The theme for this month’s Mixology Monday (hosted at Sloshed) is brandy. I’ve been taking a bit of a look at pisco recently (check posts here, here, here, here and especially here), so brace yourselves for some more pisco brandy.

Some weeks back I made a dead simple and intuitive pisco drink, (more…)

Sir Edmund Hillary died yesterday morning.

For the past 24 hours the New Zealand media has been full of tributes, summaries of his achievements, reactions from around the world, various miscellaneous interest stories. Some might call it overdone, but it isn’t like he’s done this before, so lets let the media go to town. If talk-back radio is anything to go by the interest is out there. Since he passed away there has been little else on the airwaves besides people ringing in and sharing stories and thoughts. OK, there has been a little bit of silly stuff (replacing Waitangi Day with Hillary Day can only seem a good idea if harmonious race relations bore you), but mostly it’s been a feel-good media fest.

So far the New Zealand Chinese media is a glaring exception though. (more…)

Despite being most popular beer style in the world today, Pilsner is probably not my favorite type of beer. I generally prefer ales to lagers, and I often prefer stronger beers to weaker ones. However, Czech Pilsner is quality stuff. No surprises there since although the world tends to associate Pilsner with the Germans, in fact it was the Czechs who invented the style. (more…)

Ernest Hemingway, endurance drinker, greets Fidel Castro, endurance orator

Auckland is suffering in the grip of a pressing lime shortage. Unrest has been quelled so far through the imposition of martial law (Batista will be smiling in his grave), but nobody knows how long the authorities can maintain even this crude semblance of order. OK, I may be exaggerating slightly. Everything is surprisingly normal considering that there have been no limes in the supermarkets since before Christmas. This means I can’t enjoy a Daiquiri despite the summery weather. The good thing though is that I’ve been meaning to write about the Daiquiri for a while, so with Daiquiris on my mind but none to be had I may as well get writing. (more…)