting for. In fact the other day when we left the bar, I went up to a guy who had kindly asked me to let him know when we were leaving so he could pinch our seats, and passed the torch on. The look of relief and happiness on the guy's face was worth going alone. Well kinda.

So The Standard's other qualities - great food, a small but good imported beer selection, Bulmers on tap (UK not Irish, hehe) and they make the best bloody mary I've had in a bar in Australia. They use a splash of red wine and good tomato juice. Genius. Really, when you go to The Standard, you're investing at least a few hours there, if not one hell of an enjoyable afternoon/evening.

NOTE/HINT - The Standard don't use this I don't think, but I'm also a bloody mary fiend and make my own regularly - Golden Circle Tomato Juice and celery salt are the key.

Local Taphouse (St Kilda)
I've talked a lot about this place in previous blogs and given how long this blog is getting I'll let the goodness of what I've told you previously soak in further.

Napier Hotel (Fitzroy)
Tucked away between Brunswick St and Smith St. Part irish pub vibe, you really need to be up for a feed when you go here since it's really centred around the food, with the drinks almost being a side issue. But here's the thing - you will not believe the portion sizes you get at the Napier. I think we ordered an entree once that could barely be finished. Plus all the food I've tried there tastes amazing. The beergarden is ok (though the weakest of the beergardens mentioned here and I don't remember much music being played at a decent level either) but not inviting enough to really commit to a long afternoon of drinking.

The clientele is a bit rougher footy type for my liking then again, during AFL season, so is the next pub - that doesn't really detract from its likeable qualities though (in either case) as long as you time your drinking sessions correctly.

Corner Hotel (Richmond)
Now I'm going to be biased towards the Corner by default because I work in an office in the same building, with my desk being about 30 steps from the upstairs bar, but this really is a music institution in Melbourne, with touring bands disrupting my work on a not quite daily but feels too often basis. Sometimes I'm happy with the disruption if it's a great band, others - like many shall not be named Australian touring acts - are just plain annoying. If I drilled a hole straight into the floor from where I'm sitting, I'd land somewhere near the stage. Good to know.

Anyway, great bar staff, amazing food, and not only do they have a beergarden where you can regularly hear Old Crow Medicine Show, Dylan and the like, but they also have a downstairs bar area aside from the band room that has booths, a pool table and an old school arcade machine with Galaga, 1942, Space Invaders and all the greats. Just good vibes all round. The only thing lacking is a good beer selection but in this life, you gotta compromise and I'm very willing to do it given everything else the Corner offers. Plus Mountain Goat Hightail Ale (Richmond) tastes good on tap as long as you don't let it drop a degree in temperature i.e. drink quickly.

Great Britain Hotel (Richmond)
Terrible looking on the outside - in fact it's one of the first bars discovered in Melbourne by my housemate when we moved over here from Perth, but I never wanted to go in because it looks like a horrible blue collar bar from the sidewalk. How wrong I was. Now, as long as you never go there on a Friday or Saturday night when all the upturned collar fuckwits go to pick up short skirts (and try them on presumably) you'll be witness to a very chilled, dark, somewhat dirty folk/rock/blues vibe.

Couches inside, great decor and folk singer/songwriters every Sunday afternoon. Beergarden lacks sunshine in the winter which is difficult to deal with given how bone chilling the Melbourne winters can be, but they have wasabi peas available on their bar snack list, so I forgive them. Also don't ever try the "Piss" beer they have on tap - it tastes exactly as it sounds. Cider on tap is Pipsqueak - as mentioned previously is far more tolerable then in bottle form.

Oh and to dispel the legend - Bimbos is not a good place and don't ever mention it to me alongside any of these. The end.

Five recently tried brews to avoid

Anything from the Bridge Road brewery (VIC)
Firstly, there is no brewery on Bridge Road. Secondly, I was recommended this by a guy working at the Queen Victoria St markets on a Saturday afternoon who gave me a taste of some Rose that he said was awesome "and he doesn't even like Rose". Think sipping on red cordial after leaving it in a glass on your kitchen counter for 5 months. So I'm not sure why I even entertained the idea of trusting his opinion, but it was $5 badly spent. Also the label had BLING written on it, as you can see in the image...

