June 18th, 2015

Beer + Gin

Melding beer and gin is not a new thing to Fritz Kuckuck and Maria Grau, the brains behind Rough Hands.


They are perhaps best known for creating the world's first fresh hopped gin, back when they ran Nelson's Liquid Alchemy distillery.

Fritz & Maria have once again brought together beer and gin, this time in beer form with 'beerNgin'.


An oak barrel was seasoned with their own gin, while a biere de garde was brewed at Golden Bear in Mapua to go into it.

"beerNgin aims to balance the fruity and spicy complexity of the beer with suggestions of juniper, coriander, citrus and cardamom from the gin. In the aroma of this rich golden ale you will notice the collaboration of Motueka and Amarillo hops with the slightly sweet barrel notes, and the spicy yeast and gin character. This beer is an approachable, refreshing showcase of pine and citrus with a hint of roasted wheat in the finish."

We'll be tapping beerNgin at 5pm on Tuesday.

The Shadow Blasters

Another new band graces the HZ lounge this Saturday, The Shadow Blasters.

"Fresh from recording their self-titled album and single “Tongue Tied And Twisted” with Lee Prebble of The Surgery Studio, The Shadow Blasters are an energetic 4-piece blend of blues, white soul and rock ‘n’ roll."

The Blasters kick off at 9.30pm on Saturday and is free as always.

People's Choice

I'm sure most of you went to last weekend's Winter Ale Festival, run by SOBA. If you missed out, make sure you buy your tickets early next year!

But missing out on the festival doesn't mean missing out on the beer, and we've secured some of the peoples choice beer of the festival: Imperial Nibs.
Imperial Nibs is For Even Greater Justice coconut porter, aged on cocoa nibs and vanilla beans.

The coconut, chocolate and vanilla come together amazingly so keep an eye on our apps for when this comes on tap.

Sadly I'll most likely be missing out on Imperial Nibs, as I'm off on holiday from tomorrow for a week. Which means next week's email will be a Dominic Kelly special edition which is sure to make waves.

June 11th, 2015

Townshend Takeover Tomorrow

Don't forget that we have New Zealand's champion brewer (BGONZA's 2014) visiting tomorrow, and he's bringing nine of his beers with him.

Martin Townshend of Townshend Brewery should be arriving at around 5pm, and we'll be tapping his beers from midday:


On tap:

Last of the Summer Ale fresh hop ESB
Oldhams Tap fresh hop pils
Aotearoa Pale Ale
Black Arrow Pils
Black Strap Porter
Blue Shadow Dry Stout
Flemish Stout

On pump:

Donelan's IPA
Sun Kisser Golden Ale

Personally I'm quite looking forward to trying his fresh hop beers and sour stout.

Most importantly, Martin Townshend himself will be in attendance and fielding all your questions and admiration.

Chocolate Thunder

No, Tasi's amazing chocolate beer isn't back. Chocolate Thunder is also a sensuous Jazz/Funk/Soul/Fusion band who share its name and are playing the HZ lounge this Saturday.
Chocolate Thunder are a "maelstrom that strikes without mercy where you least expect it. Sheer groovemanship to make your body move and your flowers blossom. Gird your loins, people!"

Conway Jeune – Guitar, excellent vibes

Bryn van Vliet – Saxophones, Vocoder, Wind Chimes

Makura Tomoana – Bass

Hikurangi Schaverien-Kaa - Drums

Chocolate Thunder start at 9.30pm, and are free as always.

Staffie Series #3

You might not have seen Tristan behind the bar in a while. He’s been off on a big trip to the Middle East for a couple months.

But just before he set off, Tristan popped down the Occasional Brewer and made 30L of one of his favourite homebrews for our Staffie Series of beers: Silk Road Spiced Amber Ale.
If you've forgotten, the Staffie Series are beers brewed by our multi-talented bar staff, most of which are also homebrewers. So far we've had my own Beeetnik IPA and Chris's Citron Fest Saison.

