Moondog Black Lung II

So the story goes .... Devilishly handsome boy meets devilishly handsome image in the mirror and its love at first sight. Years later devilishly handsome boy witnesses devilishly handsome friends incinerate at local gas station in innocent petrol fight. Blah blahs aside, devilishly handsome boy becomes muse for crazy brewers in downtown Abbotsford where a devilishly awesome stout is produced. You know the story ....

The Moondog Black Lung II is liquid gold. And yes, looks can kill. Sometimes you can judge a book by its cover. Thats all I got.

Just drink it!

4 Pines Stout, Manly NSW

In what seems to be a never ending growth industry of micro breweries, another label has hit the ground running (maybe a bit premature perhaps) with a band of lads from the inner northern beaches of Sydney coming up with 4 Pines Brewing Company. It also seems to be a trend nowadays to position a numeral in the brand name - 2 Brothers, 3 Ravens, 5 Numbnuts - the last one will be my label hitting the market soon. Maybe. Dunno know.

The trend is Pale Ale, Wheat beers and pretty much all and sundry. One style that is I see as semi-uncommon is stout. Stout done well is pure sex. Stout just done is pure pedestrian. The 4 Pines Stout is the former!

The primary aroma is pure espresso coffee, the like I quite possibly have never seen before - intense, powerful and all other adjectives that describe strength! The head even looks like coffee crema too. This stout doesn't have the brain swelling headiness of most, and I found this cos I nailed it toot-sweet. What I did find however was that the aromoa was gone after about two or three minutes. Saying this though, the palate of toffeed raisens and dark chocolate hung around to the sweet-bitter end.

All in all, a great entry to the market and a stout you'll see in the cooler months down at Albert St I would suggest.

Drink with shephards pie
5.1%v/v www.4pinesbeer.com.au

Season of Stout - Monteiths Black Beer, NZ

So, we find ourselves yet again in the middle of a long cold winter. And in this winter I have had two constents; Masterchef on Network 10 and Monteiths Black Beer; my daughter calls it the Masterchef beer - bless!

Now this is my first 'Season of Stout' post this winter, and I don't quite think it is a stout, but it's black. So the reason for it taking this long is simply I have not been drinking anything else; quite easy the pick of winter.

It reads on the back label that the good boys from the West Coast (NZ, not the Perth boys) use five premium malts. I'm not all over brewing, but that sounds like a lot to me. What would I know it turns out a friend recently told me; what would I know indeed. What i do n]know however, is that this beer is jam packed with gorgeous chocolate and coffee aroma's with more of this in the palte along with burnt toffee and licorice make this beer a fair dinkum cracker! Too easy!

Drink now
Drink with roast beef leftovers or freshly shucked oysters - now thats a Susan if there ever was one!
About $18 a six-pack 5.2%v/v

Santa Marta Salusrti Tuscany Montecucco Sangiovese 2004 DOC and my Prickly Moses Beef and Potato Pie's

Vineyards of Santa Marta

There is not more important factor than the weather when it comes to producing great wine. The wine maker can be as famous as they want to be, but if they do not get a decent growing season, you can kiss goodbye all those glowing reviews they had been counting on. The final month is probably the most fraught with stress to the wine maker; when is the right time to pick? Can I leave the fruit out for just one more week? Will that rain band alter its course and miss my fruit?

Just one hot day at the end of the growing season can push the potential alcohol up in fruit by up to 2% which can effectively change the style of wine that was intended to be made. In Tuscany in 2003, the vintage after the hottest on record of 2002, growers were faced with this dilemma in late September with their Sangiovese. Ultra dry and hot weather hit the area in the last week of September and pretty much wiped out the fruit for that year to a lot of growers. So in 2004, growers were so vigilant in this period that they had picking crews on standby if the celsius got over 28°. With added bunch and shoot thinning in this season, 2004 eventuated as the most stressful for some years in Tuscany, but the stress paid off with many saying the 2004 vintage as the best since the great vintage of 1997.