However, despite that, it's not as bad as...

Pepperjack Ale (SA)
A winery owned by Fosters created a beer. Do I need to explain this any further? I had a couple of sips and poured the rest down the sink because it was so horrendous. No idea what I've done in a past life to have deserved this brutal assault on my taste buds. I think Pepperjack is quite possibly the worst beer I've ever tasted. Moving on...

Young's Old Special Ale (UK)
It's a damn shame because they nailed the stout, but are just slightly off when it comes to the special ale. It's missing the wonderful connection you're supposed to have between the creamy texture and the bitter hop finish. It needs to be consolidated because it does have the potential, the execution is just off. The will is strong but the skin is weak etc etc.

Tripel Karmeliet (Belgium)
Shocked that I've listed a high-end Belgian beer? Now I have to say, after the glowing recommendation from the bar woman at the Belgium Beer Cafe, I was really excited about finding this and trying it for the first time, mainly because she served me the Roquefort and Pauwel Kwak and both were brilliant. Unfortunately, the Tripel Karmeliet fails where something like the Hoegaarden Grand Cru succeeds. It's a brutally creamy brew, very sweet, but without the lingering bitterness, therefore leaving you with that constant feeling of having ingested too much sugar and the queasiness associated with it. Damn, and I was really after a beautiful relationship. Next time.

Monteith's Golden Lager (NZ)
New Zealand's answer to Corona. Now if I want to drink water, I'll just drink water, and in this case I'll put a few drops of pure ethanol in my water rather than spending money on something I can't even believe is being seriously marketed as a legitimate brew. It's no surprise the Golden Lager tastes as weak as their Cider, on the other hand though their Celtic Ale is decent. Inconsistent.

I had an amazing bar experience on Saturday, until the next blog.

Cider, cider everywhere so let's all have a drink

Four quick things...

1. After yesterday's blog, I received a text from the Local Taphouse of the two latest brews tapped - Little Creatures India Pale Ale (WA) and Napoleon & Co Cider (??). I can't find anything about it online, so expect a full report on your desk Monday morning after I sample it this weekend.

2. I work upstairs at the Corner Hotel in Melbourne and therefore use the toilet facilities used by patrons at the pub. I was just in there washing my hands and noticed a bottle on the sink. It was Mercury Dry Cider (TAS). I'm also incredibly hungover so nearly literally threw up at the sight, especially considering the Corner also sells Bulmers (UK). I'd like to find the person who left that bottle there and tear them to shreds.

3. Yes, there is a Bulmers (IRE) as well, but outside of Ireland it's called Magners Original Irish Cider (IRE). Without going into too much detail, Bulmers and Magners were friends once, then severed ties. Blah Blah copyright dispute blah blah blah. Also Strongbow (UK) is manufactured by Bulmers. The British one. And a few years ago they launched a variation called Strongbow Sirrus (UK) to compete with Magners. Which is called Bulmers in Ireland. All very confusing. Also Strongbow (UK) is what we get in Australia except we do a Sweet version and they don't. Funny how the one version we did ourselves tastes like crap. Oh and we produced the short lived Strongbow White (AUS) which from all reports also tasted like crap.

4. In reference to my hangover in point two, last night I had a little too much high-end beer, which is better than way too much low-end beer except when it comes to longevity. And the headache the next day is the same you'd get from drinking too many cocktails. See photo for reasons why I feel like arse today. 6.4%-9% brews. Christ.

Have a great weekend, send me beer photos.

PS. I've been told to create a flow chart on point 3. Maybe next blog.

In Cider and now I'm Out Of Cider

I realise I've made a terrible mistake with this whole beer tasting business. I got too excited, a little too keen, a little overzealous and now I've fucked myself.

