{"id":1021,"date":"2010-11-01T00:01:21","date_gmt":"2010-10-31T11:01:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/?p=1021"},"modified":"2011-03-15T23:06:24","modified_gmt":"2011-03-15T10:06:24","slug":"west-coast-brewing-pale-ale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2010\/11\/01\/west-coast-brewing-pale-ale\/","title":{"rendered":"West Coast Brewing Pale Ale"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"West<\/a>
West Coast Pale Ale<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My friends and I became very fond of the West Coast beers when we stopped for a night in the tiny town of Blackball, and had more than a few at the \u2018Hilton<\/a>\u2019. Their lager and dark are certainly nothing socks-knocking in craft beer terms, but they’re well made, tasty, and acquired a lot of ‘bonus points’ from the situation and setting, of course. This happens a lot with beer, sociable thing that it is.<\/p>\n

Years later, the brewery did a bit of a share float to raise money for some expansion plans. My friends who’d been there at the Hilton — who all have day jobs<\/em> and who all earn, you know, actual money<\/em> — bought in. Then it seemed a bit odd that I, as the Beer Nerd, wasn’t in on it, too. So I bought one<\/em> share off one of them, for the princely sum of 31\u00a2.<\/p>\n

So this is how much of a stickler I am for some sort of ‘journalistic’ integrity in beer writing. I have thirty-one cents<\/em> in a brewery and feel obliged to say so<\/a>. It drives me bonkers that this basic impulse to declare conflicts of interest isn’t much shared. I can think of several instances of people writing professionally about a brewery or a beer without divulging such probably-pertinent facts as close friendships, occasional employment, or other such potential or actual conflicts. It’s something I’ll have to make more of a stink about sometime soon, and then maybe just start naming names and ‘outing’ the offenders.<\/p>\n

Anyway<\/em>, West Coast recently hired a new junior brewer, and one of his first tasks was to take a crack at a pale ale. I think they did pretty admirably; it’s not overwhelming, but not all pale ale needs<\/em> to be, and given the ‘pitch’ of their other beers, this will make for a nice little stepping stone without freaking out their core customers. It’s quite moreishly sharp and citrussy, though some Nerdier people did pick out some faulty flavours kicking around in there, too — but this is a first batch, and they do have some seriously-refined brewers’ palates, rather sensitive to these things.<\/p>\n

\"West<\/a>
Diary II entry #33, West Coast Pale Ale<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Verbatim:<\/strong> West Coast Pale Ale 1\/11\/10 on tap @ MH ?% I feel I have to declare my official conflict of interest, in that I’m the smallest shareholder of West Coast Brewery. Got to know Darryl, the bosses’ son a bit over the years, and he mentioned this was headed our way when he was here at Festival time. It’s pretty damn nice; not aggressive, but more in the Creatures \/ Croucher mold — the sharpish, in a nice way. Very citrussy, but not one-note. Slightly hazy, nicely tart + refreshing + moreish. I had some of this here on Hallowe’en Eve, when we all dressed up; but I was in no state to make a proper note, then. So I had this while watching the Zombie Episode of Community<\/a>. Neat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My friends and I became very fond of the West Coast beers when we stopped for a night in the tiny town of Blackball, and had more than a few at the \u2018Hilton\u2019. Their lager and dark are certainly nothing socks-knocking in craft beer terms, but they’re well made, tasty, and acquired a lot of … Continue reading West Coast Brewing Pale Ale<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[6,14,37,12],"class_list":["post-1021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-diary","tag-pages","tag-nz","tag-gateway","tag-pale-ale"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":152,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2004\/11\/06\/goose-island-honkers-ale\/","url_meta":{"origin":1021,"position":0},"title":"Goose Island \u2018Honker\u2019s Ale\u2019","author":"Phil","date":"November 6, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Verbatim: Goose Island Honker's Ale. $?, 12oz, @home, Nov 6. More West Wing, so a Chicago ale with burgers. Darkish, but hints of orange again. Bubbles not so enduring, no haze. Lighter taste + smell, still flat, muted ale-ish. More an afternoon beer. Perfectly respectable + tasty. Great everyday stuff;\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Goose Island 'Honker's Ale'","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Diary-1016-Goose-Island-Honkers-1-300x138.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1848,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2011\/02\/26\/liberty-brewing-west-coast-blonde-amarillo\/","url_meta":{"origin":1021,"position":1},"title":"Liberty Brewing ‘West Coast Blonde: Amarillo’","author":"Phil","date":"February 26, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"On February 26th,1 Hashigo Zake hosted an amazing fundraising night, donating all of their takings between 6pm and midnight to raise money for a local mental health charity and the Red Cross effort in Christchurch. My plan was to stop by late shortly before midnight, after spending my Saturday night\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Liberty 'West Coast Blonde'","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Liberty-West-Coast-Blonde-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1405,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2009\/03\/24\/theresianer-pale-ale\/","url_meta":{"origin":1021,"position":2},"title":"Theresianer Pale Ale","author":"Phil","date":"March 24, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Another Italian beer, and one I'd had before, with an altogether brilliant dinner at La Casa here in town, a while back. It's an appealing bright orangey colour, and definitely has appropriately citrussy twangs in the nose and the taste. It's a bit boozy, at 6.3%, and has a slightly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Theresianer Pale Ale","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Theresianer-Pale-Ale-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1459,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2011\/01\/10\/matilda-bay-fat-yak\/","url_meta":{"origin":1021,"position":3},"title":"Matilda Bay ‘Fat Yak’","author":"Phil","date":"January 10, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"It does seem to me that (though the traffic in both directions is still painfully slow) the Australians are having better luck at getting good New Zealand beer available over there than we are with the vice-versa, over here. We do manage to get some goodies at work, though, and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Matilda Bay 'Fat Yak'","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Matilda-Bay-Fat-Yak-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":403,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2008\/08\/28\/croucher-pale-ale\/","url_meta":{"origin":1021,"position":4},"title":"Croucher Pale Ale","author":"Phil","date":"August 28, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Verbatim: Croucher Pale Ale, from Rotorua, but with none of that city's usual aromatic downsides. An after-work drink, and a pretty damn good one. It's a little bit Little-Creatures-esque, what with being a pale ale, but not being a thwack in the head with a fistful of hops. More just\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Croucher Pale Ale","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Croucher-Pale-Ale-300x225.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1255,"url":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/2010\/12\/31\/lagunitas-a-little-sumpin-sumpin\/","url_meta":{"origin":1021,"position":5},"title":"Lagunitas ‘A Little Sumpin’ Sumpin”","author":"Phil","date":"December 31, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm not sure what did it, but New Year's was uncharacteristically quiet, so I was able to sign off pretty early and just perch on the end of the bar. My fellow bartender Halena had gotten back from some time in the U.S., and had whipped up some of her\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Actual Diary entries"","block_context":{"text":"Actual Diary entries","link":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/category\/diary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Lagunitas 'A Little Sumpin' Sumpin''","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-content\/uploads\/Lagunitas-Little-Sumpin-Sumpin-225x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1021"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1021\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1956,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1021\/revisions\/1956"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/philcook.net\/beerdiary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}