November | 2013 | Beer Diary

George and I recently had the pleasure of sitting down — for a record number of Beers Of The Week, amidst all the banter — with Stu McKinlay, notorious pants-wearer, and one half (give or take) of the Yeastie Boys. We crash-tested whether fresh is best, sampled some ill-fated beers from the Great Drought era, and heard the origin story for several individual beers and for the unique operation itself — before turning to industry-wide issues like collegiality in the beer business and the culture of consuming alcohol. (Some local wildlife joined in as Special Guest Stars, with Zola the dog providing various thumps and scuffles, and myriad native birds adding a backing track.)

As always, a direct download is available, there’s a podcast-specific RSS feed, and you should be able to get us on iTunes. George and myself can also both be reached on the Twitterthing, or you can leave comments here or on the Bookface; feedback is absolutely always welcome — I’m also about to start working on providing a few more subscription and download options so any input on such mechanical details is extra-welcome. Cheers!

Yeastie Boys handpull, my view on ‘Daughter Porter’ night

Yeastie Boys 'Golden Perch', during Dioramarama — Yeastie Boys ‘Golden Perch’, during Dioramarama

Firestone Walker's utterly fucking marvellous 'Double DBA' — Firestone Walker’s utterly fucking marvellous ‘Double DBA’

— Show notes:

(0.38) Get the coloured-pants references out of the way right out the gate, and welcome friend of the show Stu McKinlay, Yeastie Boy.
(1.55) “Bagonza” is way better than “Suhguhbuhguhnnnn-zah”, to which I resorted in previous episodes, when sponsor’s initials were awkwardly appended to the acronym.
(8.50) Beer of the Week #1: Pot Kettle Back, 2^ed. #freshisnotbest
(18.00) I’m trying to find the link to Yeastie Boys’ explanation of the Great Yeastie Drought — which set the bar for open and honest communication from a brewery — but it seems to’ve been splatted when Posterous closed down. These are the perils of the modern internets, I suppose.
(19.45) Moments of Zola are just wonderful, and I say this as a committed Cat Person. If superadorable puppies are you thing, follow George on the Tweets for a daily dose.
(22.55) Beer of the Week #2: Digital IPA, plus microbial guest(s).
(24.55) I spent a good part of the rest of the afternoon trying to figure out clever ways to rescue these beers, from a retail point of view. They would’ve been worth it.
(25.40) Beer of the Week #3: Gunnamatta, likewise accidentally remixed.
(28.40) I’ve learned a lot about music by Googling beer names from Yeastie Boys.
(29.45) I loved Hud-a-wa’ — and the confusion its name caused.
(32.30) At time of writing, ‘Perch’ is my third most-checked-in beer, claiming a place in a crowd otherwise populated by predictable freebies I get from work. And Gunnamatta.
(40.50) Stu’s probably here anticipating a friendly-but-philosophical debate on “origin-fudging”, which we never really got around to in this episode. Another time, for sure.
(41.20) Beer of the Week #4: Firestone Walker ‘Double DBA’, which truly was face-meltingly awesome. Seriously mind blowing and delicious.
(44.20) John Palmer’s website (and book) is admirably simply-named How To Brew. The entire first edition is online for free, which is just awesome.
(46.20) Shit Beer Geeks Say: “…but in a good way.”
(49.30) Tea. So much tea.
(55.10) Untappd ratings’ inappropriateness was on my mind as I uploaded this, too.
(56.55) Prison Brew sounds amazing. Let’s stage this again, someone, please.
(58.30) Beer of the Week #5: Rex Attitude, vaguely vintaged, which George bravely re-tries after his ordeal way back in s01e03. I love its origin story, and hereby apologise for perpetuating the not-quite-right one for ‘Men’n Skurrts’.
(1.10.40) Five Yeastie Beers for Five Yeastie Years, a.k.a. Dioramarama, really does deserve a post of its own. But I am, as always, appallingly far behind with such things.
(1.11.45) Yeastie Boys Tea Party / Yeas-tea Something. Mere days away! Wellingtonians, mark your calendars; non-Wellingtonians, book travel. George and I have quiz-related duties on the night, but will make sure to stop by before and/or after.
(1.15.30) Beastwars were unsurprisingly awesome. Get familiar with them a.s.a.p..
(1.18.40) Recommendations: The original ‘G.A.o.B.’, by Rowland S. Howard, and A Tribe Called Quest, probably on Rdio. And any steaming service is welcome to my tip-jar idea. I just want it implemented.
(1.22.45) Beer of the Week #6: Townshend ‘Flemish Stout’. We did have this a few episodes ago, and I’m entirely on board with Stu’s generalised praise for Martin. I don’t have a photo of the 750s, sadly; I should grab some for my stash.
(1.28.00) In praise of sessionability, for all sorts of reasons.
(1.31.00) The various ways PBE encouraged sensible drinking are a real factor in its loveliness as a festival. I also owe you all a festival-roundup. (A non-podcast one, at least, our surprisingly-balanced assessment of Beervana was our last episode.)
(1.33.30) Pete Brown on alco-pops, a.k.a. “ciders”.
(1.38.40) See, e.g., Victoria Bitter and Crafty Beggars.
(1.40.10) 90% of the random thumps, and 100% of the slurping noises, were Zola.
(1.40.30) Cue the music: ‘Shopping for Explosives’, by The Coconut Monkeyrocket. Audio editing done in Audacity. Habitual thanks to both.

