Southwark Old Stout

Old stout, and looks it too.

In fact it kind of put me in mind of another regional stout I had on the road.. though this one has a bit more of a legacy reputation. In fact, looking at ratebeer it's pretty highly regarded indeed.

I found it far better than the aforementioned invalid, but nothing that special. It's a solid black pour supposedly based on an old English Russian Imperial recipe, but seemingly more often regarded as a Foreign Extra Stout and to my mind it fits the second category more naturally.

Aroma is of chocolate, bitter hops and slight alcohol. Mouthfeel is pretty highly carbonated for the style but then it's captaining a phalanx of blasting alcohol that comes at you after an initial dry cocoa introduction. It's complex but better than most and you'd think with a bit of label-work and redistribution via the Lion Nathan empire, could be selling a few bottles elsewhere. I'd like to see it racked over coffee for a while and see what that does..  6.0

Lobethal Bierhaus Red Truck Porter

Fresh (well, May 2012) bottle of the local SA porter. Well, the non-Coopers one.

This is a dark amber pour rather than black when you look at it in the light, reasonable head hangs on though a little loose. Nose is of chocolate first, fair bit of hops, little bit of metallics there too.

The mouthfeel is a bit too fizzy here, always a shame with a porter, ends in buzzing metalic alcohol but up until then, has a pretty decent choc porter character. It's not bad overall, just a bit nondescript - I've had far better porters, but far worse too. 6.0

Yeastie Boys + Lobethal Bierhaus Bruce

I have to admit I looked at the 3.5% abv on the menu with some disdain before ordering this one.

It came with a recommendation though and I'm glad I picked it up - great nose from the outset really lifts the spirits with both hops and barley present and accounted for. Nice caramel character there too.

Flavour-wise it's malt driven for the most part with some sweet cotton candy sort of notes. Slightly overcarbed I felt, but then for its aim of a low alc beer that's maybe not a bad thing. There's enough hop bitterness to push it over the norm for a bitter and crank up the interest level to something pretty good.

This is up there with Rogers and a couple others in quite rare territory at present: a mild beer that you actually want to drink. Good stuff. 7.5

Lobethal Bohemian Philsner

Hurr hurr, Philsner.

More importantly though it's both the first beer at what I'm told is an Adelaide institution The Wheatsheaf, and the first tap beer from Lobethal Bierhaus, part of what is an increasingly endangered species of Adelaide breweries.

Additionally, it's pretty good for a Pilsner and slid down very nicely after the 4.5km walk to get to this place. Good looking beer, pretty nondescript nose but a good bite first up then clean finish. Pilsner.

Good stuff! 7.0

McLaren Vale IPA

A rare IPA from South Australia, bright bottle looks good.

It's got good strong US / maybe Australian citrusy hops smell out of the bottle too. Once it's in the glass, malt is more apparent. It's a reasonable looking pour, decent head to boot. Nice work so far.

Taste-wise, this is a beer thattriestotalkabouteverythingallatonce and it's a bit confronting. Rather than having stages, it's like there's a burst of all different fruits, passionfruit and stonefruit in particular just jump in the door three stooges style and the balance kind of suffers as a result. I think it could stand to be a little maltier too, comes across as a little on the watery side which promotes a sweet fruit, almost berry vibe at times.

Not a bad beer - but not memorable or comforting either. 6.0

Lobethal Bierhaus India Pale Al

Believe it or not it's Top Gear in the background.. missed the Stig by about 1 frame.

I'd been keen to try these guys if only because they seem to be one of about 2 (McLaren the other) breweries actually still operating in SA (if you don't count wineries) .. even Beard n Brau has now relocated to QLD by the sounds.

So.. traditional 'bierhaus' name, beer called 'India Pale Al' of all things, label that looks more like a Christmas spiced seasonal than a refreshing ale, described as "hoppy british ale". Very clear pour but a bit sort of dull, small head. The malts are more pronounced than the hops on the nose in fact but ol' lupulus comes back in the taste. It's not apparent front of mouth early in the tasting but does appear from the midpoint as an indistinct burst of bitterness, somewhat muffled by the predominant barley flavours. Bottled Dec 2011 so while not fresh, not dead either.

If you quaff this, there's an instant where you feel some fruits but it is gone in a flash. I'm well aware these English variants aren't the hop wagon that American style efforts often are, but it's nevertheless a little indistinct and underdone for mine. That's not to say it's bad beer - it's just really not hit the spot for a beer marketed as IPA - UK or otherwise. And I'm still unsure why it's called Al. Hi Al! 5.5

Woolshed Brewery W Amazon Ale

Champagne glass pour.. bit limited with hotel rooms unfortunately.

