New Zealand's South Island

[benny]

Just came back from a 3 week holiday to New Zulland.

In that time I visited the Speights and Monteiths Brewerys, as well as the Green Man, Emmerson, Wanaka Beerworks, MOA, Brew Moon and Renaissance Microbreweries.

For a beer to go with a hearty red meat meal, Speights Distinction got the nod for me.

The most solid beer to finish a night on I found was the Green Man Celt.

The best sessionable beers were the Speights Gold Medal Ale and Monteiths Original. There were better, more easy drinking beers I came across, but they aren't as affordable and readily available like these 2 "mainstream" beers.

As I think I've mentioned earlier in this thread, Emerson Pilsner is by far and away the dominant beer IMO from NZ. When I went to the brewery, I was fortunate enough to have a sample of their Summer Release, the Extra Pils, which weighed in at 6.2%. And fark me, that shit must have been filtered through the vagina of an angel. Amazing stuff. They don't put a foot wrong with any of their beers, really.

Wanaka made a Pilsner called the Brewski. Their Stout (Tall Black) goes alright and their Gold Ale (Cardrona Gold) tasted like farts.

The best thing about MOA was their lack of security in their bar, the chick serving drinks was also the secretary, so I had no problems taking a couple of the "BAR MOA" branded pilsner glasses home with me rather than paying $10 in the Gift shop for the exact same glasses. The beer itself was nothing too flash.

Renaissance was quite disappointing. They had 5 beers on tap. A Pale Ale, American Pale Ale, Red Ale, Stout and an India Pale Ale. They said they were making Ales only as around 90% of beer sold are lagers(their claims, not my research). With the exception of the IPA, which was only a new edition after one of their mates came from Europe to make beer with them, they tasted alright but didn't have any of the heavy characteristics that jump out and grab you when you are drinking Ales. Put simply, they took a soft option I reckon.

Brew Moon were initially left out of this post and are only appearing in the edit, which I guess reflects how non-memorable their beers were... Though their IPA was pretty good.

I also boofed shitloads of wine (MOA and Renaissance are right in the guts of the Marlborough wine region), but any further discussion on the matter has no place in this thread. Same goes for my trip to the Prenzel Distillery.

Current scoreline between NZ's South Island and Tasmania:
Breweries 13
Distilleries 3
Cadbury Factories 0
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