Where do you go once you've sipped on something created by Belgian monks for gods sake? I should have built up to it, not jumped in straight away. You don't start at the bottom rung and leapfrog to the top in one go, there's small steps that need to be taken, that are important to be taken, important for the journey's sake.

So I'm going to take a breather from the beer for a moment, and quickly run you through the top 5ish general ciders worth noting. By general I mean the ones you're most likely to be served at an Australian pub, and by worth noting, I mean that they're not all necessarily good, and the ones that aren't good deserve to be belittled.

Bulmers (UK), Magners (IRE)
Finding Magners on tap in Australia is like looking for the Lost Ark, and to this day I don't actually think I've seen it anywhere on tap, which is a damn shame, because it ranks as one of the best ciders in the world. Good on the Irish, they're more than just a pretty stout. Luckily though, Bulmers - the UK version (rip off) of Magners - is appearing in more and more pubs as time goes by. I love Bulmers for the same reasons I like my favourites pales. A good balance of flavour, not too sweet or fruity, with a good colour and incredibly refreshing. It's also an amazing hangover cure.

Pipsqueak (WA)
Brewed by Little Creatures. I frequently have people telling me how great they think Pipsqueak tastes and I just don't see it myself. I'm guessing it's because the massive problem with Pipsqueak is only most noticeable in the bottled form - and it's the fact that it's over-carbonated. No good drinking a cider if you're going to have to belch every 3 seconds and have to take small sips because the bubbles are overpowering your tongue. Other than that, the taste is ok but it's pretty unspectacular.

Strongbow (UK), Three Oaks (SA)
Firstly, don't ever touch the Strongbow Sweet (thankfully only Australia fucked this one, the UK brewery does not produce a Sweet version). The primary danger of cider is being given one that actually tastes like apples - that's not what cider is meant to be about. It's like if a beer tasted like nothing but wheat and hops. The Dry and Draught versions are satisfactory, in that Pipsqueak kind of way, while the Three Oaks is a step below. In beer terms, this is hovering in that Heineken/Tooheys New kind of area.

Mercury (TAS)
This is quite possibly the most depressing cider known to man kind. It looks bland, it tastes like crap and it leaves you with an amazing hangover thanks to being loaded up with preservatives, just like all those low carb beers. Actually here I should point out that low carb beers should never be invested in to begin with. If you don't want to gain weight, don't drink any beer in the first place. Vodka has bugger all calories, drink that with soda. I tried drinking a mere 6 pack of that Boag's Blonde, and woke up not understanding why my brain felt detached from my head.

It actually makes me angry seeing people drinking Mercury, particularly at bars that are based around good quality product. I witnessed this at the Local Taphouse as I was sipping on my Timothy Taylor Pale. I mean for god's sake, go to Crown Casino at 3am if you want to indulge in scum scraped from the bottom of a barrel.

Monteith's Crushed Apple Cider (NZ)
The newbie cider. The problem here though is you know exactly what you're going to get from the moment you see it poured from a tap. A weak cider, weak in colour, weak in taste. I may as well be drinking diluted carbonated apple juice. This is the equivalent of drinking mid-strength beer, which is just as bad as drinking low-carb beer. For shame.

I did a bit of research on cider too - whilst this is a blind recommendation, if you're looking for something a bit finer, maybe check out the Wychwood Green Goblin Oak Aged Cider (UK). I've tried two Wychwood beers which were both pleasing and I think they would have the same quality control on their cider too. If it's bad, I apologise.

Depression

Forget what the dictionary says, the definition of depression is going to a restaurant you're really looking forward to eating at for the first time because the food is meant to be awesome, and then seeing the following beer menu...



When the most exciting beer on a menu is one that has "bio-grow certified" next to it, you know you may as well kill yourself right now. And no, it is not acceptable to just settle for Heineken.

Beer and cheese

I touched on this briefly in the Trappist blog. Yeah, I know - beer and cheese doesn't quite have the same kind of sophisticated ring that red wine and cheese does. In fact the mental image conjured for me is one of a massive pitcher of low quality beer and a massive bowl of nachos with fatty fat fat fat cheese melted on top, resembling the Blob if it was yellow and had a taste for corn chips instead of blood.

