Winner of the International Lager category at the 2021 Brewers Guild Awards.  Boneface IPL is, ostensibly, lager that’s hopped like an IPA.  It’s been one of my favorite beers for a long time, but seems to forever be stuck as a fringe style.  Outlaw has clean and bright aromas of lime, pineapple and rockmelon, with an extremely neutral and fresh malt base.  Smooth malt and citrus-focused hop character leads on the palate, with faint tropicals and minty herbaceousness following.  Moderate but precise bitterness closes out the brisk and refreshing finish, leaving the palate cleansed and wanting nothing more than another sip.  Hopefully its recent success at the awards encourages a few more brewers to tackle this style.  We’ll see.

Haagen Lager

by | April 13, 2026 | Recommended | 0 Comments

As consumers, we all have two lines that constrain our habits.  Above, there’s the price ceiling, when the cost of beer gets above a certain point we’ll turn away.  That price ceiling has been talked about to death over the last five years (at least). ...
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Boneface X Brave Cold IPA

by | April 13, 2026 | Recommended | 0 Comments

Cracks are already appearing in the fresh hop dam… but before we’re completely awash in those impending releases — one more conventional IPA. The third in Boneface Brewing’s rolling series of collabs (this time from Hasting’s Brave Brewing) and quite possibly the best...
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Sawmill Barrel-aged Imperial Porter

by | April 13, 2026 | Recommended | 0 Comments

As a tribute to the official end of summer (or perhaps a final nail in the coffin, for those of us in Canterbury), I’ll turn to a more fireside coded drop, crafted by Matakana’s Sawmill brewery. In terms of its principle construction, this is a fairly simply patterned...
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Boneface Knuckle Duster West Coast Pilsner

by | April 13, 2026 | Recommended | 0 Comments

The ‘West Coast Pilsner’ style continues to wander through the craft beer labyrinth somewhat without a bearing, and drifts further from its (admittedly flawed from the beginning) descriptor in the process.  It’s as much as I can do to classify them as ‘good ones’ vs...
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My Life In Five Beers — Matt Warner

by | April 1, 2026 | Cover Story | 0 Comments

While still at university in 2008 and after a hot Friday of Wellington hillside landscaping, I vividly remember propping up at the end of The Malthouse bar with my flatmate and being smacked in the face with a pint of Emerson’s Pilsner. It was brash, full of...
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Drinking In The Middle Lane

by | April 1, 2026 | Cover Story | 0 Comments

When my recent piece ‘A slow walk through paradise’ was published, a mate joked, “Jeepers BH, you’re a bit middle-of-the-road in your beer tastes to be talking to the craft beer community.”...
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