Boatrocker Hoppbier is the second release from Brunswick's dynamic duo Matt and Andrea. These guys have really broken new ground with their Boatrocker brand, persuading the guys at Southern Bay Brewing (Victoria's big contract brewer) that people really do want to taste the malt and hops in their beer. Previous contract brews out of Southern Bay seemed to taste just like one another, a base wort that is then tweaked slightly to the contractor's tastes (Three Troupers, Hawthorn and The Ranga to name a few). The Hoppbier is a pilsner base but boasts lashings of fresh NZ hops giving mad texture and extremely moreish aromas and flavours. Think passionfruit and melon and dry, tingly acids from those fresh flowers but totally sessionable rather than the mouth-stripping hopfests seen in many other hop-driven brews. Yum!
Kirin Ichiban Shiboru is the real Kirin, not the flacid green bottled piss marketed by our friends at Lion Nathan, or is it CUB, same diff. They use the "First Press" method where they ditch the first and last (heads and tails for spirit fans) runs of the wort and make their beer exclusively with the juicy, full-flavoured mid-section of the wort. They add maize and rice to their grist which lightens and sweetens the brew but use just the right amount of hops to give dryness and texture in harmony with the sugars. I'm a sucker for labels too and there's no arguing with the bold, gold stement on the bottle - "Brewed for good times". It works, I had a good time.
Coopers Pale Ale is one of those beers that I keep going back to and marvelling at how enjoyable it can be. I've been drinking the Green for close to 20 years and although there was a change when Coopers changed their brewery and upgraded their equipment (around 2002 i think), the quality, flavour and integrity is still there. A whiff of hops when you crack the beer, beautiful dry ale on the first sip, creamier if you like to roll and slightly sour yeast esters on the nose too if you like to roll. I don't like to roll and shudder when a barperson rolls my bottle along the bar but hey, it's a free world. I do like to roll my Reds though. When I lived in Byron I drank a lot of Coopers Green and got to a point where I could barely taste it. I started to add a shot of Stone's Green Ginger Wine and boom! Green and Green, heaven on a hot day.
3 Ravens 55 APA is the bitter, hoppy, juicy American Pale Ale from my local brewery in Thornbury (Victoria). Adrian, the brewer, uses five different hops and five different malts to create this dry, refreshing ale. I like it as a palate re-setter for when all the beer starts to taste the same as it's ripping bittereness really strips away any mouth-grot that's built up over the evening (or morning as I think it was maybe).
Kooinda Pale Ale is an APA from Victoria's smallest microbrewery. Full, juicy, hoppy without being extreme and so sessionable. I love it. I've been pleasantly surprised by how many people get turned on by the full body and balance of this beer. The guys that make it are legends too, real salt-of-the-earth Aussie battlers who deserve respect not only for their brewing skills but also for being good human beings ready with a laugh and happy to lend a hand to any good cause.
So that was the eski, but around 8:00am, when the real soldiers are still standing, that's when the big guns come out. Oooh yeah.
Baladin Elixir is a peated malt ale from Italy (!). It comes in a very pretty 750ml champagne bottle and, it may be wanky, but I was given some wine glass shaped glassware from Baladin and there's a good laugh in a bunch of red-eyed guys (and one girl) sitting around the backyard drinking this rich, sweet, whisky-centric ale from stemmed glasses. The ale is magic, one of the best whisky ales I've come across, medium to full bodied, extremely textural and complex flavours of Highland whisky, toffee and oak nuances really wake up the palate. It boasts a 10% ABV but the heat is totally in line with the whisky phenols, small sharp carbonation and malt richness.
Southern Tier Cuvee Series 2 (Lakewood, New York) is an American Amber Ale aged in American Oak. This brew is extremely limited and I cracked my second last one to celebrate the dawn of 2011 with my best mates (who deserve good beer for supporting and listening to me throughout 2010). So rich, so sweet, those amber malts give such juiciness with a variety of toffee, caramel and dried fruit flavours supported by the vanilla, cigar, burnt sugar and oak textures from the American oak (think good bourbon like Stagg or Booker's). At 11% ABV you'd think it'd be a sipper but it didn't last long, the sun didn't quite make it past the horizon before we were fighting over the dregs in the bottle.
Mountain Goat Double Hightail is my beer of the year for 2010. Mountain Goat is Melbourne's iconic first real microbrewery. Their contentious Steam Ale has brought their craft beer skills to the masses and their Double Hightail is a reward for the Goat Army who didn't let a little commercialisation get in the way of a good drink. Big, juicy malts are balanced by near-perfect hop-levels. Unjudicial use of Galaxy hops provides bitterness and lighter aromatics to the rich fruitiness of this absolutley f*n awesome ale. Bless you Dave, Cam and Jane, may your angels smile on you for all of 2011.
At about this point a few of the soldiers decided to go and lie down whcih left the few crazy and keen hardcore flavour junkies slurring and laughing on the lawn. We needed a wake-up, a refresher, something to bring us back from the brink of drunkenness and we found it in a small bottle of Mikkeller and Brewdog's collaborative effort, a blended DIPA (Double India Pale Ale) humbly named I Hardcore You. Apt. Two of us shared this ridiculously, some may even say stupidly (we certainly were) bitter bitter bitter DIPA. A Coopers Green has an IBU (International Bitterness Units) of about 15. The I Hardcore You is up around 150 IBU. Like sucking on a salt-crusted grapefruit with just enough marmaladey, biscuity malt to keep your mouth from getting up and running away. It was a perfect refresher after the shenanigans and cigarettes of a crackin New Year's Eve. And after so much good beer I barley noticed the 9.5% ABV.
It's probably important to note that we drank about a pint of water with each beer, or between beers. The lemon tree loved it.
After all these good beers and good people and good time I slept the sleep of the just and woke up smiling, looking forward to a full and rewarding year of beer and beautiful people. Blessings and best wishes to all for 2011, may all your beers come true.
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