Great Australian Beer Yarns

by Peter Lalor

  RUSSIA AILED BY BEER

  You’ve got to love those Russians; they just seem to have a thirst for the hard stuff that leaves most of us looking like bloody great nancies.

  In January 2001 the Russian Health Ministry launched a campaign for beer to be recognised as an alcoholic drink. For some strange reason the Russkis never considered the amber stuff to be alcoholic and so even children could buy and drink it.

  The idea was that if it was readily available people would drink less vodka, but it seems the locals just drank vodka and beer.

  The mayor of Moscow even authorised the building of a large brewery outside the city saying that beer was the perfect cure for recovering alcoholics.

  Sounds like the sort of politician we need.

  WAR STORIES

  A BELLYFUL

  Butch Brown

  During my first tour of duty in Vietnam (1967–68) we were under the old rule of one beer per man per day. In an effort to ‘savour’ the event, we would drink them a little faster than normal and then lie down on the sandbag bunkers and let the sun warm up the belly.

  After a few minutes you would stand up very fast. The reaction was like that of smoking your first cigarette and getting very dizzy. Short-lived, but something to look forward to the next day!

  A CASE OF VD

  Brian Wallace

  A navy ship had been in an exotic port for a couple of weeks when the captain ordered all the crew together.

  ‘Gentlemen, I am disturbed to have to say that we have discovered quite a few cases of VD on board the ship,’ he said.

  ‘That’s good,’ said one of the sailors.

  ‘What could be good about that?’ asked the captain.

  ‘Well,’ said the sailor, ‘it’s got to be better than the local beer.’

  A FOSTERS OR AN ABBOTTS

  Neil Gillies

  I was serving with 6th Battery, 2/3rd Field Regiment and at our first position in Greece we were issued with two bottles of beer. The signals sergeant did the issuing but had some bottles left over as they couldn’t be sent to observation posts etc.

  When we were forced to withdraw, some infantry men stopped and gave covering fire while our guns were timbered up, then hopped onto our trucks. A couple got into a signals van. One of them said, ‘How’d a beer go now?’ and nearly fell out of the van when a sig produced two bottles and said, ‘Which one do you want, a Fosters or an Abbotts?’

  BEER PYRAMID

  Fred Fortescue

  I was in the RAAF in Vietnam (Caribou Transport Flight at Vung Tau) in the very early days of our involvement in the war (June 1965). Our access to any beer other than the local 333 was nil.

  As secretary of our little ‘club’ at the villa I had heard that in Saigon the Americans had a warehouse full of beer (used to supply their Special Forces camps).

  So, armed with a fistful of US dollars and a helper, and with the cooperation of the pilot of one of our Caribous, it was arranged that we (and the beer — about sixty cartons) would be picked up at the Ton-Son-Aut (Saigon airport) at about 4 p.m. one afternoon.

  Everything went very well and we were in position on the tarmac at 2 p.m. with the beer.

  We couldn’t leave our prize, but to fill in the time my helper suggested we build a sort of pyramid out of all the cartons. It looked great.

  At 3.30 p.m. a tropical rain storm hit us and dumped approx one and a half feet of water on us and the pyramid of cartons. There was hardly a carton which was not soaked. Our Caribou arrived on time and we loaded the beer a can at a time, as each carton fell apart as soon as you touched it.

  The unloading at Vung Tau was the same — one can at a time out of the plane and one at a time into a truck and again a can at a time at the villa.

  The beer by now was hot and undrinkable due to the way it had been thrown about. After we’d chilled the beer (for twenty-four hours) everyone enjoyed a better-quality brew.

  I did the same trip to the Saigon warehouse every two weeks for the next six months, except I had a very heavy large tarpaulin and a helper who was content to sit on a square block of cartons for however long it took.

  KOREAN HOPSICLES

  Dudley C Pye

  During the Christmas of 1953 I was a young soldier/cook serving in Korea. The practice of the government was to issue soldiers with a beer ration on days such as Christmas Day, ANZAC Day etc.

  Two bottles of Abbotts lager were issued per soldier for Christmas Day; they were to be consumed with lunch in an effort to improve morale.

  The intense cold (minus fifteen degrees centigrade) caused the beer to become somewhat frozen and great difficulty was experienced in attempting to consume the much anticipated brew.

  As it was so cold, many soldiers were gathered around my field stove and some bottles were placed on top of the range where the bottoms became heated a little. Soon the heat began to force the beer up through the neck of the bottles like a candle-shaped periscope.

  The diggers then proceeded to chew lumps from the beer candles as they rose from the bottle like some kind of hopsicle. As the beer warmed too much, the bottle was placed in the snow to refreeze and the process was repeated.

  What a Christmas! And those memories are recalled each ANZAC Day as the tastiest Christmas candles ever invented.

  This now old cook still likes a cold drop on a hot day.

  UNOPENED BEER AND DUNNY DOORS

  Andrew McCarthy

  Back in the early 1970s when I was serving on HMAS Melbourne, our mess had a soft drink fridge. Cartons of soft drink were purchased ashore and the fridge was kept full of various types. Payment for each drink was via an honesty box and any profits went towards a mess party at some overseas port.

