Stone & Wood, Beers of the Earth report 2:
Tried the German hefeweizen, Czech pilsener and American IPA recently.
German hefeweizen, a good rendition of a Germanic wheat beer style, had the requisite clove lingering in the aftertaste (from Wikipedia, "
Weizenbier or Hefeweizen, in the southern parts of Bavaria usually called Weißbier (literally "white beer",.....is a Bavarian beer in which a significant proportion of malted barley is replaced with malted wheat. By German law, weißbiers brewed in Germany must be top-fermented. Specialised strains of yeast are used which produce overtones of banana and clove as by-products of fermentation.") One of the better Australian wheat beers I've come across.
Czech pilsner, nice and clean but not quite as crisp as the real thing. Those of us from the Sydney Brigade of G&GR who have pre-match beers at The Local Taphouse are familiar with Czech and German pilsners as they've had Budvar and Trumer Pils on tap for years. An acceptable Australian copy.
These two and the London porter are delicious beers, but I'd term them almost very, very good. I gather S&W knocked this lot out as a seasonal or special offering, maybe if they were a standard line they'd improve them that little bit, the porter with a touch more burnt coffee, the wheat beer a bit more clove and the pilsner a tad crisper.
American IPA, definitely not an "almost" beer, in fact quite the opposite, it was over the top. I downed this on my own one evening, and was a bit worse for wear next morning. An inspection of the bottle showed why: 7.2% alc/vol! HUGE residual hop bitterness to go with that big, chewy sweetness common to high alcohol beers. Not one for the faint-hearted.