Tristan's Silk Road features a mixture of cinnamon, ginger, cloves and orange zest on a rich malty 7.5% amber ale base. The melange of Gladfields malts used such as 'Shepherd's Delight' and 'Aurora' really stand up to the spices.

The unfermented beer tasted amazing with the spices, fruit and malt nicely balanced. During the weeks Tristan was away we fermented the beer, and gave it plenty of warm and then cold conditioning to help the spices meld together with the base beer.

Silk Road has been conditioning for two months now, and is ready to pour just in time for Tristan’s return.

Tristan will tap Silk Road at 5pm on Tuesday the 16th of June. Only 30L was brewed so don’t miss out!

June 4th, 2015

Hashigo Jazzy

Starting tonight, the Wellington Jazz Festival will descend upon the Hashigo Zake lounge.

We've got three free gigs this weekend, starting from 10pm tonight when we squeeze the six piece Sunlight Band in to play some jazz-based funk.

Tomorrow from 10pm we'll be hosting The Doublenecks, whose funky improv will be mixed with groove classics.

The grand finale from 10pm Saturday is the legendary blues man Darren Watson, who will be playing solo. Fingers crossed for a rousing rendition of Planet Key.

All of these gigs start at 10pm to allow a bit of a jazz crawl from some of the earlier finishing gigs elsewhere in town. What better way to wrap up a night of jazz than more jazz?

An Old New Release

Back in 2012 we had Hallertau brewery fill some of our kegs with their new Double Stout, a beer inspired by one of our imports from Green Flash.

It was quite popular back in 2012, but we held onto one 20L keg. The big rich 8% pitch black stout seemed like something that would age well, so it's been hanging out up at our cool store since then.

Even though Hallertau's brewer thinks we're "dicks" (1 min 22 seconds in the video) 2 years, 7 months, and 15 days later (i.e. Tuesday) we'll be tapping that last keg to see how it's held up over time. It'll hit the taps at 5pm, and being that there's only 20L we don't expect it to last long.

Townshend's Tap Takeover

Surprisingly, Townshend Brewery has never taken part in a tap takeover event before. This will change on Friday the 12th of June, when we host the first ever Townshend Tap Takeover.

New Zealand's 2014 champion brewer usually lets his beer do the talking, and since winning the title has been busy trying to create enough of it to fulfill the increased demand.

I was lucky enough to visit Townshend Brewery with a SOBA tour back in March. Unless you know where you're going it would be impossible to find, but if you want to have a go just look for the unmarked driveway off a long gravel road in Upper Moutere...

The brewery was idyllic, bathed in sunshine just metres from brewer Martin's home and covered in hop bines.
Martin and his dog were amazing hosts and made sure everyone didn't want to leave when the time came.

Townshend made their name in English style cask conditioned real ales, with beers like Old House ESB often gracing the Hashigo handpumps since we first opened.

In more recent years new-world styles have begun to enter the Townshend range, with beers like Scissor Jack India Pale Lager and Aotearoa Pale Ale.

Next Friday's tap takeover will feature 7 beers on tap including both of his fresh hop beers and two on handpump.

On tap:

Last of the Summer Ale fresh hop ESB
Oldhams Tap fresh hop pils
Aotearoa Pale Ale
Black Arrow Pils
Black Strap Porter
Blue Shadow Dry Stout
Flemish Stout

On pump:

Donelan's IPA
Sun Kisser Golden Ale

Most importantly, Martin Townshend himself will be in attendance and fielding all your questions and admiration.
The beers will be on tap from midday, and we expect Martin to arrive closer to 5pm.

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.

May 21st, 2015

OREgasmic

In Rogue's apparent drive to become its own nation, self sufficiency was an important step.

At Rogue Farms in Tygh Valley, Oregon Rogue grows almost everything that goes into their beers. Hops, barley, rye, pumpkin, jalepeno, marionberries, hazelnuts, honey... You get the picture.

