Wellington has a new craft beer precinct. Three new craft beer bars, with more than 100 taps between them, opened recently, all centred around Manners Street and all within a three-minute walk. The Taphaus is on the corner of Victoria and Dixon Streets. The site was a curry joint for years and the decor still […]
Filed under: Around the country, Beer Bars | 8 Comments »
Last Friday night I created my own Hop Zombie army
Filed under: Beer Bars, Beer Makers, Reviews | 4 Comments »
The second NZBeerBlog Sunday Session will be on Sunday, 4pm, at The Malthouse in Wellington (48 Courtenay Place). There’s no need to book, just show up and enjoy good beer and good company. And thanks to all the Census volunteers. I will be back to you soon with details. I’ve had good coverage from all […]
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Binge drinking used to be compulsory here in New Zealand, and was reinforced by an emergency law that lasted for half a century. For the benefit of international readers, let me start at the beginning. Back in 1917, New Zealand was at war. We were attempting to drive the Hun out of Flanders, and the […]
Filed under: Gushing forth | 2 Comments »
Over the past few weeks I’ve tried a few new brews, and revisited a couple of older favourites in new forms. Ranfurly generously sent me two dozen of its rebranded lagers and pale ale. Ranfurly is made in Auckland by Boundary Road Brewery and has sat firmly on the “value-based-proposition” end of the market. The […]
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Down here in the South Pacific, we have just changed our clocks for daylight saving. Longer, sunnier evenings are on the way, perhaps with a barbecue, and every change of season is a good excuse to explore new beers. This winter has seen many high-hopped, high alcohol monsters set loose from New Zealand’s craft brewers, […]
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Marlborough has been a quiet achiever in the New Zealand craft brew industry. It has an international profile for its grapes and winemakers, but there’s more to Marlborough than wine. One of the pioneers of the current generation of craft brewers was Pink Elephant, with the quirky and challenging Pink Elephant PDA. This was on […]
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Thornbridge is an English craft brewery with strong links to New Zealand. Those links will be strengthened next week when the Malthouse launches three Thornbridge imports at Beervana. English pale ales always seem a bit understated and stiff-upper-lip to my New World tastes, but Jaipur India Pale Ale proves me wrong again. Thornbridge describe it […]
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I was at the Malthouse on Saturday for the third West Coast IPA Challenge. I was expecting hops, hops and nothing but hops, but I didn’t get it. And that’s a good thing. Now don’t get me wrong – there’s no shortage of healthy, resinous, clears-the-sinuses American hops in both Epic Armageddon and Hallertau Maximus […]
Filed under: Beer Bars, Beer Makers, Gushing forth, Reviews | 7 Comments »