Last night I opened this wonderful bottle that I acquired on Friday (the only reason I didn’t open it then was the 10k Melbourne Marathon even I ran on early Sunday morning).
It was delicious. The fig really came through and lent a nice sweetness to contrast with the bitterness. I’m now wondering why I don’t make things with figs more often….
Only drink this if you really really really like sour things. OMG it was sour – too much so for me.
This, my friends, was good. Supremely drinkable with great flavour, colour and body. I want more of them. We have a bit of a saying around here that the Sierra Nevada brew of any style of beer is a rather good definition of that style – and this is no exception. If you feel like a good oatmeal stout, go grab one of these and you won’t be disappointed.
I had this a little while ago now, but distinctly enjoyed it. I’d keep an eye out for Red Duck beers, I seem to enjoy them.
I wish I enjoyed this a bit more. I’m just spoilt by Bundaberg ginger beer. Why does it seem so hard for something to be slightly alcoholic yet as good as Bundaberg?
I have a number of friends who are gluten intolerant, so I’ve taken one from the team and grabbed a few gluten free beers available locally to try. The Wilde Gluten Free Pale Ale wasn’t bad, and although does have that distinctive taste of a gluten free beer, certainly wasn’t offputting. I’d put this around what’ you’d expect from a more mass produced pale ale.
ale. 
Tasty, not especially special, and does feel like something that’s more mass produced than much of the beer I consume (can that be a valid description?). That being said, this cold Melbournian enjoyed it.
Another beer with the Vegan sign from Sam L Smith. Also, a good Best Ale. A good amount of flavour and utterly pleasant to drink just before nomming down on some awesome thai food. If you’re a fan of proper British beer, give this one a go (also, you know it’s vegan, which is always a plus)
Damn this was good. I reckon that Harviestoun must be my favourite brewery at the moment. Just delicious.
More Vegan beer from Samuel Smith’s! I can heartily recommend their Nut Brown Ale to anyone who’s ever had a Newcastle Brown and wanted a bit more. This isn’t overwhelming and thoroughly enjoyable. I’m finding that this seems to be a good pattern in their beers – flavourful, drinkable and not overwhelming. You could easily pair this with food too… and I’m either craving lentils or they’d go well with it. The back of bottle suggests Thai, Malaysian and Chinese food, which would also go pretty well. There is a societal bias towards matching wine with food, and beer is often supremely overlooked. This is rather sad as the range and depths of flavours of bere is wide and varied, and pretty much always supremely more affordable. You can probably easily name several wines that cost hundreds or thousands of dollars; try naming a single beer that costs more than $100 for a six pack.
Edit: it’s not this beer that costs a lot, this one is quite reasonable. The expensive one is of you can’t easily get to a Belgian monastery.
Another Vegan beer from Samuel Smith with the nice Vegan symbol on the back and everything. This isn’t a heavy stout, it’s quite lite and consuming more than one pint wouldn’t be taxing at all. The oatmeal part is not overwhelming, providing a subtle flavour more than overpowering the rest of the beer. A quite nice midweek beer.
I had this one a few days ago. When I was last in Acland Cellars I saw a bunch of Samuel Smith’s beer, and I noticed the small Vegan symbol on the back. Not one to shy away from vegan beer, I bought one of each I could see.
Beer doesn’t have to be explicitly labelled to be vegan, basically what you’re wanting to avoid is isinglass (obtained from dried swim bladders from fish) that is used as a fining agent.
Pro tip: if your beer has a bit of sediment in it (like Coopers does), it’s near 100% likely to be vegan (barring honey or somebody inventing a way to put bacon in beer).
A fining agent will accelerate the settling (clarification) of beer. If you’ve ever bottled your own homebrew, you’ll have noticed that the first 90% of bottles look a lot clearer than the last 10% (here you’re starting to stir up the sediment at the bottom of the brewing vessel). This then settles in the bottle and isn’t a problem – just don’t drink the last half mouthful. This is natural beer – “bottle conditioned”. Mass produced beers (think VB/Carlton/XXXX, not Coopers) are likely to use a fining agent such as isinglass as this enables them to pump out the beer quicker and not have to produce bottles that can withstand the pressure of secondary fermentation.
Pro tip: “bottle conditioned” likely means vegan too.
Basically, being vegan is a great excuse to not drink lots of shit beer.
Anyway, this is the beer I had the other night, and it was quite a pleasant porter. yay!
It’s Belgian, described as “strong bitter and blond” and damn tasty. Damn, damn tasty. I’d really like more of this.
A fairly nice stout… although not enough to dislodge my favourite go-to stouts (hint: not the watery rubbish that passes for Guinness).
This was certainly not too bad, an enjoyable strong 8.5% and a good solid colour. A good beer for the damn freezing nights we’ve been having here recently.
In my search for the best alcoholic ginger beer I’ve been mostly disappointed. I’m pretty sure Bundaberg takes the cake for non-alcoholic ginger beer and is unlikely to ever be beaten in both quality and availability. I had Loveday’s Ginger beer a couple of weeks ago and it was okay, but I think the Matso‘s still takes the cake for alcoholic ginger beer.
Ahhh… a dark scotch ale. I had this a couple of weeks ago now, and I’ve had it before. I do like a scotch ale and Grand Ridge doesn’t disappoint (you should go get some of their beers if you haven’t had any)
The first thing I’d say is that it reminds me of a Lambic beer – but without the fruit. Think of a kriek but without cherry. Yes, this beer is sweet. It’s grown on me since my first mouthful of it, but I’m still not entirely into it.
Although Innis and Gunn is from Scotland, they’ve made a Canada Day beer. Rather unusual for a clear bottle, it’s bottled conditioned – and 8%. On her first taste, Leah described it as “mmm buttery”. You can taste the rum cask (as with other Innis & Gunn that I’ve had) and this one is rather nice. It may be hard to get any more of this as, it, well, Canada Day in 2011 happens once.
It’s from Canada, not France. Although it’s certainly from a more French part of Canada. This was a nice imperial coffee stout. The coffee flavour was not overwhelming in any way, it was this nice pervasive hint . At 9.5% it’s strong in alcohol and the flavour is also nice and strong, although not overwhelming. I’d certainly have this one again.
