The Beer Diary Podcast

Enjoying good beer, talking about its various happenings and history.

2017 Unexpected Christmas Special 01/07/2018

2017 Unexpected Christmas Special On the 14th anniversary of the first entry in the original Beer Diary, George and I present a "holiday special" of sorts — a look back on what's changed, and what hasn't, since we last talked and since we first talked. We cover a little of the long arc of news, entry and exit from the subculture of beer (or anything else), the ageing of beer and of ourselves, and keeping things in balance in a peculiar world. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/6122996

s05e02: Dave Wood and Denise Garland 04/26/2016

s05e02: Dave Wood and Denise Garland This conversation was recorded on 17 September 2015 and is one /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/4321230

s05e05: Crowd, Fun, Ding 03/28/2016

s05e05: Crowd, Fun, Ding Damn these recurrent hiatuses. It happened again, as these things do. But we're back this week — rather fittingly, after the long weekend — with a little look at crowdfunding in the beer business, some reminiscences over my marvellous trip to the Mussel Inn, and looking forward to the Great Kiwi Beer Festival this very weekend, at which I'll be doing one of my little rambles. All that by way of bicycle bells and videogames, and accompanied by two rather strikingly different Beers Of The Week. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/4254353

s04e06: Live from Beervana 2014 ― part 2 08/13/2015

s04e06: Live from Beervana 2014 ― part 2 Recorded at Beervana 2014 and lost for a year on account of technical difficulties, this was our second "live" session, from the Saturday night. This time, we were joined by blogger and podcaster Luke Robertson (an ex-pat New Zealander living in Melbourne) and Denise Ratfield from the Pink Boots Society and Stone Brewery. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/3733171

s04e05: Live from Beervana 2014 ― part 1 08/13/2015

s04e05: Live from Beervana 2014 ― part 1 Recorded last year in the seminar room at Beervana 2014, and waylaid since on account of technical difficulties. We were joined by Australian beer writer and founder of BrewsNews.com.au, Matt Kirkegaard, and Sean Burke of the Commons Brewery in Portland. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/3733153

s05e01: Garage Project, GABS, and Gastrophysics 08/01/2015

s05e01: Garage Project, GABS, and Gastrophysics And so the is back for a fifth season, and with our traditional delay in hitting 'publish', no less. Episodes should return to their usual non-super-sized format and a sharper turnaround in this back half of the year — but you all know what kind of paving projects are undertaken with good intentions. Here, we accidentally settle on a G-theme: we catch up about the end of my tenure at Garage Project, including some thoughts on how they make their interesting beers; the debut of GABS — Sydney Edition, which also makes us ponder trans-Tasman beer availability; and read a neat little piece in the Guardian on Gastrophysics which sets us wondering about experiments that really should be done at the beer awards. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/3709547

s04e08: 2014 Year in Review 05/08/2015

s04e08: 2014 Year in Review Back at last for a traditionally-belated — but moreso, at no extra charge! — 'Year in Review' episode, George and I called in a few guests to help ponder what 2014 meant to us in beer, since we were both extra-busy in everything else. Now-recidivist Friends Of The Show Jono and Hadyn graciously took up the challenge and joined us in searching their memories for the year's highlights, disasters, themes and oddities — and they also threw in bonus musings on professional wrestling and the sociology of Palmerston North. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/3543680

s04e04: Women & Beer — part 2 09/14/2014

s04e04: Women & Beer — part 2 Following straight on — after a quick re-play of the introduction, thanks to some clever editing by George — from last weekend's episode, we're delighted to present the second half of our Very Special podcast takeover on Women & Beer, by women, drinking beer. Megan, Beth, Hayley and Steph continue their conversation, covering topics as diverse as canned beer, food matching, 'extreme' beers, festivals, labeling and tastings — as well as discussing the potential need for (and nuances of) dedicated women's groups in the community, and the role of (and need for) overt feminism in the beer business. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/3064288

s04e03: Women & Beer — part 1 09/07/2014

s04e03: Women & Beer — part 1 For a Very Special episode, George and I relinquish the microphone entirely to four of our friends. We'd wanted to dedicate an episode entirely to 'Women & Beer' for some time and eventually realised that we were sufficiently blessed for potential guests — and also sufficiently lacking in personal experience, for obvious reasons — that a takeover episode made all kinds of sense. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/3052346

s04e02: Dry July 08/16/2014

s04e02: Dry July An episode with no beer. Well, none were consumed — out of a vague nod to Dry July, but more a result of us both being in losing phases of the age-old battle of Monkey v Microbe. We ponder Dry July, as a charitable enterprise (we're unconvinced) and (much better) a way for people to test and/or manage their relationship with one of humanity's favourite drugs. We drink some worthwhile non-beers, and I have a little ramble on the social history of tea and coffee and whatnot. And an episode this time of year wouldn't be complete without a looking-forward toward the beer awards and Beervana. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/3015135

