The other night when I
was in the Dove and Olive I notice posters all over the place
advertising this thing called a 'Craft Beer Fight Club'. I
misunderstood it as being a kind of tap takeover which it kind of was
but not in the way that I was used to.
I met an old friend for
some lunch at a brilliant little Vietnamese restaurant for a bowl of
'Pho', Vietnamese beef noodle soup. We dated a couple of years ago
and we lived together when I used to live in Australia. We regularly
came to this place to enjoy a delicious bowl of deep and rich meaty
broth with rice noodles, thinly sliced beef, fresh herbs and bean
sprouts. Having had it many times elsewhere, nowhere has ever come
close to the Pho at 'Pasteur' on Sydney's George St.
A tasty lunch, catching
up over the tastiest Pho out of Vietnam. It was like old times. From
there we headed in the direction of the Dove and Olive via a couple
of places to get some other bits. There was a place that made
dumplings to order on Pitt St, 'Ho's Dim Sum Kitchen'. They have
these amazing little egg custard pancakes. Sticky, gooey rice flour
pancakes filled with sweet and creamy egg custard. I remember that
they always used to sell out of them early and once out they wouldn't
make any more for that day. We were unfortunate to visit on a day
when they'd run out. I had braced myself for this disappointment but
Jade had not. She was devastated. Something so tasty filled with such
memories would have made for such a wonderful middle to what was for
me already a lovely afternoon.
The 'Craft Beer Fight
Club' was due to start any time after 7pm so we went over to the pub
to wait and see what it was all about.
We go there quite early
so had a few beers while we conversed about old times, present times
and ideas of what to do in the future. Quite a lot came out and an
idea of mine came to the surface and got me quite excited about the
up and coming months. All I can say is that it involves beer, both
the production and the sale and possibly something along the lines of
a bar sort of thing.
The time came to go
upstairs, pay the rudimentary off duty staff posing as door staff the
entrance fee which was quite hefty at $30 but when you consider that
that included 4 schooners of craft beer from two different, battling
brewers. Moo Brew from Tasmania and HopDog Beer Works out of New
South Wales. I'd tried a couple of Moo Brew beers on this trip but
nothing yet from HopDog. P-Slatez had informed me of their existence
but I hadn't actually seen anything in any pubs yet.
We managed to find a
couple of seats opposite what looked and seemed like a couple of
regulars. They were 'in' with the bar staff and seemed to know a lot
of people there on the night. We were seated on sofas in the far left
corner of the upstairs bistro/bar section of the pub. Behind us was
the 'staff' team. A bunch that turned out to be very loud and
actually quite annoying. When it came to the quiz round, they had an
unfair advantage.
The first beer out was
one from Moo Brew, their Hefeweizen. I was shocked how close it was
to its German cousin. It was almost just like drinking a beer in
Munich but instead of being surrounded by square jawed men and tall
blonde vixens, the place was full of all kinds of folks from all
walks of life, big and tall, short and skinny, any kind of
demographic was in here, even a couple of tourists from the European
continent. It was a very yeasty beer but so fruity and smooth that it
was a pleasure to consume. It was however quite a filling little
drop. I would rate that one very highly in the Hefe or Weiss
category.
I think it was a bit
crap having a face off or fight club or whatever, when comparing some
of these beers that are not anything like the oppositions beer. You
can't possible compare a Hefe with an IPA Saison, it just doesn't
work. For that reason I was reluctant to give any kind of grading or
score between the two breweries.
Talking of the IPA
Saison, it was the next beer out. One from HopDog Beer Works. It
sounded very interesting. I was willing to stay or even come for that
beer alone. One of the brew days I did at a London brewery was making
an IPA Saison. I won't really got much into this one as I don't think
it was right. Thick, cloudy, not tasting anything like a Saison or
IPA fermented using Saison yeast should. At all, in any way. It was
all wrong. Maybe if it had had a couple more weeks to condition it
might have cleared a little and allowed the flavours to mellow and
come out and in some cases intensify. As it hadn't and according to
the brewer, come straight from the fermenter I think I heard him say,
“it is as fresh a beer as you can get”. The idea behind it and
the write up were really selling it but the beer did not live up to
any of it. Looking around seeing so many full and untouched glasses
really tells a story. We had a silly little challenge with this beer.
Beer Bingo or whatever you want to call it. A stupid little game to
identify however many flavours you can in the beer. It was a bit crap
really. Rather than naming specifics you could have just said
'Tropical' or 'Citrus' and one of the flavours was I think 'Pig
Semen'. I mean what the fuck. Any way, it didn't put me off the rest
of the evening, well it almost did.
Something else a bit
wrong with the whole evening was a Pale following such an odd and
powerful beer. Nothing but an intense Imperial Stout or Double IPA or
something really packing a punch could follow the IPA Saison.
However good Moo Brew
Pale is, it was difficult to detect and appreciate the flavours after
the previous beer. A real shame as it is one of the best Pales I've
had whilst in Australia. I would and have happily paid almost $10 for
a schooner of the stuff before. Hopped using Aussie grown US hop
varieties. The conditions in Australia are slightly different to most
of the US hops so you get a bit of variation there. A great Aussie
Pale with US hop varieties grown down under.
The last beer was the
only thing keeping us there. The staff team, drunk, rude and very
loud, almost deafeningly loud. The IPA Saison occasionally popping up
in a burp or two and a hunger growing with the intention of finishing
the night at cute little Thai, 'Chat Thai' on Campbell St.
The lack of order and
organisation being all over the place meant that what I thought would
be a couple of hours was more likely taking three almost four hours.
Probably by the time it finished it would have passed the four hour
mark.
Thinking it would be
over soon, I readied myself for the next beer and to leave but out
came a random pub quiz, trivia round. Jade had gone out for a smoke,
so I bowed out of the first round. A bit of a shame as I would have
won, I reckon I would have anyway. Jade wasn't too happy as the night
had gone on too long, we were both hungry and it wasn't that great in
there. I wanted to see it through to the end as it was something I'd
been looking forward to even if it was a bit shit. We stayed for the
last beer.
A good thing too as the
last beer was by far the winner of the night. Incomparable to any of
the other beers but standing out high above the rest. I didn't used
to enjoy Red IPAs but things have changed. They have much, much more
flavour than their paler brothers, usually with a hoppier character
and bitterness to rival Double IPAs. 'Redhopulous Maximus India Red
Ale' is a amped up version of HopDog's 'Redhopulous'. What a beer,
any Red IPA fan must give it a go.
With the amount of
disorder or would it be better to say 'lack of order' of the night, I
won't take part in one again and judging any. I can't and wouldn't
compare the two breweries based on the beers up for trial. Both had
their merits and one in particular had so many flaws that one might
have written off the brewery altogether. They did manage to redeem
themselves later but I think trying their beers in future I will have
a little taste before I dive in a buy before I try. Moo Brew can hold
their heads up as they brought two faultless beers to the table.
A great pub with lots of ever changing local and overseas brews
More wonderful beer coming from Tasmania
I'm sure on a good day IPA Saison is a tasty drop.
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