Beer

[AndyP]

AP have you had a chance to try the new season 2013 Sierra Nevada Southern Hemisphere IPA?

I have now.

#270 Sierra Nevada Southern Hemisphere Harvest (2013) American IPA
As usual, these Harvest beers from SN take me on a bit of a ride. Citrus is all I can think at the start, but it's nice. Then I have a little struggle with it in the middle, I'm not sure why. But by the end I love it and want more.

[AndyP]

#271 Gage Road Sleeping Giant IPA
It is IPA Day, so I grabbed a couple for the "occasion". This was worse than what I remembered. 2.5/5

Tomorrow is International Beer Day.

[gazgolf1]

Tough crowd, I think for $42 per carton Sleeping Giant is a nice IPA and good value, it's not earth shatteringly good but I like it for a Friday night session.
Are you drinking it out of a glass P?

[AndyP]

I drink nearly every beer out of a glass. Sleeping Giant, like Feral Hop Hog, is a type of IPA that does not appeal to me. That said, most of the Gage Road beers have been garbage and they are borderline "craft" beers with Woolies owning 25%.

Three new beers for me today from Brisbane Brewhouse. Two were solid, but the IPA was really good.

[AndyP]

I'm at #291 since I started tracking beers in Untappd, with #300 just around the corner.

Here's some stats:

First beer - Little Creatures Bright Ale
Most checked in - Burleigh Brewing Hef (13)

Top 5 Highest Rated
As rated by others (average) - Feral Hop Hog (4.13/5), Tripel Karmeliet (4.1/5), Holgate Temptress (3.99), Holgate Millenium Falcon (3.97/5), Holgate Empress (3.93/5)
As rated by me (4.5/5) - Hoegaarden Grand Cru, La Trappe Blond, North Coast Brother Thelonious, Holgate Double Trouble, Franziskaner Hefe-Weissbier, Holgate Empress

Top 5 Lowest Rated
As rated by others (average) - Carlton Mid (2.47/5), Carlton Draught (2.49), XXXX Gold (2.55), Crown Lager (2.64), Carlton Dry (2.66)
As rated by me - James Squire 150 Lashes (1/5 - I think I got a bad one and was probably harsh), Mad Brewers Ginger Chops Ale (1/5), Corona Extra (1/5), Gage Pils 1.5 (1/5), Sunshine Coast Rauch Bier (1/5), Kooinda Black IPA (1/5)

Highest Alcohol Content - Holgate Millenium Falcon (10%), Holgate Empress (10%), North Coast Brother Thelonious (9.4%)
Lowest Alcohol Content - Erdinger Alkoholfrei (0.4%), Coopers Birell Ultra Light (0.5%), Cascade Premium Light (2.7%)

I haven't given out a 5/5 yet. I feel like I have been holding off for something that blows me away in awesomeness. Perhaps, I will give one of the 4.5/5 beers a 5 next time around. The Holgate Empress was very impressive.

[mike]

Does Magners count as beer?

[AndyP]

The commonly used term is cider, because it's a cider, although you can check those into untappd too.

[mike]

Anyway I'm having a few pints now. Nice.

[Johnny Canuck]

I'm at #291 since I started tracking beers in Untappd, with #300 just around the corner.

Here's some stats:

First beer - Little Creatures Bright Ale
Most checked in - Burleigh Brewing Hef (13)

Top 5 Highest Rated
As rated by others (average) - Feral Hop Hog (4.13/5), Tripel Karmeliet (4.1/5), Holgate Temptress (3.99), Holgate Millenium Falcon (3.97/5), Holgate Empress (3.93/5)
As rated by me (4.5/5) - Hoegaarden Grand Cru, La Trappe Blond, North Coast Brother Thelonious, Holgate Double Trouble, Franziskaner Hefe-Weissbier, Holgate Empress

Top 5 Lowest Rated
As rated by others (average) - Carlton Mid (2.47/5), Carlton Draught (2.49), XXXX Gold (2.55), Crown Lager (2.64), Carlton Dry (2.66)
As rated by me - James Squire 150 Lashes (1/5 - I think I got a bad one and was probably harsh), Mad Brewers Ginger Chops Ale (1/5), Corona Extra (1/5), Gage Pils 1.5 (1/5), Sunshine Coast Rauch Bier (1/5), Kooinda Black IPA (1/5)

Highest Alcohol Content - Holgate Millenium Falcon (10%), Holgate Empress (10%), North Coast Brother Thelonious (9.4%)
Lowest Alcohol Content - Erdinger Alkoholfrei (0.4%), Coopers Birell Ultra Light (0.5%), Cascade Premium Light (2.7%)

I haven't given out a 5/5 yet. I feel like I have been holding off for something that blows me away in awesomeness. Perhaps, I will give one of the 4.5/5 beers a 5 next time around. The Holgate Empress was very impressive.

La Trappe Blond it one of my favourites.

I highly agree with your worst list. I think Corona is so flavourless that it shouldn't count as a beer.

