New Beers
Barely a day goes by without another seasonal or one-off special flying out of an Australian brewery (if not ten). Here and in our weekly newsletter, we'll bring you news and, if we've sampled them, our take on as many of them as possible. Happy hunting!
One Drop Brewing 5 Brett Saison
Tapped January 29th, 2020
One Drop Brewing add flavour ingredients to their beers with a generous hand. Making an IPA? Don’t be shy with the hops. Making a fruit beer? Pack it in tight. Making a Brett saison? Hmmm better use five strains of Brettanomyces. Let’s get some real flavour happening here. Having said that, don’t take my flippant tone to mean there’s anything clumsy about their approach to the 5 Brett Saison. The first of One Drop’s Limited Cellar Series takes the brewery’s carefully crafted Saison and… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Brett Saison
- ABV
- 8.2%
Ballistic Beer Co Twang White Peach & Cold One
Tapped January 28th, 2020
Come on, Ballistic. It’s been a stinker of a summer. And you held out on us until mid-January to release these? Don’t drink Twang White Peach Sour when you’re after a sour. Drink it when you’re after all the refreshingness a person can fit in a can. While there’s some cloudiness in the appearance, there’s nothing but clarity in the flavour. It tastes cleaner than clean - think filtered water compared to tap water - with mild sour and gentle peach, like a peach iced tea that wasn’t flooded… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Fruit Sour & Aussie Pale
- ABV
- 4.6% & 4.5%
- Stockists
-
Ballistic Salisbury
And good Ballistic stockists
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Malt Shovel Brewers Haydo's Slidin' Sun IPA
Tapped January 28th, 2020
When IPAs first found their way into the Australian beer scene, they were often referred to as the big bitter beers that blow your head off (and of course, they still represent this to some people). But one look at the decal of Haydo’s Slidin’ Sun IPA - Malt Shovel’s head brewer Haydo reclining on top of the surf van while the deep orange sun sinks inexorably toward the horizon - and you get the sense this beer isn’t going to knock you out, but chill you out. It’s beautifully bright, with… Read more
Golden
- Style
- IPA
- ABV
- 6.2%
Balter & Garage Project Dry Haze
Tapped January 24th, 2020
You only need a little knowledge of either Balter or Garage Project to make the assumption both breweries would be regular visitors to North America’s hop farms. Both have made beers that do a wonderful job of showcasing hop varieties and neither is shy of building beers around some of the newest on the market either. And so it was that Balter’s Scotty Hargrave and Garage Project’s Pete Gillespie crossed paths while visiting Yakima Chief last harvest. That Northern Hemisphere fall spent traversing… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Hazy IPA
- ABV
- 6.0%
Batch Brewing Co Into The Summer Session Ale
Tapped January 24th, 2020
When you're after a summer smasher, you want something refreshing, low on alcohol, and tasty without bringing a sledgehammer to the senses. But when the Batch crew looked around at the mid-strengths other breweries were coming out with they found almost all of them sat in a certain part of the flavour spectrum. "We did a panel of all the mid-strength we could find, and everything was hop driven. So we wanted to do something different," is how they put it. Into The Summer is a session… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- Session Ale
- ABV
- 3.5%
- Stockists
-
Batch Brewing Co
And all good Batch stockists
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Sailors Grave Crystal Healing 2020
Tapped January 24th, 2020
Crystal Healing first appeared in March 2019 and, when it did so, came in two formats. There was the collab with Stomping Ground and Little Latin Lucy, a gose featuring crystal apple cucumbers, then the canned version that went further afield and featured additional ingredients in the form of karkalla (pigface) and prickly pear. The former wasn't seen outside the venues and the odd event, but now it's back and in cans. The karkalla-and-prickly pear-less version retains that wild, windswept, rustic… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- Fruit Gose
- ABV
- 4.8%
Sauce Brewing Co Sabarillo Juicy IPA
Tapped January 24th, 2020