Why the hotel? I had come to Adelaide, where while there's a Coopers flag outside every bar (no seriously - every bar), and a couple of Coopers Pale Ales in every hotel minifridge (a definite improvement on the norm), it seems wider craft is floundering. I hunted down a bottle-o to check out some locals and after the server has leisurely taken his 10 minutes to run up my 4 bottles, cracked into this hitherto unforeseen rare bird of an ale.

It's a very clear pour here with a reasonable fizzy head. The nose gives up pils metallicisms first off but then delivers something a bit sweeter, I had thought honey or something perhaps, combined with probably Australian Pale Ale yeast.

The body is pretty sweet overall, but also delivers some nice nutty characters at odds with anything I was expecting and these become more apparent as it warms. It's a bit of a spin first up but not bad once you're used to what you're getting, though there is still just that tiny itchy hint of metal on the finish holding it back.

Label says it's their inaugural brew made using solar energy, rainwater, and 100% recyclable techniques (good thing here, I hate seeing places using unique brewing techniques every time that aren't reuseable). Quite enjoyable on the whole - keep doing what you're doing, chaps. Perhaps there is a future for Adelaide after all ? 6.0

McLaren Vale Drk

After the last two from these guys I approached these as a gourmand restaurant reviewer would sidle up to a local dive, grimly determined to write it off with little if any mercy.

Contrary to expectations though this is a tasty enough drop in a blue collar sort of way. You're greeted with an aroma of choc cherry caramel scents which is quite nice. The beer itself is malty with slight roastiness and a burnt caramel character that is pretty damn good.

It's a little watery but I'm just pleased my expectations were proven wrong. This is their best beer by a distance. 7.0

McLaren Vale Ale

Ok - now that it's not a lager, can Vale pull something out?

Hmm. Fancy packaging, yes. But even after drinking two of these on separate occasions I still had to look up to find out what this was even supposed to be. American Pale Ale, I'm told. I couldn't really get past "Um. Ale?" personally.

If you analyse this forensically you can find a little bit of apple, light malt, caramel, and sugar. But I suppose the best you could say is that it's inoffensive, insofar as it's utterly forgettable.

After a bit of thought, I had come to think this would be reasonable as a sort of gateway craft conversion beer. But then I'm not sure it has the punch to do that even. Disappointing. 4.0

McLaren Vale Dry

Bugger, bought this pretty much by accident trying to get some of McLaren's other stuff on here.

4.5%, "australian dry lager", pithy insubstantial head, very light. Minimal aroma. Not motivating. In terms of taste it's a bit better than the preamble would lead you to expect - there's a little bit of sweetness there backed by malts. Kind of apple like tastes.

Not a great deal of complexity, though that clearly wasn't the aim here and I don't want to line this up on purpose just to smash it. I'll rate it not bad as a sort of a gateway lager conversion tool.. still miles behind Knappstein and the like though. 4.5

Beard and Brau Golden Paw

Back to those cheerful schnauzers from Adelaide. But oh dear.

Pretty bad smell to this, earthy, metallic, garbage, massive aeration and carbonation both when opened and when poured. Sour notes dominate the taste, artificial lager notes, not a lot that's golden. Bit puzzled how it won a silver medal somewhere?

I want to like these guys. But this is a 1.0 for sure.

Beard and Brau Black Snout Milk Stout

I'm clearly a sucker for bottles with animals on them it seems. Particularly if they also say interesting things like "milk stout" and the like. And if the animals are schnauzers.

750ml beauty this, and a big thick heavy bottle too.

Bit too aerated I must say (becoming a bit of an unfortunate trend with these porters?) - had to basically leave it a while to let it settle and improve. While doing so you sort of notice that while this pours deep opaque black it's actually bubbling away merrily within. Hmm.

You also note the aroma - dark chocolate, coffee mocha sort of style. Nice mocha colour to the head also.

This does indeed have a sort of waxen quality to it that I suppose can be attributed to the 'milk stout' lactose injection. It's still a bit sort of empty in places though. Would like to see it bulked up a bit.
6.5

Knappstein Enterprise Brewery Reserve Lager

Having destroyed Squires for its miserable plunder we needed to resort to bottled beer to wash the mouth out.

Knappstein's been around at least a couple years now and I've been impressed with it from day 1. On the flip side, I'm drinking far better quality beer more often now (ask my wallet) and so I wondered vaguely if this would continue to stack up.

Pleasingly, it does. The dominant flavours are spicy passionfruit hops, with a backing vanilla undertone. It's easy drinking and tasty, plus 5.6% to boot. What's not to love? Hopefully this winery-and-now-brewery are working on more projects now given the deserved success of this drop.

I'm still shocked this counts as a 'lager' - don't see how a lager is going to beat this in its field on current evidence? Can only wait expectantly and see. 8.0