Crafty Beggars 'Wheat As', in context — Crafty Beggars ‘Wheat As’, in context

In this, as in all things, context is king. Perfect circumstances can rescue the naffest of beers — and mismatchings of time and/or place could equally ruin the most otherwise-charming. Today, Wellingtonians were rightly beside themselves with the sheer loveliness of the weather out there, seizing upon this as the first real Saturday of the summer by pootling around in boats, sitting in the warm sunshine, or hurling themselves off a pier and into the still-actually-rather-brisk-now-you-mention-it harbour. Myself, I was gardening.¹ My deeply-ingrained nocturnality is slowly and awkwardly (but painlessly enough) giving way and I’m becoming a little more ambitempstrous ² as I slowly discover worthwhile things about the daylight hours the Normals inhabit.

Meanwhile, there was a Crafty Beggars ‘Wheat As’ in my fridge, thanks to its — potentially ironic — inclusion in a little Thank You parcel the Brewers’ Guild gave me after I helped go over the Beer Writer Of The Year nominees earlier this year. Since I was hugely not a fan of it the first time I had it — as an inherently-underwhelming thing as well as because of its annoying halo of brandwank — I resolved to give this “bonus” bottle its best-possible go. A few hours of serious hack-and-slash dig-and-heave garden rehabilitation provided exactly the right opportunity to climb the goat-track to the Thinking Chair in the back corner of the property to take in the view,³ eat some delicious cheese, and have a beer.

Crafy Beggars 'Wheat As' for lunch — Crafy Beggars ‘Wheat As’; part of your complete breakfast

And it was, I’ll cheerfully admit, fucking glorious; properly refreshing, flavourful but not distractingly so, it went gangbusters with the cheese (and its surroundings), and had the added benefit of being a sessionable four-point-zero percent. Given the price-point these things seemed to be pitched at — doubtless to serve as a bulwark against Independent / Asahi’s rather-aggressive (and successful!) attempt to carve out some market share — it could prove one of the bargain buys of the summer. If — always a crucial “if”, and always up to the individual — you can bring yourself to hand over your money to its producer.

If you’ll forgive the loose extrapolations from a single (but sublime) moment, this impossible-to-overstate element of context is a good part of the reason why I can never bring myself to push the “ratings” buttons in Untappd, and a strong element of my ongoing leeriness of beer awards. What would I be rating any particular beer against — my assumptions of what it was going to be like, its reputation, its “style” (defined by its marketing department, or someone more “objective”?), or how it fit the particular occasion, no matter how little thought I gave to my selection? And likewise, what hope can any number of potentially-bloody-marvellous beers have of being at their best in a little tasting glass, among scores of broadly-similar relatives, at a table full of weary judges?

I would happily stand up in any beer geek support group and say “Hi, my name is Phil Cook and, just the other day, I acutally bloody loved a Crafty Beggars ‘Wheat As'”. Hopefully, this is part of what separates the enthusiasts from the snobs. I won’t be rushing out to buy more — Lion aren’t in boycott territory,⁴ but I think there always plenty of more-deserving candidates for a dose of my meagre monies — but, in context, it was great. If you need me, I’ll be up in my Thinking Chair, mulling that over.

Contemplating context — and garden layout, and sunburn, and how my life has changed

1: And then I hurled myself off a pier. ↑
2: Apparently the actual word is “cathemeral”. ↑
3: Caveats: 1) it’s a rental, not “mine” (nor even “my bank’s”) in the ownership sense, 2) there’s a seriously perilous goat-track to get to this spot; it’s not even vaguely representative of the rest of the place. I hope my Middle Class credentials are unsullied after you’ve seen my Harbour Views. ↑
4: Unlike, you know, some people. ↑

Beer Diary

Monthly Archives: November 2013

Beer Diary Podcast s03e06: Stu McKinlay, Yeastie Boy

— Show notes:

Everything in Its Right Place

Tastings and ramblings and whatnot

— Show notes:

Spread the word:

Spread the word:

Tastings and ramblings and whatnot