June 24, 2010

Immediately below...

• On Tap Soon
• Sour Beer
• Our Next Two Tastings
• Meet The Brewer(s)
• Festivals

On Tap Soon

As predicted last week, Liberty Brewing's Summit Imperial India Pale Ale is en route from Auckland right now. At this point those who you who've read a few of these emails will snigger and take that as meaning that the shipment will arrive on Monday morning. The fact is you might be right, but there remains a good chance that New Zealand's newest big, bold IPA will be on tap by Friday evening.

There are two ways you can know for sure if it's available: one is to religiously monitor our beer list here, the other is to just come on down and see.

Meanwhile we're racing through our one and only keg of Invercargill Brewing's Sa!son. This has proven to be every bit as good as the predictions and on your behalf we'll be encouraging Steve Nelly to start making bigger volumes.

This week sees the arrival of our ration of Dux de Lux's Norwester (subject, as always, to the whims of the distributor and freight company).

And last but not least, the Yeastie Boys' latest love children - Yakima Monster and Motueka Monster - are both back on tap and side by side at the time of writing. Judging by demand last week one or both of them will be finished by Friday.

Sour Beer

We were looking forward to announcing the arrival of another big, exciting beer in Rogue's XS Imperial Porter. To quote the brewery, it's "unfiltered, unrefined, uncompromised". We held our single keg of this back several months to make sure the climate was nice and cold.

Now for better or worse those words "unfiltered, unrefined, uncompromised" have come back to haunt us and the beer has become somewhat sour. This will probably be enough to put most of you off but we also believe there are a few connoisseurs who won't mind at all. So we're going to leave it on tap for tonight at least and invite anyone who wants to to have a taste.

Our Next Two Tastings

For those of you too distracted last week by other news, here are details of our next two beer tastings. Interestingly bookings for the second tasting are racing ahead of the first.

Barley Wines, July 13

We're confident we have the most extensive range of barley wines in New Zealand. In fact we will leave a couple of barley wines out to make room for some related styles - such as a wheat wine and oat wine.

The lineup will include beers from the US, Denmark (more than once, thanks to Mikkel), Japan, England, Scotland and Brazil. The only thing missing is a local example of the style. If anyone knows of a New Zealand barley wine that might be available to us, please let us know.

Imperial Stouts and Porters, August 10

A month should be long enough for everyone to recover from the barley wines, so August will be the turn of Imperial Stouts and Porters. Again we have an extensive range to choose from. And this time there should be one or two local examples.

Note that we aren't completely irresponsible, and to compensate for the extremely high alcohol levels (and expense) of the styles being tasted, portions will be small. But we are confident that the quality, variety and sheer flavour of these tastings will leave you all satisfied. The price for both will be $40. Bookings are now open and the easiest way to reserve your place is to reply to this email.

Meet the Brewer(s)

Our ally and supplier Regional Wines and Spirits are distributors for some of New Zealand's most loved craft breweries. One of their stable is Founders Organic Brewery and they are bringing Matt Duncan of Founders to Wellington and to Hashigo Zake specifically. He will be in the bar on Monday July the 5th, dispensing samples of one of their range and meeting Wellington's most discerning drinkers.

In association with Regional Wines and Spirits we are planning a similar event later in July involving the one and only Richard Emerson. Stay tuned for more information.

Beer Festivals

It's just two days until SOBA's Matariki Winter Ales Festival. Rumour has it that it's almost sold out. We will be there with our contribution, including the only keg in New Zealand of Rogue's John John Dead Guy Ale (Dead Guy finished in whisky barrels). The event will also see the unveiling of our brand new, custom-made and, frankly, very cool portable bar. Go to SOBA's website for more info.

The superbowl of NZ Beer Festivals is Beervana - the main public event within the larger BrewNZ Festival. It takes place on the 27th and 28th of August. We'll be there with a stall, serving beers that we think are extreme even by our standards and, we hope, one or two big surprises. We're also talking to the Brewers Guild about being an outlet for tickets. More info to come.