[Pieface]

Maybe I'll have to retry the Grand Cru. I remember being fairly underwhelmed. Haven't seen Holgates...must keep an eye out.

La trappe 4.5...really?

[AndyP]

La Trappe tasted good to me. It has been a while since I had the Grand Cru; it could be a 4.

Most of Holgate's beers are very good.

[Golfnut]

Maybe I'll have to retry the Grand Cru. I remember being fairly underwhelmed. Haven't seen Holgates...must keep an eye out.La trappe 4.5...really?

Timely this....I'm at the bottle shop now staring at the Grand Cru....wow $130 a carton!!! Curiosity has got me though

[Golfnut]

White rabbit white ale any good?

[AndyP]

I highly agree with your worst list. I think Corona is so flavourless that it shouldn't count as a beer.

Without the lemon or lime chucked in, it is barely drinkable.

[AndyP]

White rabbit white ale any good?

I seem to remember it being okay. I gave the dark ale 3.5. Apparently, I haven't had the white since keeping track. I'll have to get one now.

[Golfnut]

I seem to remember it being okay. I gave the dark ale 3.5. Apparently, I haven't had the white since keeping track. I'll have to get one now.

I shall await you review. Hop hog's in the trolley.

[AndyP]

Ha! Fortunately for everyone, I haven't reviewed all 291 beers, although I have scored most of them.

The scoring might be unfair considering that I'm only trying one of each generally and it might be a bad batch or my tastebuds might be having an off day. My scoring has probably evolved over time too.

Still, it's a good indicator and gives me a good list to go back to, if I can afford them.

I wonder if I can get to #365 within one year.

[Pieface]

I think I'm possibly confusing my La Trappe and my Leffe and being over harsh.

I certainly wouldn't stump for a carton of Grand Cru without trying it 'nut.

[simmsy]

Andy suggestions for an Amber Ale?

Red Trolley and Stoke I don't mind.. Anything else you'd suggest?

[Golfnut]

I think I'm possibly confusing my La Trappe and my Leffe and being over harsh.I certainly wouldn't stump for a carton of Grand Cru without trying it 'nut.

Yeah I'm not one for buying a carton of a new beer without trying a roadie first....couldn't think of anything worse than having a carton of beer you don't enjoy drinking sitting in the fridge.

[BenM]

I've had a few nice beers while I've been away, here's a short summary.

Innis & Gunn Oak Aged Ale - I really enjoyed this but couldn't drink too many. It's strong flavoured and almost reminds you of port, given that it's aged in oak barrels and also has a bit of a kick at 6.6%. 4/5 pints

Brewdog 5am Saint Amber Ale - This one blew me away. I love this style of beer - nice and hoppy but a clean finish. Could've drunk it all night. The colour is also awesome - I have a great photo of the glass with some London landmarks in the background. 4.5/5 hiccups

Camden Hells Lager - this is the house lager at Jamie Oliver's Fifteen. It wasn't a bad drop at all, very easy to drink but not really anything special. 2 pints went down very, very easily. 3/5 burp spews.

Kronenbourg 1664 - don't know what to say about this. It's easy to drink (5 pints in a sitting with my brother... must remember I'm not drinking stubbies over here) but I wasn't overly taken with it - it was just the best they had on tap. Quite bitter and weak like the country of origin. 2.5/5 kebabs after midnight

Harviestoun Old Engine Oil - I don't drink a lot of dark beers so this is hard to compare, but I did like it. This is a nice porter style beer which is really malty with coffee kinda flavours, maybe even a hint of chocolate (though I had it with my chocolate dessert!) - I just liked it for the name. Would definitely drink again though if feeling in the mood. 3.5/5 unintelligible foreign taxi drivers

I think that covers my exploits, wish I had more to tell. I've been hooking into Peroni, Becks and Heineken most of the time, it's easy to get (and cheap) but also suits the warmish weather perfectly.



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[AndyP]

Nice one, Ben. I really liked the Oak Aged Ale too. First Choice were out of the Old Engine Oil yesterday, otherwise I would have grabbed it.

Simmsy, there aren't too many amber ales around and sometimes they can be a bit sickly. Jack loved the Red Duck Amber, and I preferred their Hoppy Amber. I had Two Birds Sunset Ale the other night; it was nice too.

edit: Little Creatures Shepherd's Delight is very nice, if you haven't had it yet. I gave Endeavour's Reserve Amber Ale a 4 too.

[BenM]

I love Amber style ales. Will definitely give the Shepherd's Delight a crack too - interestingly some of the Little Creatures range may well be produced very near to me at the Boag's Brewery soon. Lion Nathan are spending a fortune upgrading it so that they can brew some of their other brands there.

Probably won't make much difference to me in terms of price/availability but it'll sure be fresh at least


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[AndyP]

As long as Little Creatures doesn't start producing mass produced swill like James Squires with this expanding. Their single batch beers are always good. Mr Obidiah is the latest one.

[BenM]

I doubt it. I don't think they plan on brewing the other brands there regularly - it's all about redundancy and making sure they can keep making beer if one of the other production lines elsewhere goes offline.


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