All beers in the 'Rogue Farms' range use only ingredients grown by Rogue. The pale ale of this range is OREgasmic Ale, a simple beer to show off Rogue's hops and barley without anything getting in the way.

It features Dare™, Risk™ & Maier Munich Malts; Rogue Farms Revolution™, Independent™, Newport™, Freedom™ & Liberty™ Hops™™™™; 'Free Range Coastal Water' & Rogue's proprietary Pacman Yeast.

We've had the odd bottle of this one in the fridge, and now our first ever kegs have arrived from Oregon on Tuesday in Beer Without Borders' latest shipment.

So on Tuesday at 5pm we'll be tapping the first keg of Oregasmic Ale, and you can experience Rogue's terrior.

Double Drums

Because one drum kit is never enough, this Saturday night our lounge will house two.

Nick Granville's Double Drum Funk features both Lance Philip and Richard Te One on the drums, with Ross McDermott on bass and of course Nick Granville with guitar.
Double drums should make for a fun night, with the music kicking off at 9.30pm Saturday, with no charge as usual.

The Three Dimensions of Hopwired

Back in March, I attended the Marchfest beer festival in Nelson.

Marchfest is my favourite beer festival to attend in NZ. Partly because I don't have anything to do with organising it, but mostly because it's an incredibly well run event that showcases brand new beers from the Nelson region's brewers.
With their move from Blenheim to Warkworth this year was 8 Wired's final year at Marchfest, and they went out with style.
Easily the most challenging beer of the day (ignoring the red onion stout...) was 8 Wired Hopwired Unchained, a barrel aged version of Hopwired with various bacteria and wild yeast thrown in.

Only one barrel of Hopwired Unchained was filled back in 2013, when a batch of Hopwired was made for 'wort kits' (for home brewers to ferment at home).

It was lucky then that I ran into 8 Wired brewer Søren Eriksen at Marchfest, and managed to put our name on one of the few kegs of Hopwired Unchained remaining.

Of course since then, Fresh Hopwired has been released, along with the second Warkworth-brewed batch of plain old normal Hopwired.

That makes three different versions of Hopwired all out at the same time, which just begs for a side-by-side comparison.
We are happy to oblige. On Friday the 29th of May we'll have all three versions of Hopwired on tap.

We'll be offering tasting flights of all three for a special price, so you can see how the fresh and the funky compare to the original.

Sriracha Beer!

You've probably heard of Sriracha Sauce. Its ability to improve almost any food has made it famous on the internet and is available at almost every Asian takeaway in the U.S.

Huy Fong Foods is largely responsible for Sriracha's popularity in the U.S. - their sauce's distinctive red hue and green cap make it the most recognisable hot sauce in the world. If you've seen it on the shelves in supermarkets, it was probably a knock-off brand - as the proper Huy Fong 'cock brand' sauce is hard to come by in NZ.
Rogue has managed to strike a deal with Huy Fong Foods to turn this iconic hot sauce into a beer.
Speaking to a visiting Rogue brewer last week, I found out the unique Sriracha flavour is imparted to a base beer of Shakespeare Stout by adding both the liquid sauce and powdered Sriracha at various stages of brewing. A long period of R & D went into getting the flavour right, until Rogue Sriracha HOT Stout was released.

It comes in a distinctive red 750ml bottle with a green cap to mimic the hot sauce. The label features the proud rooster, and copies text from the hot sauce bottle with subtle changes (eg. "shake well" changed to "don't shake").

Beer Without Borders has finally secured this in-demand beer, with an entire pallet of it showing up in this week's Rogue container.

To coordinate the launch of Sriracha Stout nationwide the beer will be embargoed till Saturday May 30th, when bars and bottle shops nationwide will unleash the rooster.
At Hashigo Zake we will be pouring glasses of Sriracha Stout from midday on the 30th. We have even sourced proper Huy Fong Sriracha Sauce to rim your glasses with (if you want), and you can match your beer with a special Sriracha Beef Pie.

