Gallia Paris – a Parisienne Lager and big boats

A friend of Back of the Ferry sent a couple of bottles of new to Australia beer to the insular peninsula. Now, when someone goes to the trouble of sending BotF some beer to try, it deserves the royal BotF beerporn treatment. Despite the fact that Sydney is wetter than a seaweed farm, Circular Quay is still a wonderful place to be. It is cruise ship/ocean liner time in Australia and Circular Quay, Darling Harbour, Garden Island and even the Harbour itself has had a variety of 70,000 tonne plus cruise ships berthed. The seventh biggest, the Queen Mary, is currently berthed at Circular Quay and BotF will be there to farewell it – even though the way it is raining the earth and sea may merge into one. The Queen Elizabeth, which is the backdrop to the biere du jour is a mere whipper snapper at only 294m long.

Gallia Paris is a new beer with a great little back story. A couple of relatives of a bloke that ran a brewery in Paris in the 1890s have revived the brewery with the old name. The history is worth reading, but the descendants have shown some modern day nouse, by recognising that Paris no longer has its own beer and they’ve pugged the gap. With a nifty website, some Facebook work and a very attractive beer t-shirt (not yet available for shipping to Australia), these fellas may be the Quatre abres de pin of Paris. I’ve got to say that the label is one of the most aesthetically pleasing ones I’ve seen. The lid is awesome and a finer and happier looking cock, I haven’t seen. The beer isn’t bad either. I was expecting a typical Euro malt, but this one had a unique very pleasing sweetness to it. There’s hops in there, as well as plenty of maltiness – but this ain’t your run of the mill Euro. Tres agreable – or as my year 8 French teacher would say – Tray Enjoyarbla.