s04e01: Friend Of The Show 07/26/2014

s04e01: Friend Of The Show Back at last for a fourth season — which promises to include several Very Special Epsiodes, but more on those in due course — George and I quickly re-tell our Origin Story for new listeners, return briefly to the topic of our first-ever show (so-called "grey market" imports), before catching up on the beer festivals that happened while we were on hiatus. I also rave about keeping a Beer Diary (since it turns out I've been doing so for a decade), and we finally formalise what it means to be a 'Friend Of The Show'. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2971196

s03e09: 2013 Year in Review 04/18/2014

s03e09: 2013 Year in Review It's time again, at last, for our Year in Review: a look back at 2013, a pondering of its best beers and beer-related-things, and contemplation of what kind of 'theme' the year developed as it went. Our traditionally unhurried approach to these things (we've recorded all these episodes in March) met a few additional delays this year, but here we are. Plans are already underway for some Very Special Episodes in season four, but first let's wrap up our third year — and thank you all for coming along for the rambles. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2789288

s03e08: What We Did On Our Holidays 02/04/2014

s03e08: What We Did On Our Holidays For our first recording of 2014 and the penultimate episode of Season 3, George and I sat down for a post-holiday catch up over two beers he'd brought back from his travels and one we'd been meaning to share for a while. Somehow, we also talked about Canada a lot. We offer our traditional recommendations and observations — and also take the chance to make a more-explicit-than-usual call for listener feedback (and suggestions for Year In Review gong-winners), backed-up by a sincere offer of a bribe in beer form... /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2662883

s03e07 Bonus: Moa 01/20/2014

s03e07 Bonus: Moa B.O.T.W. #4 in s03e07 (with Jono Galuszka) was a (non-boycott-breaking) Moa Sour Blanc. It prompted a predictable little side-ramble into their current situation. We've excised it from the main episode and present it here as a DVD Extra / after-credits scene. I allude a few times to a work-in-progress catch-up with post-IPO Moa, and I'll try to get that done a.s.a.p.. (Meanwhile, I still really miss the .) /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2639573

s03e07: Jono Galuszka 01/20/2014

s03e07: Jono Galuszka Just before the holidays — so apologies for the delay but, you know, holidays — George and I sat down for a ramble with Jono Galuszka, journalist, beer-and-music nerd, former bartender and barista, and occasional drummer. We discuss the many and varied joys of homebrewing, the at-last semi-reliable appearances of good beer in unexpected places, and (inevitably) a bunch of music. We had a venue change for this episode, so the background dog-shuffles have been replaced with regular overhead airplanes. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2639543

s03e06: Stu McKinlay, Yeastie Boy 11/21/2013

s03e06: Stu McKinlay, Yeastie Boy George and I recently had the pleasure of sitting down — for a record number of Beers Of The Week, amidst all the banter — with Stu McKinlay, notorious pants-wearer, and one half (give or take) of the Yeastie Boys. We crash-tested whether fresh is best, sampled some ill-fated beers from the Great Drought era, and heard the origin story for several individual beers and for the unique operation itself — before turning to industry-wide issues like collegiality in the beer business and the culture of consuming alcohol. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2560736

s03e05: Licensing laws and Beervana afterthoughts 10/22/2013

s03e05: Licensing laws and Beervana afterthoughts Requiring more We Do Not Here Represent Our Day Jobs than usual, George and I recently had a little ramble about a few potentially-controversial topics in the Beer Business: the ongoing shitfight-with-a-side-order-of-handwringing that is the Licensing Laws Debate, and the continuing evolution of the nation's most-senior beer festival, Beervana. My apologies — again!; you are an understanding lot — for the delay in posting, though there is something appropriate about getting my Afterthoughts out on the eve of the next (much littler) festival. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2518730

s03e04: The (Postponed) pre-Beervana Hostful 09/11/2013

s03e04: The (Postponed) pre-Beervana Hostful And we're back. Though we're not quite as back as we intended. This happens to us, sometimes. George has been abnormally busy, post-holiday — though often with new-puppy-related duties about which he's not remotely about to complain — and I was diverted, in the actual around-Beervana-itself days, by ingloriously falling off my bike. But at last, we're back. Much (though by no means all) of the conversation was looking-ahead to events now past, but we're presenting them here mostly unvarnished and uncorrected so you can test how prescient and/or very-very-wrong we were. More generally, we ponder beer in cans (and drink one) and the burgeoning (but still finding-its-feet) world of the beer documentary. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2467805

s03e03: Beer Names (and Festivals, again) with Hadyn Green 07/11/2013

s03e03: Beer Names (and Festivals, again) with Hadyn Green Catching up for the first time in a while, and not long after a now-notorious kerfuffle over the 'Death From Above' beer put out by Garage Project (site of my day job, if you haven't already noticed), my fellow red-bearded beer writer Hadyn Green and I were about to have a ramble about potentially-offensive beer names when George leapt in and suggested / insisted we save it for a podcast episode. And here's the result. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2393009