First there was Mosarillo. Then there was Mosalaxy. Now Sabarillo is here. The Sauce crew aren’t trying to win any prizes for most original names for these beers - they’re just focused on squeezing different hop varieties together until they explode into a juicy IPA. (At least, that’s my understanding of the brewing process.) Double dry-hopped with Sabro and Amarillo (who’d have thunk it?), this beer has really got that piña colada thing going on. Smooth coconut comes together with freshly… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Juicy IPA
- ABV
- 6.9%
Sauce Brewing Recovery Bloody Mary Gose
Tapped January 24th, 2020
Cards on the table: I’m one of those annoying, self righteous people who thinks the best hangover cure is to avoid getting a hangover in the first place. So obviously I’m not one to turn to a Bloody Mary after a night of drinking. I also think Bloody Marys (Bloody Maries?) taste like spicy pasta sauce. Don’t get me wrong - I love spicy pasta sauce. I just don’t usually drink it. All of this might make you think: “Why am I reading a description of a Bloody Mary beer written by this guy?”… Read more
Red
- Style
- Bloody Mary Gose
- ABV
- 7.0%
Grifter Brewing Co C-Boogie Cucumber Kolsch
Tapped January 23rd, 2020
You don’t eat cucumber looking for a lot of flavour. Not really. But put them in a salad, a sandwich, a watermelon juice or a G&T and they add a layer of freshness and crispness. So perhaps it’s no surprise that C-Boogie is crisp as a winter’s morning and refreshing as a Pimms Cup. Using a Kolsch-style beer as a base all but guaranteed that outcome. But the drinkability of the Kolsch and crispness of the cucumber are augmented with a smooth malt body, making C-Boogie billow in the mouth… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- Cucumber Kolsch
- ABV
- 5.2%
Temple Brewing 888 Mandarin Ale
Tapped January 23rd, 2020
With a history stretching back 3,800 years, to say Chinese New Year is an important celebration on the calendars of millions around the globe is an understatement. Marking the start of the Lunar Calendar, it sees people toast to good fortune, prosperity and wealth among many other things, as well as being a time for gift giving, special meals and catching up with family and friends in a manner not unlike the Christian festive period. Symbolism during Chinese New Year is strong. For example, the colour… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Mandarin Ale
- ABV
- 4.5%
- Stockists
-
Available from the brewery and Temple stockists nationwide
Queenscliff Brewhouse Cool Change & American Dream
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
They're ripping through the beers at the Queenscliff Brewhouse this summer, with these two hop forward offerings unlikely to last much longer than the Hazy IPA that preceded them. Cool Change is an India pale lager we're told has "notes of grapefruit and pine" plus aromas and flavours of "bread and dried fruit", while the lager yeast "gives it a nice clean, slightly sweet finish with lingering stone fruit notes" according to the brewing team. As for American Dream, it's… Read more
Golden
- Style
- IPL & American Amber
- ABV
- 6.0% & 6.1%
Tallboy & Moose Goblinoid & Snot Goblin
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
Tallboy & Moose have let two mischevious goblins losse from their Preston brewpub in cans that, for our part, brought to mind the illustrations that covered Roald Dahl’s books. Both goblins are 7 percent ABV IPAs that showcase the power of Cryo hops, a relatively new form of concentrated hop power from Yakima Chief Hops that aims to get as much aroma and flavour into a beer. In the case of Goblinoid, the combination of Cryo CTZ, Mosaic, Chinook and Centennial packs a whole heap of tropical… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Cryo-Hopped IPAs
- ABV
- 7.0%
Tallboy & Moose Lazy Riviera & Wolfenstein
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
Two new European-inspired releases from Tallboy & Moose have taken modern styles and given them a twist. Lazy Riviera is a bright and golden saison dry-hopped with Cascade and Styrian Goldings. So, while a classic peppery and herbal note from the yeast are there, you’ll pick up a fairly substantial zesty orange alongside them. The second is Wolfenstein, a German-style altbier with biscuit and toffee flavours that sticks to the beer's origins by finishing quite clean and dry. The Tallboy brew… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- Saison & Altbier
- ABV
- 5.2% & 5.0%
Akasha All Australian IPA
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
