Geoff: “This is bloody nice. Not only coming in a medicine bottle, but tasting of medicine (in a good way). Astringent bitterness.” Oliver: “A pretty nice beer. Rich and tasty.” Guest Reviewer Gav: “St Peter’s beer … Hmmmm, ungodly beer. Lighter than it looks.”

Allegedly “the famous beer of Mauritius”. It’s imported to Australia, according to the label, by a firm in South “Fermentle”. We weren’t sure whether this was some sort of brewing joke, or just a mistake. We suspect the latter. The beer itself was the former. GR: “Weak as piss.” MD: “It smells terrible. That’s awful.” Lisa: “Oh, no! I’ll stick to my Moo Brew. It’s totally one-dimensional.” Floss: “It just looks awful.” Geoff: “It tastes like an Indian beer.” Geoff thought the representation of the phoenix on the label was more like a “satanic zombie turkey famous for being shite”. Oliver: “Not a pleasant beer. How have these guys been brewing since 1963? Practice does not make perfect.”

Guest Reviewer Floss: “Tastes like a musk stick.” Oliver: “Beautifully balanced and hoppy. Floss summed up the taste well.” Geoff: “Nothing to add.”

A great-looking beer, golden and cloudy, and tasty too. Guest Reviewer Gav: “My taste might be changing. I quite enjoy this,” he said, after earlier saying he didn’t like wheat beer. A superior beer to the Burleigh HEF tasted earlier, which was too sweet.

Guest Reviewer Gav: “This beer has a sunny disposition." Geoff: “A ripper of a beer.” Oliver: “A pretty easy-drinking, tasty ale.”

“A nice, foamy head.” Geoff: “F---ing brilliant beer.” Oliver: “’Fucking brilliant’ might be a bit of an overstatement.” Guest Reviewer Gav: “It’s pale and it’s beautiful.” Was Gav’s favourite to that point and possibly for the day. Geoff: “Good combination: Sweet, florally hops and those that are bitter. Oliver: “A nice American pale ale with good US hops coming through on the finish.”

A black beer. GR: You won’t find this beer in Tennessee.” As with the Red Ale, this has large clumps of yeast in it. Oliver: “An average stout, but as it’s warmed up it has got more flavoursome. GR: “As light as it is dark.”

A beautiful red colour. Unless Geoff pours a huge clump of yeast into your glass, as happened to Oliver. A tasty beer. GR: “That’s frisky.” Oliver: There’s a bit of astringency, which detracts from an otherwise very pleasant beer.”

Guest Reviewer Gav: “4.1%: That does’t auger well. It’s better than that though. Don’t trust first impressions.” A nice, light, refreshing beer. We agreed that it didn’t have any negatives but it also didn’t have any positives.

The label says: “This is the 2010 vintage release imperial stout. John Kelly’s art on the front. Bullshit on the back. Beer in the middle. To explain it any more than that would most likely just reaffirm your notion that all this is just pap from some pseudo-intellectual wanker.”

Bottle no.660 of 2500 ($25). Smells similar to the Innis & Gunn. Like it’s been aged in oak barrels.
Geoff's wife, Lisa: "Very chocolately."
Full of spirit. A crackin’ beer. Roasty goodness.
Geoff: "Like one bourbon, one whiskey, one beer, all in one taste."
Not a sessional beverage. A very complex beer. Not as tasty as last year, but also not as carbonated.

It’s a stout from Manly.
Marcelle: "Does that make it a manly stout?"
Oliver: "It’s a fine beer – not exceptional, but run-of-the-mill. No reason not to recommend it, but no reason to recommend it. If a choice had to be made between this and Coopers Stout, I’d go with the Coopers every time."
A safe stout (“is that a stafe?” Well, it is late and this is the 20th beer we’ve tasted today). Neither here, nor there, could be coming or going – could be a matter of induction or conduction, could be a matter of addition or subtraction ...
Marcelle: "It is a matter of you two being knobs."

This is over-rated, and relies too much on the name. It’s a bit spotty schoolboy. Or Scooby Doo – “those damn kids”.
They try to suck you in to buying it year after year. We used to buy slabs of each release, then down to six packs, and now down to one stubby a year (to share). Why are they are brewing this – who are they trying to sell them to?
Oliver: "Just a 'meh' beer."
Geoff: "A beer with a mangina."
We discussed the rating for this for a while and Geoff’s comment convinced
Oliver: "You’d have no hesitation in giving this 1 if it didn’t have the Coopers name on it."

Oliver: "Smells beautiful, but tastes ordinary."
Geoff and Oliver's chick, Marcelle, like the taste.
Geoff: "Falls into the much-maligned category of novelty beers."
Oliver: "I just don’t like it at all."
Geoff: "I like this and the coffee addition tastes much better than if someone just threw a cup of Nescafe into it. I’m intrigued by the grain vs grain battle going on with this brew."
Oliver declines to rate.

Label says it’s a “post-modern classic pale ale”. We say it’s just a delicious pale ale.
Geoff's wife Lisa: "So big and beautiful, would taste delicious with dark chocolate. Where are the VB drinkers – look at all the beautiful beers they are missing out on."
Oliver: "An absolute ripper of a beer. I love this beer. The beer of the weekend so far." (And 28 beers were tasted this weekend.)
Geoff: "I’m not so sure that it is a five, but it does have an amazing profile of flavours."

Pretty easy-drinking, nice, delicious beer, but otherwise unremarkable.

Old school ring-pull has novelty value. Not sure about the nose, but expect that it will taste nice. And it does. Not a proper pilsner – it’s a fabulous beer, but not a pilsner.
Oliver: "A bloody nice beer though! The Nelson Sauvin hops are great."

A pale ale brewed with Galaxy, Amarillo and Super Alpha hops.
Oliver: Not a bad beer. A muted version of an American pale ale, but pretty delicious.
Geoff: "All right, but a little spewy."
Marcelle: "What does 'Great beer is not only determined on where its ingredients come from, but how you enjoy it' mean?" Sounds like someone has translated this from the English to Japanese, then back again, and then into Swahili and back.
Geoff: "That’s also what this beer tastes like. Cannot compare this to the best of American pale ales but, as a beer, it’s pretty good."

Certainly has the raspberry nose - delicious. Lovely dessert beer. A great surprise, given Geoff was expecting something dicey and shithouse. But it’s neither of those things. A big hit with the ladies, who agreed it would taste great with chocolate cake. A little carbonated – a gassy, burpy beer. But that’s the only criticism.

Another organic ale. Strangely reminiscent of the Red Angus – a controversial comment as it is dripping with sarcasm. A side-by-side tasting would show that it is very difficult to tell one from the other. Having had a few sips, they are not that similar apart from the graininess.
Geoff: "A bit muddy."
Oliver: "The more I drink it the less I like it. Something NQR about it. Tastes like a lager."

Very easy drinking, throwing these down is as easy as throwing a hotdog down a hallway… (?!). A great sweetness, not cloying at all. A bit of a honey taste.