One of the great wines to come out of this vintage is the Santa Marta Salusrti Montecucco Sangiovese 2004 DOC. Yet another gem purchased from Mediterranean Wholesalers in Brunswick, this wine shows all the hallmarks of coming from a superior year, with just a touch of ripeness telling me that they got the fruit of just in time I’d say. This wine however was not an impulse purchase; I needed something that had great acid structure with fine and tart fruit layers in it for my stout chuck steak and potato pie.


Like most meals I prepare, plenty of time is needed as the chuck steak needs about three and half hours to braise with the spuds. So here is how you do it:
· 500 grams of good stewing beef
· Good oil
· 750mL of stout, Prickly Moses for this one
· Water
· Three Desiree potatoes, peeled and diced
· Two cloves of garlic, crushed
· Three shallots, cut fine
· Puff pastry, baked in oven


As I said, the meat needs to be braised for about three and a half hours, so brown the beef in a pot and add stout and water and bring to boil. The mix will head up quite a bit so keep an eye on it. Once it has boiled, bring to simmer and add the remaining ingredients and stir every 15 minutes. Once you have the braise, spoon in to bowls and cover with the pastry. Bake to a desired puffiness.

Imogen in Action.... literally

A good fun thing to do with the kids is to cut out the starting letter of their names in pastry and put it on top of the layer of pastry. This is an easy way to get your children to eat their meal because they have some sort of ownership in the making of it, that’s what happened with Imogen anyway.
Now the wine. Very Sangiovese in the glass, with a clear translucency about it with a ruby red/pinkish hue. The nose is all prickly fir and morello cherry with a little hint of prunes. Very savoury acid in the mouth that builds to red fruit right at the end. This wine also had about 30 minutes in the decanter before dinner.

Like I said, you get a good growing season you get good fruit and in the end good fruit equals good wine, and this Sangiovese is great and a definite Susan with my pie’s.

Drink till 2025
Drink with my stout beef pie
92
Quality cork 13.5%v/v $30 at Mediterranean Wholesalers, Brunswick

Season of Stout - Mountain Goat 'Surefoot' Stout

This is a man’s stout baby. Or if you are a woman, knock yourself out too. This is just a brilliant drop.

Definitely one of the leaders of the pack when it comes to independent brewers, Mountain Goat literally started in a back yard back in the grungy early 90’s to now being available all over Oz, and winning heaps of gongs along the way.

The ‘Surefoot’ stout is an ideal winter stout, be it cold or room temperature (the Goat men recommend at about 8°C). In the glass the stout is a very black black, if there can be a black like that, with a smooth caramel head. The nose gives off a crisp coffee caramel whiff with a more toffee whiff when a bit warmer. The mouth is layered with more coffee and toffee, bitter chocolate and liquorice, with the liquorice really coming out as it warms up. Super stuff this one, no doubt about it!!

I would without doubt recommend heading to the ‘Goat Bar’ on a Friday evening or a tour of the brewery on a Wednesday night (bookings required with groups +4). Ya gotta love The Goat.

Drink now
Drink with Beef and Guinness pie - a good one can be found at 'The Spencer Hotel' on Spencer Street, West Melbourne

about $20 a six pack 5% a/v

Mountain Goar Brewery, Corner North and Clark Streets Richmond

http://goatbeer.com.au/

Season of Stout - Grand Ridge 'Hatlifter' Stout Gippsland

It still cold and rainy here in Brunswick, so it is time for another stout.

Grand Ridge ‘Hatlifter’ Stout from Mirboo North, that’s right, Mirboo North – so fun to say isn’t it, in Gippsland is one of the easiest Stouts to drink I would have to say.

Grand Ridge has been around since the late 80’s when Aussie Rules was played by men, ‘greed was good’ and so to was Bryan Adams. Re-branded after a failed brewery vacated the premises, Grand Ridge has consistently been winning awards on the global stage essentially since the first frothy came off the brewery floor.