May 14th, 2015

If you were worried about us with all the flooding, rest easy. We're still warm and dry down in the beer bunker, so if you need a place to while away the hours till you can get home - we're ready for you.

Stingray Point

Coronado deliver us another new release this Tuesday, with Stingray Point IPA hitting the taps.
This seems to be an occasionally released IPA, with tasting records of it as far back as 2012. These tasting records are also overwhelmingly positive.

While Stingray Point might be "just another US IPA" is seems it's a really good one. With reviews like:

"Coronado does west coast IPAs very well and this is one of my favorites." 

" Taste like a stingray, with a hint of victory."

It seems like we're in for a bit of a hoppy treat come Tuesday. Check it out on tap from 5pm.

This is Just a Tribute

Way back in 2011, Renaissance was one of the first (if not the first) NZ brewer to begin releasing a vintage barley wine each year, à la Thomas Hardy's.Renaissance Tribute is a "mellow, warming ale with layers of biscuit, roasted hazelnut and maple syrup, with hints of black current and toast." and weighs in at 10.8% ABV.

Barley wines are usually pretty massive malt monsters, especially when fresh. The idea behind a vintage barley wine like this is to give it a few years to reach its peak. Time lets the beer mellow out, thins the body a little bit but develops complex aged characters.

After four years we think the original Tribute is tasting pretty great. So to give you chance to try a well-aged barley wine without having to invest in the years, we're pouring 150ml of Tribute this Saturday for $8.

Father & Son

The father and Son percussion duo of Sam and Myele Manzanza return to the HZ lounge this Saturday with Sam & Myele Manzanza's Afrobeats.
Come and enjoy a beer to Afrobeat, Ska, Funk, Soul, Blues and Reggae from these two percussion maestros.

The music starts from 9.30pm, and won’t cost you a thing.

Special Sours

As our NZ vs The World sour beer showdown tasting approaches the beer list is emerging.

On the cards so far we have:
Funk Estate vs Almanac

Craftwork vs Rodenbach

8 Wired vs Wild Beer

8 Wired vs Mikkeller

And we're still finalising a contender to go up against the mighty Green Flash Rayon Vert.

In the last week we've also managed to obtain a couple of NZ brewed sour/wild fermented beers which are yet to be released to the pubic. We'll be throwing these into the tasting as bonus beers, because why not.

Book your spot at Cultbeerstore.co.nz or over the bar.

May 7th, 2015

Thanks

Last week's charity keg of Wild & Woolly and tip jar donations raised over $1100 for victims of the Nepal earthquake.

On behalf of Hashigo Zake and Wild & Woolly, I'd like to thank everyone who helped raise these funds.

The money has been donated to the Red Cross' Nepal earthquake appeal, and will be used to help provide food, shelter, first aid and drinking water to those in need.

Lime Light

Another container has arrived from the west coast of the states, which means another dose of exciting Coronado Brewer's Series releases for you to enjoy.
First up is a beer that may break the first commandment of beer naming:

'thou shalt not have a flavour or ingredient in thou name, that doth not feature in thy beer'

Coronado Lime Light seems to be a fun, easy going witbier to match the scorching San Diego summer. The brewery's description sounds pretty appetising, but doesn't mention the lime that so prominently features in the beer's name:

"Step into the Lime Light, this beer is light in body, and easy drinking. Sneaky, yet sticky notes of chamomile and lemon grass. Refreshingly fresh and citrusy, sure to quench your thirst, and more importantly, light up your life."

Hopefully the citrusy flavours they refer to are limey flavours, or I might have to have a Ekim scale rant in next week's email.
Lime Light hits our wheat beer tap on Tuesday at 5pm.

Stupid Bourbon Beer

Another goodie from the latest U.S. shipment you may remember from last year's Pacific Beer Expo.

