O'Hara's Irish Red Ale

By chance I came upon an Irish Craft Beer and wow, what a find.

O’Hara’s Irish Red Ale is a testament to the fine brewing skills of the Irish.

The website describes it as having a smooth malt body complimented by caramel tones and perfectly balanced in bitterness, this Irish Red is much more complex than its mainstream rivals.

It has a nice red hue on pour and beautiful caramel tones with every sip.

At 4% and 330mls it is a little weak and a little less in content, but it makes up for that with flavour.

Founded in 1996, the brewery is one of 72 craft breweries in Ireland, each adding their own Irish twist to their brews.

Interesting fact, before the 1700’s, beer in Ireland were fermented without hops.

If you are feeling a bit Irish then seek out this beer, you won’t be disappointed.

Cheers,

Dave

Fresh Hop 2019

 After an enjoyable visit to the 2019 Hop Harvest in Launceston I have to say that it has been my #1 event this year.

This has replaced the Fyre Festival that I was at briefly on New Year’s Eve.

Twenty-six beers were on display that were only made for this event, ranging from pale ales, stouts and even a few sours.

With my booklet I got at the gate I ticked beers off as I went and studied which ones I wanted to sample.

I got through x15 in the end, this year to save on waste they had plastic cups you could purchase, they could be swapped over at any time and if you didn’t want to take it home you could give it back to the bar for a refund.

The thing I like about Hop Harvest is the option to get a 100ml sample of any beer for $3 or 400ml for $9, you can get through them all a lot quicker.

Once again, the food was a credit to the event, with Saint John’s regular spectacular choices to dark choc, stout brownies, loaded nachos and a lamb kebab which I didn’t get to in the end.

Choc Stout Brownie

Saint Johns tickled my merchandise habit with stubby holders and T-shirts for sale.

The beer I voted for on the way out was the Eleventh Order Super Galactic Sour Cherry, a close second was the first beer I tasted when I got there – Shambles Brewery & Ocho’s Attack of the Cones.

The winner by people’s choice was The Mill Brewery’s The Freshest Haze, unfortunately it was one of the few I missed.

Overall a fun event, only wish I could have put in three hard days there, maybe next year.

Cheers,

Dave

A popular Event

New Zealand Beer Speights

In spirit of this being ANZAC Day week I decided to focus on beer in New Zealand.

I have had a lot of trouble finding NZ beers over here, I find the occasional craft beer in my hunting, but I am curious as to what is popular over there.

Fortunately, a family member went over on holiday and I asked him to investigate.

What he came up with is Speights Gold Medal Lager.

This cheeky beer was entered into the Melbourne Exhibition in 1880 and won two gold medals, hence its name.

The flagship beer of Speights isn’t sweet so that the malt and the hops can come forward a lot more.

At 4% it isn’t as strong as I’m used to but from what I’ve heard it is a very good beer.

Beer was introduced to New Zealand by those drunken Europeans who travelled around quite a bit back in the day. Captain Cook was the first to brew beer there.

The first commercial brewery was opened in 1835 so they haven’t been brewing beer for as long as many other nations, but they seem to be on a good thing.

I once heard from someone who visited there that they like to drink warm beer? I need to confirm this.

I will endeavour to find more New Zealand brews to share with you.

Cheers,

Dave

Hobbits live here

Easter 2019

Easter is almost here, these days instead of chocolate I’m usually watering at the mouth for the best tasting Easter beer… I still don’t mind some chocolate on the side though.

Easter beer isn’t really a thing yet, not like Christmas beer, so I look for beers that fall into a certain category.

Coming into our Winter in Australia the beer will likely be a dark one and to give it a bit more going for it the stout could have chocolate, vanilla or milk tones to it.

Favourites I have drummed on about before are Young’s Double Chocolate Stout and T-Bone Choc-Milk Stout.

There are quite a few stouts available that fall into these criteria, I will need to start trying the lot.

In the meantime, I suggest the best way for you my fellow beer drinkers to enjoy Easter is to get a standard chocolate rabbit, break the head off, fill it with the dark beer of your choice and bottoms up.

At least that’s what I’ll be doing over the weekend.

Happy Easter everyone.

Cheers,

Dave

Boag's St George Returns

 Gallantry is back!

Rising from the ashes of Boag’s Wild Rivers comes the phoenix – Boag’s St George, resurrected from the Boag’s purgatory pit where all good beers seem to go to die.

Poor sales from Wild Rivers has seen it out of production, very sad since it was only created late last year.

After a lot of encouragement from fans, Boag’s caved and brought back this cult favourite for a ‘limited release’ as stated on new packaging.

see: https://www.facebook.com/pages/category/Community/Bring-Back-Boags-St-George-484426921693118/

Boag’s St George had a good run up until 2011 back in the Golden era of beers when Boag’s was making an amazing range.

St George was unique, a premium lager it had a stigma of a classy man’s beer, a smaller stubby but at 4.8% ABV still made it an easy to drink beer but with a premium price.

Meant for Tasmanian only release it has only been given to select bottle shops in the state, coming in waves as I believe only a certain amount was made.

When I held one for the first time, I kissed it, I never thought I would drink this amazing beer again…

But is it the same?

It looks the same, it tastes the same but on closer inspection the alcohol content has dropped down to 4.2%, which is why it is a lot cheaper than it used to be.

I have stocked up for now,   

My fondest memory of this beer was during Christmas of 2011 I had one carton left, I drank the whole carton that day and still had room for scotch afterwards.

Enjoy it while it lasts, sadly all good things must come to an end… again.

Cheers,

Dave

Hahn Ultra Crisp

Not everyone can enjoy beer, unfortunately people have intolerances and issues with things that go into beer.

I was once asked if there was a gluten free beer, and I felt bad knowing that I couldn’t give a definitive answer.

I’m glad to announce that a brewery has stepped up and made a gluten free beer.

Hahn Ultra crisp has arrived in a flashy green bottle and has given hope to many.

Brewers yeast, wheat and barley are the main reasons most beers don’t make the cut, an essential part of the process.

Hahn overcomes this by using rice to create a low carb reasonably strong product.

On tasting it had the hallmarks of a Hahn Super Dry, it was nice to drink, I give it my thumbs up.

I only hope other breweries take note and do something like this, find ways to make beer enjoyable for everyone.

Cheers,

Dave

Beer and Bubs

Becoming a father is a scary experience, men often aren’t sure how to support their partner while they endure nine months of changes and new experiences.

What men do know about – well a lot of us anyway – is beer.

An awesome lady in Australia has created a programme called Beer and Bubs to give fathers to be some confidence and tips on how to survive the journey ahead.

The idea is that people sign up for the course where they can also buy a book and be around other fathers to be in a bar.

A bar is an ideal setting where men are more comfortable and will hopefully start asking the many questions racking their brains.

The sessions are run by a seasoned veteran, in Tasmania’s case an ex-midwife with many years’ experience, he greets the terrified men and assures them that all will be good.

During the session you of course drink beer, have a meal, go through a slide show of handy hints and tips and are introduced to someone who recently did the course and has since become a father where he shares what he went through and answers your questions.

At the end you take the book with you and read up before D-Day.

If you are going to become a father, I highly recommend going to one of these – they are held all around Australia.

https://beerandbubs.com.au/

Cheers,

Dave