A summer fling!
The story so far: three industry veterans go to Vietnam, drink beer, eat amazing food and are inspired to share the fun and simplicity of their newest discovery: bia hoi (fresh beer) and the food that goes with it. Read More >
Bia Hoi (Fresh Beer & Vietnamese Street Food) Brunswick East – Melbourne, Australia
Beer Before Wine is Fine
When I left Australia in 2004, Victoria Bitter (VB) was the most popular beer, and Crown Lager is what we drank when we wished to be posh. Beer drinking was a simple uncomplicated pastime – at the cricket, at the footy, at a BBQ or on the wood, it lubricated conversation in a gathering of men. It created courage, stupidity and humour. It celebrated victories and consoled losses. Read More >
The Cleansing Ale
It might be perplexing to budding wine enthusiasts and no doubt connoisseurs will be aghast at the very notion of enjoying a beer at the end of a wine dinner, however the ‘cleansing ale’ does have its merits. Read More >
Meat, Beer and Tuscan Wine
I wrote this piece for a Singapore magazine although it never made it to print. The editors wanted to change things, even though it covered the brief to the letter, and I refused to change things.
Did I tell you how much I dislike editors! They are an antibiotic for creativity; a writer’s condom and its strictly missionary position only. It’s a strange interpretation of the English language, in Singapore, where newspapers and magazines for the adult audience are written in primary school prose. Read More >
A Proper Job at the Fairyboat Inn – Helford Passage, Cornwall – July 12th
A 7am chug around Falmouth Bay, that is the mouth of the Fal River, checking our lobster pots proved fruitless, although I did catch a Mackerel on the way back.
We set off to Helford Passage for lunch at the Ferryboat Inn, now run by the oyster and seafood specialist, Wright Bros, of Borough Market and their Soho restaurant, which we dined a few weeks back and had a most enjoyable experience. More on that later.
St Antony, Cornwall – 11th July
Having traveled down from Highgate by train to Haslemere in Surrey for a few days to stay with friends, we then drove to their beach house in St Antony, Cornwall, a good 6 hour drive stopping off at their Devon Farm to raid the cellar. He’s a true Wandering palate with a taste for old German Riesling and Southern Rhone reds.
Spitfire Beer
The Wandering Palate does partake in the occasional beer however not that partial to commercial bilge water that adorns the supermarket shelves and liquor barns. Like wine (grapes), good beer (Ale) starts with good ingredients (hops, malt, yeast, water).
Wine is of course all about a ‘sense of place’ and that all-encompassing aspect the French taught us – ‘terroir’ – which includes man and craftsmanship. Can beer express something as special as a ‘a sense of place’? Well, no if it’s a formulaic brew made under licence all over the planet. However, take a brew like Spitfire – a Kentish Ale – where the hops are from heirloom local varieties, the water drawn from a sole artesian well in Kent and add over 500 years of traditional brewing history, and you have a real story and real beer, or ale as it were.
