Phil Cook
LightNews LightNews
banner
beerdiary.bsky.social
Phil Cook
@beerdiary.bsky.social
640 followers 610 following 250 posts
Beer diarist (at philcook.net), bartender, and various beer industry miscellany for a decade and counting. Continually disappointed optimist. He/him.

From: Te Whanganui-a-Tara / Wellington
Recently: Naarm / Melbourne
Now: Nacotchtank land / Washington DC
Posts Replies Media Videos
beerdiary.bsky.social
The Beta Band at the @930club.bsky.social last night were an absolute delight. The reunion tour was announced shortly after we moved to DC and it felt incredibly lucky to be able to catch them here. One of those dream gigs I'll be thinking about for ages.
The Beta Band at the 930 Club in Washington DC. It's a wide angle shot from the front row, the stage washed in blue and pink, with a mirrorball lit by a dozen spotlights above. The Beta Band at the 930 Club in Washington DC. There's a screen at the back of the stage with the Three EPs artwork, the band are lit in red and orange and playing an extended jam of B+A. John Maclean from The Beta Band playing trumpet at the 930 Club in Washington DC. He's wearing a pink overall and the screen behind is a peachy glow from a sunrise animation. The photo should cause an instant Dry The Rain earworm for fans. The empty stage at the 930 Club in Washington DC before The Beta Band came on. Purple-lit smoke is creeping in from both sides, dozens of instruments are laid out, and the tiger logo from the Champion Versions EP is protected onto a large screen at the back.
October 29, 2025 at 11:55 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
#crispsandwichday observances are scattered throughout a *lot* of the calendar in my house, if I'm being completely honest about my eating habits. But I'm delighted to join in the official celebrations and see more people experimenting with the artform today.
A chippie sandwich (white bread, American cheese, a few layers of crisps) on a wooden chopping board with a can of National Bohemian in the background (its ridiculous one-eyed mascot seeming to smile approvingly at it) and a can of Dovetail wet hop lager blurrily visible behind it.
October 25, 2025 at 9:47 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Snallygaster 2025 was an excellent time — and a vastly better-than-usual use of that stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue. I mostly made myself a fresh-hop festival-within-a-festival (thanks to @dcbeer.com's helpful list), with various dark and wild and dead-straight-lager things filling in the gaps.
A Snallygaster branded taster glass of reddish-orange beer (a mixed ferment from Allagash) on the road on Pennsylvania Avenue in front of a large square Snallygaster sign, blurrily visible in the background A branded Snallygaster taster glass of foamy and hazy pale golden beer held up in one hand with the columned North face of the National Gallery Of Art blurrily visible in the background behind a white awning A Snallygaster branded taster glass half filled with dark beer (either Dupont Stout or De La Senne Brett Porter, I honestly can't recall) held up in front of a crowd of people on Pennsylvania Avenue. The Capitol dome looms in the blurry background A branded Snallygaster taster glass on the road, filled most of the way up with slightly hazy golden beer (from Fast Fashion, if memory serves). It's under a lamppost, police car lights are blurrily visible in the background, as is the white dome of the Capitol
October 12, 2025 at 2:55 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Remember, folks: any night can be #stoutfloatnight
On a wooden coffee table, a brown bottle of Guinness Foreign Extra Stout with a dark yellow label is laying on its side beside a short glass, into which the beer has been poured. In the tan foam float two white blobs of plain ice cream.
October 10, 2025 at 2:47 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Since I can't dm you a photo, @jacobsberg.bsky.social, everyone can have a sneak peak at what I've been setting up on the tasting bar at work.
An almost irresponsible array of Elder Pine beers on the tasting bar at work. Seven are mostly-black cans with gorgeous etching-style artwork, the eighth is in a cute bulbous half-litre brown glass bottle.
October 2, 2025 at 6:13 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Fresh hop beer located, autumnal weather engaged. Both of these things make me very happy — or at least go a long way towards soothing the things that don't. This is my second pint, with a tiny taster of its regular-recipe sibling by way of comparison. Lovely stuff.
Two glasses of beer, one full size and one taster, side by side on the bar top at Red Bear in DC. T-shirts are blurrily visible in the background, and the beers themselves are a bright (if slightly hazy) gold. A few sips are obviously missing from each already
October 1, 2025 at 9:09 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Delighted to report that Trader Joe's knockoff Tim Tams — with their deliriously circuitous name — are pretty legit. They even come in the same mathematically-inexplicable set of eleven.
Two packets of biscuits on my coffee table — Arnotts Tim Tams (all the way from Australia) in a brown plastic pack and Trader Joe's "Australian-style chocolate crème sandwich cookies coated in chocolate" in a white and light blue box.
