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!
Young Henrys B-Sides: From Where You'd Guava Beer
Tapped November 20, 2020
We all got there during lockdown, didn’t we? Distracting ourselves from the insanity of being stuck at home by pretending we were somewhere else. I created a hipster café in my back courtyard, and a winter pub scene in my living room (complete with YouTube fireplace). Some people went further and set up entire vacation scenarios in their house. If this video’s anything to go by, the Young Henrys crew fit into the latter category. Their new Brewers B-Side release, From Where You’d Guava Be… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- Fruit Sour
- ABV
- 4.0%
Bridge Road NEeD IPA Vol.1: Double Hazy
Tapped November 20, 2020
Screw the preamble. Bridge Road are starting a new IPA program, and the first tinnie off the line has gone off like a stick of dynamite in a fruit stand – it’s packing Mosaic, Galaxy and El Dorado hops, as well as Sabro hops two ways. Glowing gold with a sea foam head, the Hazy Double hits the nose as a huge bowl of mango drizzled with coconut cream. But in the mouth it refracts into a plethora of tropical flavours: imagine you’re stuck in the stocks, helpless before a crowd of rowdy people… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Double Hazy IPA
- ABV
- 7.6%
Akasha Project Cloud 9 Hazy IPA
Tapped November 20, 2020
I used to think I had a pretty good handle on the nomenclature of hazy/New England IPAs, but I’m not nearly as sure anymore. At one point, it seemed pretty clear cut that hazy IPAs were more or less in line with West Coast IPAs with some protein haze and a lot more cold side hopping, and NEIPAs were of the minimal bitterness variety that look and taste like fruit juice. However, lately, it feels like more and more Australian breweries are happy with calling any IPA that’s not crystal clear hazy,… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- Hazy IPA
- ABV
- 6.2%
Two Birds Brewing Total Eclipse Of The Hop XPA
Tapped November 19, 2020
Two Birds are no strangers to the newly-named hop Eclipse or giving their limited release beers musically-inspired names and in November 2020, they've done both at once. Back in 2018, the brewery used the hops - then going by the name of HPA-016 - to brew a pale and hazy IPA named Uncharted. To celebrate Eclipse being given a name, now they've reworked that IPA recipe to brew a slightly more summery XPA and given it the Total Eclipse of the Hop (which coincidentally, is the same name of the article… Read more
Pale Yellow
- Style
- XPA
- ABV
- 5.5%
- Stockists
-
Stockists are avaialble here
Otherside, The Dutch Trading Co & North Street Store Big Loaf
Tapped November 19, 2020
American strong ales are rarely seen on these shores, perhaps due to climate, meteorological or political, and, most likely, because it’s a beer family that’s as broad and misunderstood as saison. Moreover, the style icon is a Bastard, and the most widely available local example was a Convict, both of which may seem mothballed check-ins. And yet, such beers can be so generous, at once it’s a double IPA, imperial red ale and baby American-style barleywine, with equal avenues of complexity and… Read more
Golden
- Style
- American Strong Ale
- ABV
- 7.4%
- Stockists
-
Available in limited release from the brewery
And select WA Otherside stockists
More stockists...
