I love a tasty local! It’s been a long, hot summer here in Ballarat. It’s 8pm and the sun has gone down. It still and quiet and my toil is done for the day. This Cold IPA from Hepburn Springs Brewing Co. is hitting the spot perfectly. It’s a really nice balance of
Calvados is one of my favourite tipples. It is literally liquid apple distilled into a glass. All the most delicious flavours of apples in sippable form. And it transports me instantly to the wonderful year I spent in Dinan, Brittany just after I finished uni. Yec’hed mat! (That’s ‘cheers’ in Breton.)
A good sour should still taste like beer. This barrel-aged cherry sour from Ballarat brewer, Dollar Bill, is excellent. It has a real depth of flavour, a clean finish and an all-round well-balanced flavour profile. On tap at the moment at Midtown Cellars.
A list of tiny pleasures all rolled into one afternoon: sunshine, friends, gin, interesting work chat, native botanicals, sitting on the platform of the old goods shed (which is now Itinerant Spirits, who make excellent drinks, served with a smile). It all feels a bit like summer.
The beans are piled high behind me in the Ratio roastery, exuding a most delicious aroma. On the table in front there was a moment ago a perfect brownie and a dark, dark hot chocolate. They have been slowly savoured and now all that remain are brown crumbs, like soil from a table
The second coffee of the day always feels like a treat. The first is a necessity, but number two comes mid-morning with a little pause in the day’s activities.
It was so nice to have hours and hours of sunshine today. Spring is finally warming up and the garden is beckoning me out to pull acres of weeds. I was rewarded with a refreshing Argentinian beer after my labours, in the warmth of the late afternoon sun.
I did a wine course earlier this year. There were a lot of wines to taste and an enormous amount of information to learn about wine all over the world. The good news is I passed! I now have my little green badge and certificate from the Wine and Spirit Education Trust in
It feels quintessentially Brunswick to be sitting in a bar on Sydney Road, listening to afternoon ultra-groove and surrounded by 1970s decor. Trams are running past the window with their familiar metallic swoosh, jostling with the peak hour traffic.
It somehow feels luxurious to open a bottle of bubbles by yourself on a Friday night. No-one else home, nothing to celebrate, but the bubbles in the glass give the evening an air of lightness and seem a portent of a good weekend to come.