  Before leaving Sydney for exercises off Hawaii I was elected to be drinks purchaser and I duly purchased large quantities of Tarax Black Label drinks (now there’s a blast from the past).

  At Pearl Harbor I went off to the local PX to restock our supplies and was confronted by a number of brand names that I hadn’t heard of. I purchased cartons at random, later carrying them as bold as brass with a few of the blokes up the gangway and down into the mess.

  At sea a couple of days later, we discovered that the lemonade in the flashy blue cartons was in fact PABST beer. Needless to say it was secreted away — smuggling booze on board was a big no no — to be enjoyed on the last night before hitting Sydney.

  And what a night it was.

  When at sea on Melbourne, each man was entitled to one 26oz (750ml) can a day, provided there was no night flying that night.

  We were in a petty officers mess (senior sailors) and as such a couple of mess members would collect a can for every member. Any non-drinker’s can would be stored away for the last night party before getting home.

  The powers that be were aware of these lurks and when they were collected the cans were ‘cracked’ (back in the days of the ring pull). This was always done for junior sailors, but it was overlooked for senior sailors as a sort of unofficial privilege of rank.

  This practice came to the attention of a very strict and straight ‘Master at Arms’ (the ship’s head policeman) nicknamed The Hat (sailors from the 1970s will know who he was). The Hat ordered that senior sailors’ cans were to be ‘cracked’ before issue. This almost caused a mutiny amongst us and there was much bitching and moaning.

  I can remember one old salt saying that the only privilege senior sailors had on this ship was ‘unopened cans of beer and longer shithouse doors!’ (junior sailors had half length doors, senior sailors three-quarter length and officers full length).

  The next morning some wag got hold of a texta and drew dotted lines on the doors of the senior sailors’ toilets (heads) near our mess, with the words ‘cut here’.

  HOME-BREWERS

  A BEERY CONFESSION

  Anonymous

  In the late 1970s I worked for a large company in Sydney. During our lunch breaks a lot of the men got together in the canteen (or sometimes down th
e local). The conversation varied from sport to eating and drinking.

  At the time home-brewing was big in the suburbs, particularly among the married men. Being single, I had better things to do with my time and money.

  Naturally each person reckoned his brew was the best and tasted like the real thing. They often brought samples for me to try. Not wishing to offend, I told them it was hard to tell the difference; home-brew is home-brew — and nothing has changed if you ask me.

  Anyway, the boys decided they would have a home-brew barbecue at Browny’s place. Everyone had to bring six 750ml bottles of their finest for judging by the experts.

  Not wanting to be left out, I put down a brew from one of the many recipes given to me. I’ll be honest: it was nearly undrinkable.

  On the day of the big event, I bought three large bottles of KB and three bottles of Tooheys Flag Ale, removed the labels and replaced the tops with my plain crown seals.

  For a start my two beers caught everyone’s eye because there was no sediment; the old-style home-brews were loaded with it.

  Then the taste really got to them.

  I was going to own up at the end of the day but I got in so deep with all my secrecy and fibs that I had to go on with it.

  For months after the event my brews were discussed reverently and my mates tried to make me give up my secrets, but to no avail.

  I no longer have contact with those guys so you can let ‘Feet’s’ secret out of the bag if you want — sorry Browny and the Eveready Gang.

  I hope you will forgive me.

  BAD OLD DAYS

  Kevin J Crouch

  Mine is a vintage tale dating back to the late 1940s, not long after World War Two, when beer was scarce indeed. These were the heady days of the ‘six o’clock swill’, when if you didn’t tip the barmaid threepence a drink at the rare hours when the beer was ‘on’, you became invisible and didn’t get another drink.

  Bottled beer was a ration of two bottles per week, but only if you were a regular and qualified for a voucher.

  My friend Bob and I decided to brew our own to save all the running around from pub to pub, only to find when you got there that the keg had just run out and there was no more. We were single young blokes and Bob’s parents lived at the time in a short street that backed on to the Royal Manly Golf Course.

  Bob and I resided in the garage at the back of Bob’s parents’ house, where we set up our own ‘brewery’: two four-gallon kerosene tins with the tops cut out held our special brew. On waking each morning, our first job was to inspect the magic potion and scoop off any mosquito wrigglers that had made their appearance overnight. When we considered it ready to bottle, we did so with the recommended amount of sugar and stored it in the cool under the main house for a couple of weeks.

  Approaching the first bottle with some trepidation, we found it was drinkable, which was about the best that could be said of it.

  Some well-meaning soul told us to double the sugar in the next batch, because this would give it ‘a bit of a kick’ and make it taste better. So we did just that.

  We stored it under the house in the usual manner. However, one night Bob’s mum came down to the garage, woke us and said, ‘Whatever’s going on with your beer I don’t know, but there is a lot of noise. It woke me up. Please go and have a look.’

  Sadly, most of our bottles had self-destructed and the area was an unholy mess. That was our last attempt at home-brewing.

