Beer, Food & Liquor Reviews
We arrived from Ithaka, Ulysses' capital, in
Otranto, Italy. The closest tavern/café
we have is the Quarta Caffe, or the Dolfino, depending on when you knew the
place. It is a simple tavern with beer,
coffee, wine etc. Surprise surprise – he
has Tennents on tap! Nice after an overnighter in less than ideal weather. He also
has bottle beers and I had a Dreher (previously reviewed in these august
pages). A 660cl bottle goes for
…….€2.50! I asked him about
wiffy. He didn’t have wiffy in his bar. He put his hand over his heart to say “sorry”
but he couldn’t afford it in his small café/tavern. At €2.5 for a 660cl bottle of Dreher (a fine
lager for sure) I couldn’t disagree with him and said there was no need to
apologise, I would sit outside and drink my Dreher/Tennents and eat the
complimentary olives and snacks while watching the sun go down over the
Aragonese Castle. As castles go, I am a
great fan of the Aragonese variety, with their fake “come in this way, it’s
easy” points. I commented on this in
Malta and also in Kos. There’s nothing
quite like getting your enemy to march a bucketload of guys under fire down a slowly
declining plane to find out it’s a dead end!
The sheer delight on the face of the Siege Master when it all came off
must have been something to see.
G Marabrea e Figli
Blond and Strong. An old Italian brewery of
considerable class and style. This is
good stuff. I've run into it several times since then and it doesn't disappoint, excepting that the Rosso isn't much to write home about.
La Quaffe
http://www.achouffe.be/en
Brasserie d’Achouffe, Belgium. A nice light Belgian, no extra-this or
extra-that. Just good beer. Hasn’t been around long. Go to the Website, visit the "Valley of the Fairies" and play the song!
Tonnaro – red and blond. Local brewery, on tap in a busy pizza bar in
Otranto. Pizzas were exceptional and
this beer was a good local also. So small it doesn't have a web presence and the labels seem to be stuck on with Clag.
Mastri Birrai Umbri. 5.9% Blond.
750ml wire top bottle
Artisan beer from a family who have had 7
generations producing fine Umbrian products.
Sour, fizzy. Very nice, with
strong hops flavour.
Tuborg Green.
Have no idea what the Green refers to. Perhaps a little less intense than normal
Tuborg. I prefer the Tuborg Gold you get
in Turkey but this is OK.
Grimbergen
Angelo Poretti
Another fine Italian product. Pick it up if it's what's on offer in the pub. Certainly acceptable.
Another fine Italian product. Pick it up if it's what's on offer in the pub. Certainly acceptable.
Moretti “Baffo d’Oro”
A special Moretti. Despite Heineken, whom I despise, owning this
brand now, this is a good drop, in contrast with their ordinary Moretti.
Prato Rosso
http://www.pratorosso.com/
Great website - you need to look at the opening scenes.
Great beer too. Getting quite fond of red beer now.
&
Birra Bionda
Artisan beer. A bit sharpish, like a wheat beer which I
suppose it could nearly be. Double
malted, 6.6%&
Chiara Cruda
https://untappd.com/w/birra-artigianale-khamen/25021
iCavalieri
https://pirkanbeerlog.wordpress.com/category/italy/
Another Umbrian, again double malted and
7.5% ABV. Not nice. 750ml wire-topped bottle - I could only
drink a glass and a half. Very strong
grassy taste, sour and hits you fairly strongly on the alcohol level. Threw it out.
ps – went back to the supermarket to discover that all the bottles had been removed from the shelf and the ticket was gone also. The whole batch was off so maybe the beer is better than I thought but the production is questionable.
ps – went back to the supermarket to discover that all the bottles had been removed from the shelf and the ticket was gone also. The whole batch was off so maybe the beer is better than I thought but the production is questionable.
Brewed in Greece. Brewed to a price but OK for that. No particular taste other than some fizz and
it’s wet. I do take issue with the company promotion that attempts to suggest this beer has a long and storied history - it doesn't. If you read carefully, it was created in 2010, despite references in the narrative to The German Purity Act of 1790-something to make it sound older.