We managed to secure a single keg of Bourbon Barrel Aged Stupid Stout for PBE, but it only made it to bottles in early 2015.
We've finally secured a stock of 375ml bottles, but because barrel aging is an lengthy and inefficient way of producing beer they don't come cheap.

To see whether this one is worth adding to your cellar we'll be doing 125ml bottle pours of this beast on Saturday, for just $8.

The Cosmonauts

This Saturday sees another act make their HZ lounge debut.The Cosmonauts play a "high-energy blend of Soviet Folk with Italian Chanson and 19th Century Balkan Pop to stir your gypsy senses."
You've got Frankie Curac on accordion, AJ Jensen playing guitar and Andrew Laking slapping the double bass.

The music starts at 9.30pm Saturday, so pop on down for a beer and some free entertainment.

Gotta be Fresh

Our fresh hop tap takeover is tomorrow! You know the drill - all taps will feature beer made with hops taken straight from the bine.
If you need reminding, here's the full lineup:

On tap:

- Two Thumb Fresh Hop Pale Ale followed by ParrotDog Rare Bird Kakapo IPL

- Garage Project Sea of Green Pilsner

- Panhead Joy Ride Amber followed by Raindogs 17 Seconds ESB

- Three Boys Fresh Hop IPA followed by Three Boys Fresh Hop Golden

- Wild & Woolly Fresh Hop Savvy Llama

- 8 Wired Fresh Hopwired followed by Panhead Fresh Hop Vandal

- Funk Estate Fresh Hop Oh Lordy! followed by Cassels Fresh Hop Pale Ale

- Liberty/Hallertau Bier Das Schwarz Massive (BDSM)

- Mikes Hopstock and Two Smokin Barrels

On Handpump:

- Choice Bros Perichor Red IPA

- Kereru Fresh Hop Special Bitter

(The poster image is a reference to 1980's claymation kids show 'The Trap Door')

Needs More Internet

We've had fibre optic internet for a while now, but a weak router signal, brick walls and bar layout hampered connection speeds and created dead spots.
Last Sunday we hopefully fixed these issues with a fancy new router with heaps of antenna to get a strong signal to all of the bar.
The image to the right demonstrates the change in speed from an old lounge dead spot.

Our new router also handles the new 'ac' standard of wi-fi, and has a separate network on the 5GHz wavelength. If your device is capable, the 5GHz network will be a great backup for busy nights when the standard wi-fi is congested.

We've taken the opportunity to change our wi-fi password for the first time in four years, so make sure you grab it from either the paper or digital menus next time you're in.

Sour About GABS

Melbourne's 'Great Australasian Beer Spectapular' is coming up in two weeks time, and it seems like everyone in Wellington is going except me.
To spite all of those who are going to be enjoying GABS and Melbourne Good Beer Week in two weeks time, I've planned a super exciting sour beer tasting when most of them will be over in Melbourne. Ha!

































As more and more kiwi brewers produce them, sour beers are beginning to capture the imagination of NZ beer geeks. We've managed to build up a nice repertoire of New Zealand brewed sour ales, which would not have been possible just a year ago.

I thought it'd be fun to see how these NZ made sours compare to their international counterparts, in an epic showdown of Flemish red vs Flemish red, Lambic vs Lambic, Berliner Weisse vs Berliner Weisse and more.

On Wednesday 20th of May from 6pm we'll taste each style two at a time, one brewed in NZ and one abroad. Whoever comes out on top is up to you.

Featuring beers from:

Craftwork (Oamaru)

8 Wired (Warkworth)

Funk Estate (Wellington)

Almanac (San Fransisco)

Wild Beer (Somerset)

Rodenbach (Roeselare)

Green Flash (San Diego)

Plus more as I finalise the list.

I'll even be cracking out some Green Flash Rayon Vert that we've been aging a few years in this tasting, so fans of that beer should not miss it (unless they're at GABS).

Book your place for $45 over the bar or at Cultbeerstore now.