September 26, 2025 at 2:12 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
They were 'upside down' at Wildflower in Sydney when I was there early this year. The black, gold and white almost looked like a decent candidate for a tricolour flag.
A glass mug of beer with dark lager layered under pale golden lager and a nice thick white foam in top — outside at Wildflower in Sydney, Australia. It's sitting on a wooden table with a dark wall behind it, plants, hanging lights and a few people out of focus in the background.
September 24, 2025 at 5:18 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
We had booked in for a tour of the house without realising the appropriateness of the date. It's an impressive piece of conservation, our guide was excellent, and there were a million brilliant little details to discover and digest over beers after.
Heurich House entrance hall. It's a Gilded Age mansion in DC, hugely ornamented with decorations on basically every surface, a suit of armor stands beside a marble staircase with a tall electric-and-gas lamppost on its banister. There's a huge vase on a stand, a pendulum clock, and a mezzanine where musicians could set up. It's a lot. Heurich House interior. The view from the dining room through various enormous doorways of rooms designed for entertaining. There's a lot of gold detailing but it's charming rather than tacky. Low-hanging chandeliers and wall sconces light each room. A small chair with its own (reading?) lamp is opposite a piano. Heurich House interior. In an upstairs bedroom the paint is peeling on a wall behind a bed and beside a doorframe. A golden cherub hangs near a lamp and what looks to be an old call bell. Heurich House interior. The "tavern" in the basement. The decoration is mostly wood rather than gold, giving an Alpine lodge vibe in place of the Gilded Age feel of the upper rooms. Steins and bottles and playing cards are on the table in a realistic just-interrupted arrangement.
September 21, 2025 at 7:30 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Something of an accidental mini-Oktoberfest for us yesterday; all three @lostlagers.bsky.social / Right Proper 'Senate' beers — recreations of old recipes from DC's historic Heurich brewery, in the Biergarten behind the founder's mansion.
Three cans of beer — Senate (mostly white, with blue and red), Marzen (orange and red), and Bock (teal with dark blue and gold) — on the ornate stone entranceway, with arches and a hanging lamp, outside Heurich House near Dupont Circle in Washington DC
September 21, 2025 at 7:30 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
I've been craving a taste of home and NZ Hop Week at Other Half here in DC certainly delivered. Ten different beers showcasing several varieties, mostly in various degrees of hazy IPA — but also with a few lovely little lagers and an XPA. Bliss.
A pint of pale yellow beer with a small white head of foam (I'd already taken a sip before the photo) in front of an artfully rusted industrial wall. It's Other Half Riwaka Snaps at their DC location A tasting tray of four small samples of different hazy IPAs. They're in a metal tray on an NZ Hop Week placemat and my own handwritten note as to what's what; Juice Scrum, Kiwi Squabble, and two different-farm versions of Hi Motueka. The wooden table has a condensation ring from a previous pint and my green Beer Diary is nearby A heavy glass handled mug of Other Half Snaps with a full inch of dense foam. The beer is pale gold and backlit, glowing and making the bar seem dim in comparison while reflected in the bartop A tall and narrow printed menu of the ten special beers on for Other Half's NZ Hop Week, resting on a slatted wooden table. The camera angle is low and the foreground is blurry, but the title is crisp in white on red text
July 27, 2025 at 3:57 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
There are a lot of dud brand refreshes in the world, but for my money this one I just noticed on canned La Chouffe is pretty great. An update and general tidy, keeping the charm and lots of details from the original. (And the beer inside was great with dinner.)
Two two yellow cans of beer side by side. Both are La Chouffe Blonde, with old and new designs. On the updated version the font is now modern block letter san serif, and the red cap wearing gnome in the artwork is no longer awkwardly riding a unicycle but now striding purposefully forward.
July 23, 2025 at 4:14 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Just two months after asserting their "independence" during a merger, and despite a history of banging on about "supporting local" and denigrating "foreign-owned" breweries, Sydney's Wayward brewery has been sold to a UK-based group. Their founder's most-recent Facebook post is ironically apt.
Screenshot of Peter Philip's 26 March 2025 Facebook post. "The recent budget has done nothing for small locally owned breweries in spite of regular meetings with PM Anthony Albanese's office. Albo claims to support locally owned beer in his Inner West electorate but remember the adage "Watch what leaders do, not what they say".
June 25, 2025 at 2:10 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
When a local brewery was crowing about being the "New Zealand winner" in the World Beer Awards, it was like pulling teeth for me to get the organisers to admit to the fact that only *two* NZ breweries entered. Surely that's relevant!
