Ohhh... My Head... - Tour of South America 2006

In Argentina there are supposedly around 200 microbreweries. A lot of these beers are available in bars in downtown Buenos Aires.

The hunt started in Uruguay. A pleasant mistly rural little country located across the Rio de La Palata from the big city of Buenos Aires. However enjoyable the country is, there is no point in going for the beer. A government run brewery provides the country with three bland crappy lagers, and that's it...

After three days travelling the Uruguayan coast it was therefore a relieve beer wise to come to the beer mecca that is Buenos Aires. I met up with some Argentinian friends (Lucho and his girlfriend) and Nicolas (Fukito at Ratebeer) at Gibraltar, where I amongst other enjoyed a Stone Summer Ale on cask. From there on I continued with Nicolas to Territorio Bar and Untertürkheim for some rare Graf Zeppelon beers.

The next day I was heading south, down to Tandil. In Tandil the brewpub chain Antares has a location, and the microbrewery Quarryman is located there. Quarryman Ahumada proved to be a great rauchbier. Next stop was Santiago, where I was met by Panzerfaust, Lillith and Nigredo from Ratebeer. We spent some time at Sicosis, a perfect downtown bar for those who wants to sample Chilean microbrews. One brewery stood out very much: Szot. Despite great quality all the way through their line the Szot Strong Ale managed to stand out from their range. It is simply one of the greatest strong ales/barley wines I've come across. As this was summertime a lot of Chilean beers showed problems with infection.

From Santiago de Chile I headed northeast, all the way up to Iguasso Falls. These watefalls that straddles the border between Brazil and Argebtina are amongst the mightiest in the world. Not much good beer up here though. A short detour into Paraguay did not yield any new beers, or any beers at all for that matter.

Heading further north into rural areas of Brazil's Paraná province only resulted in a bunch of bland lagers. Instead I turned south again. Managed to find some rare El Infate Feik brews in Colon of the Entre Rios province in Argentina.

It was however upon returning to Buenos Aires that the real fun started. Armed with the legendary scooper Gazzas report I headed out on a brewpub crawl at lunch time. First stop was Rubia y Negra, sort of a sushi bar with 8 beers available, including a 12% and a fantastic Stout. From there on Buller is more or less around the corner. Buller is an American style brewpub with clean beers and a lovely patio.

In the evening I met Nicolas again at Cruzat Beer House. A magic place for beer rating with more than one hundred Argentinian microbrews, listed by provnince and city in their menu. Tried a couple of beers from Gülmen and to draught beers from Murray's here before moving on to what is possibly the most enjoyable brewpub in Bienos Aires, Cossab, where we somehow were invited to a private party. At this place I do belive I had my fair share of Cossab Bitter as well as some other Cossab beers, plus a good few otgher bottles from their wide selection of Argeninian bottles.

The next day I had lunch at Frankfurt, a tiny pancho stand serving amongst other a good range of Viejo Munich beers. The evening was spent doing a brewpub crawl in the Palermo district. First stop was Clandestina. A beatiful place with exellent service and food, serving so-so beers. Next up was Dalinger. It had however turned into the fancy night club-like Rina Bar & Tapas. They still served Dalingers beers, that were of generally high quality. Another establishment there was Dubliner, that serves two good beers made by them, but the brewery is elsewhere in town. Later on more time was spent digging throug the beer lists of Cruzat.

On my last day I went to Patio Cervecero, a posh pub chain establishment serving a wide range of beers from El Bolson plus some other micros before heading on to Bar de Cao, which is a lovely restaurant with their own beer. The one problem I had with this place was that the toilets were out of order. As this is not a bonus if you are on a pub crawl I had to hurry on to Cossab again to drink myself through the beer list there. This stop included a pint of Murray's Old Ale, which was the best of the beers I had in Argentina. It was however later surpassed by a take home bottle of Shopron Porter.

The beer hunt was finished on Munich airport at the brewpub Airbräu, which is certainly worthwile