Drinks

Some beers…

Nowhereman – Fresh Hop Lager, 5.3& 375ml can. A collaboration with a local hop producer. This kind of stuff will always be best on tap at the brewery as fresh as possible, unsure when this was canned but it seems to be about 3 months ago. Regardless, its a nice lager, nice malt character balanced with a real nice crisp bitterness from Victoria hops, they smell orange, mango, passionfruit. Though not as fresh as could be, this is still a real good beer that ticks all the boxes. 2.5/5.

★★★

Garage Project – Epuni Street Bitter, ESB, 5.5% 440ml can. An Extra Special/Strong Bitter. Big thick creamy head like a tap pour, very nice. Colour is amber/brown and and not fully translucent. Smells very malty, wholemeal bread, slightly yeasty with a touch of hops. Taste is biscuity, toasty, some slight sweetness from the malts, but the stand out is a herbal, earthy, very forward hop bitterness. The earthiness of the hops is really nice. This is really good. 3/5.

★★★

Jindabyne Brewing – Ol Black Diamond, Schwarzbier, 5.2% 440ml can. Another nice thick head on this pour. This is dark, opaque, with a nice tan head. Smell is dark roasted malts and lager yeast. Taste is dark and roasty malts, not overpowering, but very clean, as per the style which is basically a Pilsner. Pilsner hop character, obviously, and well balanced against the dark malt. A good Lager with nice dark roast malts that are not over powering, well balanced with a traditional hop character, and a clean finish. Very nice. 3/5

★★★

Sierra Nevada – Celebration, Fresh Hop IPA, 6.8% 355ml can. This was canned in October ’21 and it was still very damn good. An old style IPA with big malt character, the hops had dropped off so far as brightness and big notes, but still good bitterness, clean with only mild oxidization. I dont think I have had one of these for maybe 10 years? Nice. 2.5/5 only because the age doesn’t offer the full fresh hops it should, but the big malts allow for age and it was still very tasty.

★★★
Drinks

A beer

Rocky Ridge – Mexican Hot Chocolate Milk Stout, 5.5% 375ml can. This is really good. Only issue is there wasn’t really any heat from the chillis. Everything else was great.

Edit 19/7/22: Tried one of these again and there was a fair amount of chilli heat or warmth in this can, it was served in a nice beer glass instead of a jar, maybe that makes a difference? Again, it was really good.

★★★★
Drinks

Some beers…

Pirate Life – Raspberry Lamington Stout. 6.5% 355ml can. Smells like fake raspberry and coconut, but still has a nice dark malt scent. Tastes like a stout, then an artificial coconut and a cocoa/chocolate flavour, no real raspberry taste except maybe a kind of berry juice sourness which is probably just a dark malt thing. Its weird, its drinkable, but its too artificial for me.

★★

Pirate Life – Stout. 5.8% 355ml can. Its a stout. Really good, too. Not much else to say. 3 stars.

★★★

Rocky Ridge – You Put the Beer in the Coconut, Dry Hopped Sour with Finger Lime and Coconut. 4.0% 375ml can. I haven’t has a sour in so long, and this seems very sour. Theres sourness, maybe some lime sourness but mostly probably lactic acid. And thats about it. Sone lactic funk on the nose. Some hop bitterness is detectable. Its a nice sour drink, sure, but there’s no coconut or way to know its finger limes and not lemon juice or just lactic acid. 2 stars

★★

Rocky Ridge – Rice Crispy, Rice Lager 5.0% 375ml can. Its clean, crisp, slightly sweet malts, lager style smell and hopping/bitterness. A nice clean crisp lager. Good stuff.

★★★

Pirate Life & Eyre Roasted – Coffee Porter. 6.0% 355ml can. Really big coffee. Insane coffee. Hard to say if any of the bitterness is actually hops. Big coffee and some well balanced dark malts. Gets a bit sweeter as it warms up, a bit of cocoa and chocolate in there, gets slightly medicinal, and the hops are there in the residual bitterness.

★★★
Drinks

Some Beers.

Dainton – Hopf’n Juicy Blood Orange Hoppy Weiss. Hazy Hefeweizen, 5.5% 375ml can: Has that banana-smell that Hefeweizens have, but I don’t care for too much. Its not bad but there isn’t a lot else going on. It is very hazy, the hop bitterness is hazy style. Wish it had a bit more carbonation. The blood orange isn’t that noticeable, there is some bitterness that could be pith/rind? Its a Hefeweizen with hazy style hopping.
2.5 stars. It fine.

★★★

Rocky Ridge – Woodin’ It Be Nice Oaked Pale Ale. 5.0% 375ml can. This smells great, big fruity “juicy” hops (Mosaic, Strata, Vic Secret and Ella), and also vanilla supposedly from the oak. The oak/wood character is interesting in a clean crisp pale ale (its their core range Pale Ale) rather than as usual in a darker beer (or wine). There’s a dryness, a musty note, an astringency of sorts that combines with the hop bitterness? Nice. Different. 3 stars.

★★★

Rocky Ridge – 9 New Zealand, Hazy IPA (All NZ Hops). 6.66% 375ml can. First smell; Resinous and sweet, but also pretty juicy, and a bit of white wine? Its an IPA but they have rounded it out to be more “hazy” than the initial aroma suggests. The malts are there in the sweet notes, but not doing much. Its actually a bit uneventful in the end, unfortunately. Motueka, Nelson Sauvin and Nectaron hops. Its just a bit flat all round, Maybe 3 months on the shelf didn’t treat it right. Carbonation is fine, if a bit “sharp” initially. Its pretty easy drinking, and you get some interesting white wine notes. It just doesn’t pop or showcase the N.Z. hops as much as I would want. 2 stars?

★★
Drinks

Timothy Taylor’s Landlord Pale Ale

No Idea what this was doing at a usually boring big chain beer shop, and in such good quality, not skunked or fucked up at all. One of the best UK Pale Ales and one of the best Pale Ales of all time, in my limited opinion. Amazing beer, amazing and beguiling find.

Drinks

Some recent beers.

8 Wired – Horseshoe Texas Brown Ale. 6.2% 440ml can. Its an American Brown Ale, maybe a bit more darker/roast malt character, but same mild carbonation. Then there is a far more than usual load of hops even for an American Brown Ale. Its not bad.

★★★

Daintons – Burnout Black IPA. 6.2%, 375ml can. This is good and that is because it is well balanced. Its big dark roasty malts, but also big IPA style hops, and they aren’t fruity or resinous so a nice straight Old World/UK bitterness comes through and doesn’t have other hop characters that could get in the way of the malts. Balanced. Very nice.

★★★★

Eclipse – Brown Ale. 5.0% 375ml can. A straight up Brown Ale. A bit low on carbonation, but it hits that weird area between light fizz and mouthfeel that works anyway? A bit too hop bitter. maybe? Nothing too detrimental. Its fine.

★★★

Finlays Brewing – Starboard Stout. 5.4% 375ml can. Black malts, very dark. There’s a nice hop bitterness in there. Its mainly all big dark malt bitterness. Almost a dry finish, nice light carbonation, not any real mouthfeel though.

★★★

Daintons – Chipmunk Choc Hazelnut Porter. 6.0% 375ml can. Not a Porter. There’s some cocoa but no Hazelnut. Its a dark mild, but very dark, and unbalanced hops.

★★