One of the great attractions to this brewery in Mirboo North is the bar that hovers above the brewery floor. In a visit to Gippsland last year with my family we happened across the brewery (a scheduled stop actually) for some lunch and a beer or two. Well, Erin had to drive back to the holiday house cos’ at $4 a bottle for Grand Ridge at the bar, this scribe was virtually obliged to taste the entire range – except for the ‘Supershine’ which is about 13% a/v.

Although this blog is on the ‘Hatlifter’, I still think the stout was the best had on the day. Leaving Grand Ridge with us that day was a mixed case of stout, Black and Tan, Yarra Valley Gold and the Brewers Pilsener (six of each).

Anyhoo, the ‘Hatlifter’ stout. In the glass it is a brownie/black colour with a creamy coffee head. On the nose there is chocolate mousse and liquorice. In the mouth it is very smooth, very un-stout like I reckon, more ‘Newcastle Brown’ than stoutish, but stout never-the-less. But right at the end after a while in the glass, the chocolate from the nose comes and pays a visit. Super stuff this one!

Drink with BBQ Buffalo chicken wings

http://www.grand-ridge.com.au/

Season of Stout - Sinha Stout Sri Lanka

This is a fair dinkum stout!!

In the never-ending quest to find out what the best alcoholic beverage the human form can have when they are sick, I wish to formally nominate Sinha stout from Sri Lanka as the beverage to guide us through chills and sniffles.

While in sunny Perth a month ago, I was lured to Beaufort Street in search of some cold and flu tablets, so I thought while I was in the neighbourhood, I would drop in to Baron's and get a something something for my miserable self.

The something something was obviously the Sinha, and at $8 a pop and weighing in at an impressive 8% a/v, I was rationed to just 3 of the buggers.

As I said, this is a fair dinkum stout people. The colour is pitch black with a coffee ice-cream head. The nose and palate both have in common bitter chocolate, toffee and mocha liqueur. This thing is effing massive, but ohh so gorgeous.

I would like to add though, that I did not take the cold and flu tablets while drinking this beaut - I am not as stupid as I look now!

Drink with lamb vindaloo

Season of Stout - 'Prickly Moses' Otway Stout

The very oddly named – and let’s be honest, every new beer or wine has a strange moniker – ‘Prickly Moses’ Otway Stout is pure and simply gorgeous; GORGEOUS!!!!!

Another great find from Blackheart and Sparrows down on Lygon, this stout is cram packed with flavour, and only 5% a/v, which compared to a few stouts I’ve had lately is very low.

This sexy stuff is chock-a-block full of coffee mocha and toffee flavours which go on and on. Made in the Macedon Ranges out at Barongarook, which is where my vineyard will be (that or a bistro – I’m taking bets for which one), the brewers use rain water from Cape Otway for a natural clean feel.

You will be stretched to get a better stout out there, and at $18 a six pack, this is great value. Fair dinkum! Drink with oysters natural or classic beef lasagne.

Stout Season - 3 Ravens Black Real Live Ale

Beer is yum; der!!

It is hard not to go past a beer when you don’t know whether you want a Pinot Noir or Viognier or whatever. So being winter and all, the beer to be drinking is stout, the lovely dark warm ale. What I have been doing lately is finding myself trying heaps of the stuff, so, like the soup season, I’m going to do a stout season too.

Now we all know that food and wine go hand in hand, but what about beer, or more importantly, stout? There is one match that I think is one of the best ever, be it wine or beer, and that’s stout and Christmas Pud.

‘... that’s crazy man’ I hear you say, but hey, it works and it really is mucho fantastico. But it’s not Xmas so I reckon you can’t go past beef with black bean sauce, or number 73 from your local Chinese takeaway.

Today’s stout is 3 Ravens from Thornbury in Victoria, just one suburb over that way (I’m pointing east). A lovely chocolaty coffeeie black stout that really does drink easy NB a six pack between two people is not enough!! There is not much else to say but go and get some, its YUM!!