But for me, beer and cheese is a much more exciting combination of the two. Though I've never really been a wine drinker - I think Chardonnay is an abomination on the achievements of the human race, and the difference between a good and bad wine is that one doesn't taste like it wants to kill me by liquifying my internal organs. Actually another Black Books quote fits in nicely here - "No one is willing to admit that wine doesn't actually have a taste."

Anyway, so far there's been two beer and cheese combinations that have really struck me. The Chimay Blue Grand Reserve (Belgium) and Roquefort cheese (far right) in particular is a brilliant mutually beneficial partnership. Both being incredibly rich, smooth, creamy - it's like your palette is being fed liquid sensory enhancing drugs. This isn't a combination you can have as part of a late afternoon platter shared with friends though, this lends itself to you finding a completely isolated area, caressing a cigar in one hand, your Chimay in the other, the Roquefort laid out in front of you, some Coltrane playing in the background and taking a deep breath and enjoying the environment you've created, and when I say you've created, I mean you ARE fucking god. Yes, it is a combination of pretension and you should damn well enjoy it as such.

The James Squire Porter (NSW) coupled with Spanish San Simon cheese, on the other hand, is a lighter coupling - the Porter being a light, crisp beer and the San Simon resembling orange cheddar in appearance (I'm no good with cheese descriptions, sorry) with a light, complimentary taste. Something to enjoy on a Sunday afternoon with friends when you're hungover as shit and want to go some significant steps up from just a carton of VB, some Coles purchased Gouda and a box of Captain's Table water crackers.

Here's the problem - although I want to explore this further, in the two weekends of mixing two great loves together, I've put on a shitload of weight. Beer and cheese, while having the potential to blow your mind, will also turn you into a fat sack of crap.

Have a great weekend.

If you are reading this...

What the heck is wrong with you? It's St. Patrick's Day.

Rectify this situation immediately and go indulge in some quality Guinness at your local.

I'll speak to you tomorrow.

In anticipation of St. Patrick's Day, let's talk about unconvincing Dark Lager.

Well it's not quite a stout, and it's not quite a lager, but maaaan...

It's a Monday. It's not the time for pleasantries, and it's about time I wrote something negative about a brew in this blog. Ahh, dark lager - you have so much potential to be so much more but you'll never get there because you're too fascinated with playing the role of Switzerland and treading that shitty line down the middle of the road.

Now the name Köstritzer Schwarzbier (Germany) (the can in the photo below) had been popping up for me a bit recently. It's in my bible and it was recommended by the bar girl at the Local Taphouse so given I had a positive review from more than one reliable source, it was on the must have list. Acland Cellars never fails me, however they only had it in cans which was a little disappointing, though no more so than being denied that beautiful Kwak glass previously.

The Köstritzer is world famous - seemingly the most popular dark lager in the world. All I have to say is - whoever bothers to invest any time and effort into this type of beer is surely the same kind of human being that thinks having that extra piece of peppermint chocolate for dessert is "being deliciously naughty". The kind of person who defines decadence by staying up an hour later than usual. But I digress - Köstritzer is the best of the three or so I've tried recently, but it's the best of a really shitty bunch.

This Wednesday, if you happen to spot an individual with an upturned collar talking about how much he'd like to fuck that leggy blond that just walked by, drinking what looks like Guinness, it's more likely a dark lager. Now don't misunderstand me - any dark lager is still superior to, say, having to consume Tooheys Extra Dry, but at least TEDs doesn't pretend to be something it's not. Just because you have the sexy looking appeal of a stout doesn't mean you're anywhere near that league. You smell like nothing, you taste like nothing.

Also, if you're wondering why I don't blog on the weekends, I'm too busy being drunk or watching TV series' and movies in order to deal with being post-drunk. For some reason of late as well, I'm continually finding myself waking up with no pants. Clearly my drunk self likes being unrestricted and free.