I also take issue with the claim that it is made with water from Mt Parnassus - it's made in Atalanta, near Piraeus, where we have spent quite some time and like it for its modern industrial vigour, and it sure is not the home of the Gods, Parnassus is. (Parnassus is about 100 miles west - you think they truck water 100 miles??)
Not that I am against new beers, unless they are IPAs, because in Australia we once had only Coopers making good beer and all the great additions to the menu are very recent.
Red Erik
http://www.royalunibrew.com/Default.aspx?ID=467&PageNum=5
Eichbaum 4.8% Pilsener.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eichbaum
Fairly sour, sharp beer. Nice but you can’t drink it quickly. Known locally in its home town of
Mannheim as "Corpse Water", because the brewery is located alongside the cemetery. Nice, eh?
2nd large can (poured into a
glass, naturally) on 18th Nov. was just as good. Moving up in my list of go-to’s
Warsteiner.
http://www.warsteiner.com/#/uk/
I’m sure I’ve had this before but I can’t
find it in the records. Another
supermarket special but the brewery has been around since 1753. Drinkable on a warm day at a BBQ and pleasant
enough. 4.8%. Only criticism is that
it’s a bit on the bland side, but it’s not at all sweet, which is good, and not
too sharp. Available in several bars here in Licata.
Side Note.
We went to Agrigento for 4
days and while there took a bus down to Porto Empedocle, the port for
Agrigento. We went to see where Andrea
Camilleri was born but we were told “a Campagno” so without a car, no go. However, there is 1. A statue of him in town
and 2. A statue of Montalbano (not of Luca Zingarelli, who plays him in the TV
series.) They were setting up for a beer
festival in the square alongside the church.
In this beer festival, you could buy 5 (Five) different Hacker-Pschorrs,
Paulaner, Becks, Stella Artois, Nastro Azzura and something called DAM which I
couldn’t determine. If you’re going to
have a beer night, might as well have 3 of the best Germans, one of the best
Belgian lagers and a top Italian also.
Trouble was, it began at 9pm and the last bus back to Agrigento was at 7pm
One of the world's great breweries, from Munich
Peroni Rosso
A rich red from one of my favourite breweries.
Had a couple with dinner in a restaurant called "Opera", overlooking the Valley d'Templi
McFarland Red
Had this in an Indian restaurant in Catania, Sicily. Weird combination - Irish beer in an Indian restaurant serving Indonesian Samosas in Italy. Oh well, that's the modern world.
Made by Murphys Brewery. Very nice indeed. 2.5 Euros for a 500ml bottle.
Norbertus Heller Bock
Now we are getting to the top end of the beer world. I had this in bottles in Syracusa a year or so ago and liked it very much indeed then. This time, we were walking back from the Vatican to our apartment in Rome and it began to rain. We ducked into a nice modern suburban bar/café for a spell and this was on tap (La Spina in Italy). Amazing - one of the worlds great beers over the counter and 3 euros for a 600ml glass. Had to have a couple.
Home in Oz again.
Coopers to the left of me, Coopers to the right. Coopers everywhere. Wonderful way to be. Good to see some great new additions also.
Began to question my judgement on the way back so I went and bought a six-pack of VB and a sixer of Nastro Azzurro. Had Carol pour them into identical glasses, remove the bottles and the caps and give me a taste test. Sure enough, the VB was instantly identifiable as pure crap. I managed to palm off the rest of the pack to my nephew. Drank the Nastro.
Have tried a couple of Squires' offerings and liked them - despite being owned by a major brewery, they seem to have been left alone to do their own thing. Had lots of Coopers.
I was also introduced to Nail Brewery's Pale Ale - very nice indeed.
Currently drinking Lowenbrau, which I managed to score at BWS for $36 a carton, which is getting down to a very reasonable price.
There really is no reason to drink the rubbish put out by the likes of VB, XXXX etc when there are so many better offerings out there.
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