Beer Diary Podcast s03e02: Baylands Brewery 06/08/2013

Beer Diary Podcast s03e02: Baylands Brewery George and I ventured out to the wilds of Newlands (which isn't very far at all, to be fair), and sat down with Aidan and Nikki of the freshly-launched Baylands Brewery, a fully-fledged commerical brewery on a tiny-tiny scale in their garage. We talk about the process of turning a hobby into a business, how it all nearly fell apart, and taste a couple of their beers — before moving on to the traditional round-up of news and recommendations. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2351542

s03e01: A Very Good Friday 04/02/2013

s03e01: A Very Good Friday Back with unusual promptness — which is hopefully a good omen — George and I sat down on Friday for a few beers and a somewhat-supersized season opener for another round of the podcast. We try a couple of new-ish releases, and one bottle that'd been sitting around waiting for the right occasion. And, unusually, one of our Beers of the Week turns out to be something of a dud, or at least a disappointment. Conversation turns variously to good and bad advice on glassware and temperature, the wealth of new developments in the local scene, and (inevitably, it seems) the origin-fudging that I complained about . /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2272732

s02e09: 2012 Year in Review 03/11/2013

s02e09: 2012 Year in Review Determined to start a 'Year in Review' tradition, we ponder the year from our beery perspective. I give my recommendations for blog and website of the year, and George and I ponder our Beers of the Year -- and our particular Glasses of Beer of the Year. We also, without looking at year others' notes, have a stab at summing up 2012 as 'Year of the x' and wind up landing on rather-similar themes. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2246087

s02e08: Emerson's acquired by Lion 02/27/2013

s02e08: Emerson's acquired by Lion Catching up and determined to get back to the regular casting of pod, George and I sat down and — rather accidentally — wound up talking about the recent and surprising news of the sale of local darlings Emerson's — the craft beer gateway for both of us — to Lion; we happened not to've spoken to each other about it before hitting 'record'. Surprisingly, I found myself in the middle of the "debate", such as their was, and a little put out by nonsense on each side. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2232657

s02e07: Wellington in a Pint & Beervana 02/27/2013

s02e07: Wellington in a Pint & Beervana Debreifing after another -- of many -- busy periods in the local beer business, George and I sit down to drink, and talk about, the "Wellington in a Pint" series before also turning our attention to Beervana. We ponder the upsides and niggling downsides of both, while working our way through an incredibly-varied four-pack of beers. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2232651

s02e06: Craft Beer College 02/11/2013

s02e06: Craft Beer College We sit down with Steph and Jonny of Craft Beer College, a newly(ish)-formed outfit who run educational beer tastings. We talk beer-enthusiast origin stories, the joys of volunteering at beer festivals, and consumer education. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2214619

s02e05: West Coast IPA Challenge and Matariki 02/11/2013

s02e05: West Coast IPA Challenge and Matariki An experimental broadcast 'from the field', with reportage from Malthouse's fifth-annual West Coast IPA Challenge and from SOBA's Matariki / Winter Ales Festival. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2214610

s02e04: Recap and reintroduction 08/13/2012

s02e04: Recap and reintroduction There was a flurry of New Day Job productivity here, but the ramp-up to Beervana evidently derailed that somewhat. It's an awesome time of year to be a beer geek, and I've got a brilliantly-enjoyable new gig in the beer business, but my best writing hours have always been from midnight to four — it's probably genetic, for all I know — and I just haven't found the time. That should begin to swing back, on the far side of this weekend. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/2034432

s02e03: Jo Wood & Mike Nielsen 06/13/2012

s02e03: Jo Wood & Mike Nielsen George and I ventued into the (not really) wilds of Upper Hutt to have a chat with Jo Wood (of Liberty Brewing) and Mike Nielsen (of Tuatara); two homebrewers turned professional brewers (in very different capacities) who still love to get together on a weekend and knock up a random batch of something. We talk about how they got in to brewing, how they 'monetised' it for themselves, their favourites and the recurring pains in their respective asses. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/1975889

s02e02: Australia 06/03/2012

s02e02: Australia This one got a little lost in the post-post-production pipe (i.e., it was my fault, not George's), but here we are back for episode 2. In which I ramble about Australia, since I'd recently been there and was soon going back (for beery and non-beery reasons), we celebrate the return of fresh-hop beers, celebrate new employment opportunities (both mine and someone else's), offer a few recommendations -- and a word of warning. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/1965775

s02e01: Collaboration 05/10/2012

s02e01: Collaboration Back for a second 'season' -- are more-or-less arbitrary division, but we watch a fair amount of (good) TV and can't help but think of things like that -- George and I sat down a little while ago to talk about collaboration in craft beer. /episode/index/show/beerdiary/id/1941137

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