At the end of every AFL season, an illustrious panel of experts select an All Australian team. The best players in each position are given a guernsey in recognition of being the best of the best throughout the season. What if we were to adopt this tradition in the beer world? What would an All Australian beer team look like? Now, I’m a Queenslander living in Sydney and the last game of AFL I watched was when I unceremoniously leapt clear of the Lions bandwagon as it careened into a ravine that… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Australian IPA
- ABV
- 6.8%
Endeavour Brewing Hoppy Days XPA
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
Hoppy Days tastes like the first rain after a dry spell. It pours a lemony gold, looking more like a pale lager than most XPAs, which is the first hint at a refreshing drinking experience. And it certainly delivers on this promise - high carbonation, a full fluffy head, semi-dry on the palate and a clean finish all make this a beer that sinks faster than your sunnies when you drop them in the pool. But unlike a pale lager Hoppy Days hits you with Galaxy hop aromas before you even raise it to your… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- XPA
- ABV
- 4.2%
Endeavour Brewing Rockstar Pale Ale
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
Summer in Australia seems to be dominated by cricket. People who follow cricket throw around terms like “big bash” and “sandpapergate” and people like me just have to nod along and pretend to understand. But there’s one thing I do know about cricket - watching a Test match is really an exercise in long days of taking it slow with a few beers, interspersed with moments of concentration and excitement. (I assume playing in a Test match is similar, albeit minus the beers.) Rockstar Pale Ale… Read more
Golden
- Style
- Pale Ale
- ABV
- 4.5%
Endeavour Brewing Rosé Pilsner & Lemon Lime Sorbet Ale
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
If you enjoy beers that give you a pleasant little surprise, then Endeavour have a couple of treats for you. When you first look at the Rosé Pilsner, you get all kinds of expectations as to what it might taste like. Rosé? Raspberry? Strawberry? Then you’re told that it’s a Czech-style pilsner that tastes like a pilsner, with juuuust enough natural blackcurrant juice in it to give it a pink-reddish hue. But your eyes are still telling you to expect that “pink” flavour. Then you taste it…… Read more
Red
- Style
- Fruit Pilsner & Fruit Sour
- ABV
- Both 5.1%
Grifter Brewing Co Acid Drop
Tapped January 22nd, 2020
With the meteoric rise of fruit sours, it appears many of us have forgotten there are any other options for what a sour beer can taste like. But… what about hops? Acid Drop came about as a result of a fortunate accident in 2014. It doesn’t have the same following as some of the other Grifter beers (we’re looking at you, Serpent’s Kiss, you crowdpleaser you), but it’s a quiet achiever, and won the hearts of the Grifter crew. They’ve brewed a few different iterations and changed up the… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- Hoppy Sour
- ABV
- 4.3%
TWØBAYS Brewing Co No Man's Land XPA
Tapped January 17th, 2020
It's fair to say TWØBAYS head brewer AG likes his hops. Certainly, he's been adding them in greater volumes to many of the Dromana brewery's beers than any other locally brewed gluten free beers we've tasted and that's the case here with the No Man's Land XPA. While the can talks of its citrusy character, aroma wise it's a deeper, danker form of citrus than their juicily orangey pale but no less hoppy. There's a touch of edgy tropical hops there too, particularly to taste, while it's got a touch… Read more
Golden
- Style
- Gluten Free XPA
- ABV
- 5.0%
Rocky Ridge EXP IIPA #1
Tapped January 17th, 2020
The seemingly perfunctory nature of EXP IIPA #1's name and obi-strip label does little to educate the drinker as to what exactly is inside this geometric clad can. Could it be hazy? Or is this a straightforward – whatever that means in 2020 – IIPA? Has this been designed with first year geology and engineering students in mind? With precious little to go on, could the contents be actually pink, given that’s the only reference outside of the monochromatic design scheme? It’s hard to say and,… Read more
Golden
- Style
- IIPA
- ABV
- 9.0%
- Stockists
-
Rocky Ridge cellar door
And Rocky Ridge stockists until it’s not. Or is called something else.
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