May 28th, 2015

Welcome to the Whanau

You may notice a couple of fresh faces behind the bar on your next visit.

We've recently had to farewell two staff members - Josh and Jimmy - who have both moved to Europe to live.

Josh has shifted to Berlin to further his already exquisite musical talents, and Jimmy is roaming various European countries on a classic OE.

Josh and Jimmy were valued members of our family behind the bar, so we took a while finding the right replacements. But now we're back at full strength with Janete and Ross joining the team.

Janete comes to us from a Brazilian/Japanese background, so speaks quite a few languages. She's a beer geek from way back and has completed Cicerone (like Sommelier but for beer) courses so has plenty of knowledge to back her up.

Ross hails from Scotland, where he completed a masters of brewing and distilling. This means he has an impressive technical knowledge of beer and is great at matching people to beer.

Please welcome Janete and Ross to the Hashigo whanau next time you're in, and don't be afraid to put them to the test!

Puffinus Huttoni

Fresh from its GABS premiere, this Tuesday ParrotDog have granted us a preview of the second beer in their RareBird series: Puffinus Huttoni Boysenberry Sour.
The RareBird series from ParrotDog consists of their rare one-off beers, named after New Zealand's quirky and rare avian to help raise awareness of our many endangered species.

The bird version of Puffinus Huttoni is more commonly known as the endangered Hutton's Shearwater. Currently only two breeding colonies are known of (in Kaikoura), and are under threat from stoats and habitat loss.

The beer version of Puffinus Huttoni is a delicious 5.5% kettle soured boysenberry beer.

“Tart and refreshing and featuring a slight sourness derived from Lactobacillus, this has been aged on Nelson-grown boysenberries”

Reports from GABS hail it as 'awesome', 'great' and suggest ParrotDog have the Midas touch. I'm really excited to taste ParrotDog's first foray into sour beers, and hop you'll join us and some of the ParrotDog team at 5pm Tuesday 2nd June.

Hopwired in 3D

Don't forget that tomorrow from midday we're simultaneously pouring three versions of 8 Wired Hopwired for the first time outside the brewery.
Original Hopwired will be poured along with Fresh Hopwired and Hopwired Unchained.
For those not wanting a pint or a fancy of each you'll be able to grab a tasting flight with 150ml of all three for $15.

Saucy Rooster

There's heaps happening at HZ on Saturday.
First up is the Rogue Sriracha Stout launch. From midday this Saturday we'll be pouring glasses of Sriracha Stout from the bottle, and/or you can buy a bottle to take away (with our 20% takeaway discount).

If Rogue's interpretation isn't saucy enough, we'll have proper Huy Fong Sriracha sauce on hand to rim your glass.

The perfect snack to go with Sriracha Stout is our new Sriracha Beef Pie, which we'll be launching along with the beer.

Tears... In Rain

For last year's PBE, Beer Without Borders employee and Blade Runner aficionado, Ryan, brewed a beer inspired by the movie with Twisted hop: Tears... In Rain Vol 1: Glitter in the Dark.

It was a stylistically confusing beer, namely an 'Ameribelgian Scotchbock IPA', but whatever went in there worked amazingly.
It turns out a local theatre is showing Blade Runner: The Final Cut this Friday and Saturday.

So to appease Ryan and any other Blade Runner fans we'll be pouring the final keg of Glitter in the Dark from tomorrow, which is completely unrelated to the movie showing... But if you want to drink a beer inspired by the movie before/after seeing the movie, then that's possible now...

Drinking & Dancing

We're squeezing a new four piece into our lounge this Saturday night: The Drinking & Dancing Society.They play "a mix of old time standards and originals that make a toast to the intoxicating old world mélange of New Orleans Swing/Blues that will get fingers clicking and feet stomping."

Mat Enright - Vocals/Guitar/Trumpet
Nils Olsen - Clarinet/Saxophone
Adrian Jensen - Guitar/Banjo/Bass Drum
Dan Yeabsley - Bass Saxophone/Hi Hats

The music starts at 9.30pm and is free, as usual.