  Good old days, my eye! Now we can sample wonderful beers from all over the country, all over the world for that matter. I have been fortunate enough to have been able to sample many beers from many countries, without ever having left Sydney and its environs. In my opinion, some of our own beers must rate with the world’s best: Squires, Dogbolter, Moonshine (Victorian) and Balmain Bock (which I hear is no longer brewed), to name only a few which come to mind. Our wonderful brewers in this country have produced lots more which I anticipate tasting before I fall off the perch.

  CAT-A-TONIC

  Ken Evans

  I’ve seen beer do strange things to men and women, but nothing like what it did to our family cats.

  Patch and Ribs (mother and son) were feline residents and part of our family, commanding full attention as to food requirements and hours of leisure. In fact, leading a perfect cat’s life.

  I was in my learning mode for home-brewing a few years back and had obtained all the ingredients separately, mixing up a concoction from a recipe given to me by someone who knew someone who knew something about home-brewing. Or at least that was the story. This was in the days before home-brew shops and kits.

  For this particular brew I decided to put half in 750ml bottles and half in 375ml stubbies. For some bizarre reason (I wonder if it had anything to do with beer) my teenage son begged to help me and after I recovered from the shock I put him in charge of adding the sugar prior to bottling and gave him precise instructions on how to do it.

  Task completed, we put the bottles onto shelves in the external laundry for the secondary fermentation. Coincidentally, this was Patch and Ribs’ boudoir.

  Two weeks after bottling the brew I went into the laundry to let the cats out for the day. An unusual sight confronted me. Two cats, oblivious to their surroundings, were walking at virtually half their normal height, scraping the ground, their eyes glazed, racing in forward motion with only their toes moving (the same as cartoon cats on the TV), desperate to escape as quickly as possible from their house of horrors.

  Evidently through the night the 375ml stubbies, due to their thin glass walls, had been unable to hold the inner pressure and had exploded, causing a chain reaction, smashing about six bottles. Glass shards and beer was everywhere.

  Imagine what it had been like for Patch and Ribs, settled in for the night when all of a sudden all hell breaks loose. It was Pearl Harbor in the laundry and they had no way of escaping and no idea about what was happening.

  They were in shock — literally out of their minds with fear.

  What caused the bottles to erupt?

  My son had done what he thought was right and put the same amount of sugar into each bottle, causing a vigorous secondary fermentation in the smaller bottles. Who said teenagers don’t listen?

  The poor cats were not keen to sleep in the laundry that night; in fact, they even discovered a hitherto unknown ability to run backwards in order to escape.

  Soon after, Patch died after being run over by the family car, although it was thought this might have been suicide. Ribs died of kidney failure.

  It seemed neither had the will to go on. Talk about having the horrors!

  EXPLODING BEER BOTTLES

  Elaine Johnston

  Everybody has heard about the Japanese attacks on Darwin and the invasion of Sydney Harbour during World War Two by mini submarine, but a few of us were involved in a little-known battle in our suburban street.

  During World War Two, our next-door neighbour made quantities of home-brew which he stored under the house. Late one night, loud explosions rocked the street. Our family and many neighbours raced into our backyard and down into our large air-raid shelter.

  We huddled in the dark, fearing the ‘invasion’ had begun. During a long silence, some of the men ventured out and discovered smashed bottles and tops — the ‘bombs’ were cases of home-brew exploding amongst the foundations and against the floorboards.

  Talk of ‘having a beer’ was greeted by sheepish grins and laughter for some time afterwards. (But, of course, a lot of beer had to be ‘disposed of’ — read that as ‘consumed’ — in a hurry ‘in case it goes off again, mate!’)

  HARD TO SWALLOW

  Brian Noyes

  I was having a drink with this home-brewer at the local pub when the publican called last drinks.

  We’d put a few away but needed a roadie to clear the head. This was in the bad old days when bottle shops closed earlier than banks and it was looking pretty bleak.

  Jim — well, that’s what I’ll ca
ll him in an attempt to keep his guilt anonymous — suggested I go back home and try one of his home-brews.

  Now, other blokes had done this in the past and those that had survived the experience described a drink that while alcoholic was so bad not even the most hardened alcoholic could come near more than one. It had the odour of month-old witches’ knickers and a flavour not unlike the slops that you find at the bottom of an abattoir’s wheelie bin after a hot day.

  I must’ve been a bit more pithed than I thought because somehow I found myself on the way back to Jim’s house.

  His horrible old wife greeted us at the door with a face that would scare Mike Tyson and an order that we take ourselves out to the back shed and not bother her or her equally ugly sister. Fat chance of that.

  Anyway, Jim was also pleased to be banished to the shed and so we slunk through the house and made for the backyard.

  Out in the shed he opened the fridge like a man opening a treasure chest. I swear the bottles were squirming and seething on the shelves and there appeared to be a foul green gas rising through the corroding tops.

  Jim grabbed a bottle and then reached in the drawer for a bottle opener and a gun.

  Yes, a gun.

  Shit, I thought, he’s gonna kill me.

  ‘Don’t be frightened,’ said Jim. ‘This is just to make sure we both have a nice drink.’

  I was absolutely petrified as I didn’t really know him that well and I was even more scared when he poured out a huge glass of this bubbling, burping, stenching, farting liquid and told me it was all mine.