Promotional image from Cassels Brewery's Facebook page, featuring a hand holding a mostly-black can of 'Fogged up' hazy pale ale against a yellow-gold background, with two bright yellow World Beer Awards icons beside it, proclaiming it as "New Zealand Winner" and "New Zealand Gold"
May 29, 2025 at 1:17 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Today's commentary on the state of the discourse in Australian beer circles is brought to you by this slide, which has always haunted me.
A person in a pink t-shirt is standing at a podium with two laptops and a huge bottle of water (or possibly wine) making a presentation, gesticulating enough to blur their hand. Their slide reads: "The amount of energy necessary to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it"
May 1, 2025 at 3:57 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Another highlight of the weekend away: finally getting a cheesesteak from the source, as it were. (And then a bonus one on that second visit to Human Robot, forever tying them together in the Greatest Hits section of my brain.)
A cheesesteak from Woodrows in Philadelphia: a long white bread roll oozing with gooey yellow cheese and bits of steak and onions falling out, sitting on unwrapped foil beside a serving of skin-on fries in one of those 1990s-looking cups with the weird abstract design of bus upholstery
April 10, 2025 at 7:28 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Bluesky's link-preview-doodad doesn't like grabbing my header images, which is a shame, because this extremely good dog deserves to be seen:
Signage for the takeaway fridge at Human Robot in Philadelphia, illustrated in stained glass style and depicting an adorably long sausage dog with HUMAN ROBOT written on its side
April 10, 2025 at 5:23 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
You can borrow this if you need it. I'm going to be late, too. (And Matt did say he won't get to the Roundup until Monday.)
The logo for The Session group beer-blogging exercise, modified by crossing out "Friday" so the tagline now reads "Beer Blogging WHENEVER"
March 28, 2025 at 8:22 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
There's also a cute in-game brewery that gets a few mentions, which is always a nice bonus when I play something, obviously.
Screenshot from the game Hardspace: Shipbreaker, depicting a corner the player's residence in orbit, featuring a poster for Over The Moon Brewery among others, alongside their yellow spacesuit
March 19, 2025 at 8:19 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
Also, there's this excellent artwork by @ramikin.bsky.social, which Bluesky's automatic link-preview-doodad unfairly overlooked.
An illustration of a neon sign against a brick wall, in the style of an old beer ad in a dive bar, with text that reads Ice Cold Takes Served Here
March 18, 2025 at 4:35 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
I genuinely had that. (Way back in lockdown, when we were playing Scrabble every day. There's evidence of several super bleak racks in my camera roll, but this one's a favourite.)
A photo of a Scrabble rack, with the funny-but-useless combination of EIEIO (plus another I and a blank)
March 15, 2025 at 9:39 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
For what it's worth — actually a lot, I think — the NYT Connections puzzle is also fine with calling sour beer "a style".

Also an interesting little data point in that they expect their audience to be familiar with Bock; it's way more common in commercial use over there than it is around here.
Screenshot of a partially-completed Connections puzzle, with Bitter, Bock, Sour and Stout grouped as "Styles of Beer"
December 20, 2024 at 1:42 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
There was a beer round in the Saturday Quiz this weekend, and I did have to wonder about this one — what fraction of the 76% of folks who missed out on the point here were pedants upset by the idea of calling "sour beer" a "style"?
Screenshot from the Saturday Quiz. The question is "Berliner Weissr, Gose and Lambic are all examples of what beer style?" and the answer — "Sour beer" — was apparently only given correctly by 24% of players (including myself)
November 25, 2024 at 11:51 PM
beerdiary.bsky.social
I have philosophical objections to the concept of a "1 day streak", but it's nice to have the distraction and ritual of my regular crossword back. (I threw away my nearly-year-long run in solidarity with @nytguildtech.bsky.social's strike, and I hope enough of us did that their bosses took notice.)
Screenshot of the New York Times' puzzle page, showing my crossword-solving statistics and the cheery gold stars congratulating me for a "1 day streak"
November 13, 2024 at 4:54 AM
beerdiary.bsky.social
And here it is, your first official Moment Of Tilda here in The Good Place. It took me a while, so here's a quadruple dose of the ridiculous little beast finding the depths of relaxation that we could all use right about now.
A brown tabby cat yawning widely, her head poking out from under a blue blanket A brown tabby cat curled up asleep on an office chair with her head on a cushion and resting on her front leg A brown tabby cat laying on her side in-between a cushion and a big white couch, looking straight into the camera A brown tabby cat sleeping somewhat awkwardly but apparently peacefully, her head resting on a green cushion with her neck at an angle that wouldn't be comfortable with a human skeleton
November 12, 2024 at 6:45 AM