Red Duck Lazy Sunday, Flight Of The Wolf & Cinnamon Rye Pumpkin Ale
Tapped November 18, 2020
Like most of their peers, the folks at Ballarat's Red Duck have been far from idle during Victoria's lockdowns; how can you be when you run both brewery and distillery? They've emerged from the second shutdown with a new look core range and, in keeping with the DNA that saw them innovating wildly well before most local breweries existed, they've got a trio of new beers out ahead of summer. The most summer suited of those is Lazy Sunday, a strong saison that joins a long line of Belgian-influenced… Read more
Golden
- Style
- Saison & Double IPL & Spiced Belgian Quad
- ABV
- 6.3% & 7.8% & 9.8%
Frenchies Tropical Mist DDH Cryo NEIPAs
Tapped November 18, 2020
Craft beer may never have been more popular and widely available than it is now, however there still must be so much that remains completely inscrutable to the average punter. Case in point: DDH Imperial Cryo NEIPA. It sounds less like a delicious beverage and more like some kind of dumb transportation system Elon Musk “invented” that’s just less efficient in every conceivable way than a train. Which brings us to Frenchies' latest – a duo of Tropical Mists, a lil’ boy and a thicc boy. I… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- DDH NEIPA & DDH Imperial Cryo NEIPAs
- ABV
- 7.0% & 8.5%
Deeds Brewing Milk Bar: Blueberry & Raspberry & And Everything Under The Sun is In Tune
Tapped November 18, 2020
Sometimes you have to marvel at how breweries manage to keep on top of things. No sooner have Deeds sent over samples of two new releases than they're sending information on the next three... As for the two in hand (OK, in hand, in mouth, can crushed, in recycling), Blueberry & Raspberry is part of their Milk Bar Series of imperial cream sours. No prizes for guessing what's inside (although you can add vanilla and lactose to the fruits). It pours a lovely crimson colour with a pink foam and,… Read more
Red
- Style
- Imperial Berry Cream Sour & Single Hop NEIPA
- ABV
- 7.7% & 6.5%
Hop Nation Fool
Tapped November 18, 2020
The raspberry sour Fool first popped up in 2019 as part of Hop Nation’s three-part Sweet and Sour series but the beer’s popularity saw it make the move from limited release to regular run in 2020. Drinking it, it’s not hard to see where that popularity might have come from, since a sour, sweet, raspberry and vanilla-laden beer could very easily contain flavours that really stick out and compete against each other. Instead, Fool’s fruit flavour and the sweetness from the vanilla combine into… Read more
Red
- Style
- Raspberry Sour
- ABV
- 5.0%
Hop Nation Ground Control & Candyland
Tapped November 18, 2020
Hop Nation’s twin IPA releases in November manage to show off a new(ish) ingredient, a classic style, and craft brewing’s more modern direction. First up, Ground Control is a West Coast IPA brewed with Hop Product Australia’s newly-named Eclipse and is itself named after David Bowie's classic Space Oddity. It's a fitting showcase of Eclipse's mandarin-inducing qualities too, with Ground Control mostly singing that citrus note, joined by a little resinous pine and a quite prominently bitter… Read more
Golden
- Style
- West Coast IPA & Milkshake IPA
- ABV
- 7.0% & 8.0%
Moon Dog & To Øl Dream Cake
Tapped November 18, 2020
Given both breweries' past outputs, any collaboration between Moon Dog and Scandinavians To Øl could have gone in many a direction. Where this one has headed is straight for the patisserie. And how. Dream Cake is tagged a "coconut cake imperial dark ale" and you're not left wondering how far they were willing to push things into cake territory. It's based on Drømmekage, a caramelised coconut cake from Denmark, and the brewers have gone big on the coconut, big on the metaphorical slice… Read more
Dark Brown
- Style
- Imperial Cake Beers
- ABV
- 8.8%
Prancing Pony Purple Velvet Christmas Beer
Tapped November 17, 2020
Christmas markets might be cancelled across Northern Europe for 2020, but that doesn't mean the team at Prancing Pony can't get into the festive spirit. Corinna Steeb and Frank Samson hail from Esslingen, a town close to Stuttgart, where among the sweet and spicy Christmas traditions is a cake / cookie called Lebkuchen. It's the inspiration for their second cake-as-beer creation, Purple Velvet, which follows in the footsteps of The Hunt For Red Velvet. The labels are inspired by the wonderful architecture… Read more
Rich Brown
- Style
- Christmas Dunkelweizen
- ABV
- 5.2%
- Bitterness
- 32 IBU
Rocky Ridge & Short Order Burger Short Order Beer
Tapped November 17, 2020
No strangers to collaboration, Rocky Ridge have teamed up with Short Order Burger here for a classic Aussie lager. It’s an idea which seems almost foreign for a brewery pushing out double oat cream IPAs, TDH triple IPAs and barrel-aged pastry quads; however, the notion recognises that simple is best when pairing with one of Australia’s best burgers – no, really, the burger team have been rated Top 5 nationally. Short Order Beer’s light, bready malt base is dusted with subtle herbal hop notes,… Read more
Golden Yellow
- Style
- Aussie Lager
- ABV
- 4.8%
- Stockists
-
Available from Short Order Burger Fremantle
Nowhereman & Mane Liquor Hopkuna Hoptata IPA
Tapped November 17, 2020
While many are talking about the fragmentation of beer styles, some with increasingly parodic nomenclature, there’s also the name to contend with. What seems humorous, and a little cute here, actually starts making a whole lotta sense when linking Mane Liquor and manes, especially once you realise Studio Papa’s artwork features a big cat version of Mane’s Josh Daley, complete with matching tattoos. It’s a creative concept but what the collaborators didn’t do was create a cocktail of adjuncts,… Read more
Golden
- Style
- West Coast IPA
- ABV
- 6.5%
- Stockists
-
Nowhereman Brewery
Nowhereman WA stockists
More stockists...
Hargreaves Hill Beatnik Raspberry Sour
Tapped November 16, 2020
It must be tricky being the funky little sibling when your older, supposedly more sensible, elder starts playing up. When Hargreaves Hill launched Beatnik, the offshoot was designed as a home for beers that might not fit within the ethos honed over more than a decade, as well as allowing the Yarra Valley brewer to put some beer into cans. Roll on a few years and massively hopped hazies, cocktail-mimicking beers, and pastry stouts are among the limiteds bearing the Hargreaves Hill name, often in cans… Read more
Red
- Style
- Raspberry Sour
- ABV
- 4.0%
Eumundi & Bundaberg Eu-Bundy IPA
Tapped November 16, 2020
Bundaberg is known for its rum. Eumundi is known for its beer. Both are known for their ginger. Surely you can see where this is going. Eu-Bundy IPA, a collaboration between Eumundi Brewery and Bundaberg Rum, is a West Coast IPA made with Bundaberg’s Small Batch Spiced Rum and additions of ginger from both Bundaberg and Eumundi. Duncan Littler from the Bundaberg Rum Distillery says: “Finally, we can deliver a rum-influenced IPA to the beer lovers of Queensland!” - apparently something that… Read more
Golden
- Style
- Rum & Ginger Infused IPA
- ABV
- 6.0%
Tallboy And Moose Nice Cola & TDH Miasma
Tapped November 16, 2020
Tallboy and Moose may be busy back welcoming people inside their Preston brewpub - or outside, in the case of their driveway-based beer garden - but they’ve also kept cans flying out into the world too. The brewery’s two November releases are returning recipes, though both have undergone a few changes and are spreading their wings far wider than the previous keg-only releases. The sour Nice Cola is a re-worked and canned re-issue of the brewery’s LA Cola kegs from a little while back. It’s… Read more
Golden
- Style
- Cola sour & TDH IPA
- ABV
- 6% & 7.1%
Mountain Goat XL Extra Lager
Tapped November 15, 2020
The Mountain Goat story started out as two mates looking to shake things up in Melbourne's beer scene by giving drinkers something very different to the lagers that had commanded the 20th century. They certainly achieved their goal, with founders Cam and Dave claiming Champion Australian Beer at the AIBAs in 2015 for a barrel-aged barleywine before selling the business to Asahi. Since then, they've picked up more trophies for IPAs although, somewhat ironically, the beer that's performing heroics… Read more
Golden
- Style
- Hoppy Lager
- ABV
- 4.9%
- Bitterness
- 25 IBU
- Stockists
-
More info here
Akasha Projects Eclipse IPA
Tapped November 14, 2020
There’s something kind of thrilling about the official unveiling of a new hop variety. They go through an incredibly gruelling development process so, when one is finally bestowed with a name, it stands aloft on the broken and battered corpses of thousands of others that didn’t quite make the cut. Naturally, it’s gotta have something going for it, right? Eclipse has been floating around for years under the slightly less snappy moniker HPA-016, and has been spoken about in hushed tones of reverence… Read more
Golden
- Style
- West Coast IPA
- ABV
- 6.8%
Swell Brewery Corduroy Lines Hazy IPA
Tapped November 14, 2020
Fashion styles tend to work in a circular manner, yet I imagine most would be happy if humanity makes an exception for the corduroy pant. Apart from the dreary colour spread spanning light beige, beige, medium beige and darker beige colour selection [I dunno, I've seen some pretty mean purple ones! – Editor], they were just plain unexciting. Which puts them at stark contrast to Swell’s new hazy IPA, Corduroy Lines, which is an ode to a dream surf day at the beach. Lines upon lines of perfect… Read more
Golden
- Style
- Hazy IPA
- ABV
- 7.0%
