Posted on 06/26/2005 11:08:39 PM PDT by Aussie Dasher
AUSTRALIANS are drinking less full strength beer but more wine and ready-made spirits, according to figures released today.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics said full strength beer consumption fell to 80.1 litres a person in 2004 from 85.9 litres a year in 2003.
But mid-strength beer consumption increased slightly, to 15.5 litres a person from 13.8 litres previously while low strength beer consumption fell to 14.3 litres a person from 14.9 litres.
The amount of beer available for consumption fell to 1.76 billion litres, down from 1.81 billion litres.
However, it appears Australians are increasingly turning to wine, consumption of which rose to 27.5 litres a person from 26.8 litres previously.
This may be partly due to the greater availability of wine. There was almost 440 million litres of wine available for consumption in 2004, up from 432 million litres in 2003.
The amount of ready-to-drink pre-mixed spirits increased 13.8 per cent to 13.9 million litres.
Just five years earlier the bureau did not keep records on pre-mixed spirits because there was so little of it available.
The increase in available pre-mixed drinks is perhaps the driving force behind the sharp lift in consumption, which is now at 2.05 litres a person.
Glad to see you're doing your part for the Cause. We've got to keep our reputation up. Can you imagine the shame of seeing an article titled "Beer Consumption Down" about Texas? I imagine that would be about the time they were making snowballs in Hell.
Whenever my group of FReeper Friends converges on our local hangout in Houston, the beer sales for that night make a noticeable spike upward.
Ah, damn Aussies. Great beer and great wine. "Some guys have all the luck."
I did my part for the cause over the weekend. Now that I know there's an issue, I'll try to take up some slack tonight as well!
Since Australian wine is much better (and a better value for the dollar) than Australian beer, I'm not surprised. Most of the wine we buy nowadays comes from Australia or New Zealand.
Most Australian beer is quite bland. I drink some Foster's Bitter, but I put lime juice in it.
That's only 0.3 ounces per hour!
Shameful.
"...OK, y'all! Let's show these Aussies how it's done.
We Texans could write the instruction manual on beer consumption...."
I wouldn't count on it. My Texan cousin never tires of telling a story about taking an Australian friend of his to a keg party in College Station. The Australian fellow outdrank the Texans about 2-to-1, and most of the Texans ended up passed out on the floor. The Aussie looked at my cousin and said..."You chaps don't drink much, do you?"
"....Beer here is anywhere from 5% - 8.8% which is about double the strength of American beer...."
Not any more, pal. That's about the average strength of American West Coast ales (Sierra Nevada, Liberty, Anderson Valley, Rogue, etc). These breweries all brew barley wines at 10-12% as well. Lots of strong beer here for those who desire it.
To clarify, you're talking about the old megabrewers. There are a lot of smaller (and, not-so-small) brewers making real beer in the U.S. these days. And, of course, there are also homebrewers. My "Old Smiling Jackass" homebrew is a bit over 10%. :-)
Yes, we heard about that incident. Those people have had their Texas citizenship papers revoked.
You don't see any articles saying "Beer Consumption Down" about Texas, do you?
;-)
I was a beer-drinking heathen musician when I lived in Humble, too. The band I was in played what's called "Texas Country" and hit quite a few places in and around the Bayou City.
You Houston revelers do your part as well to keep brewers in business, and I'm proud of you.
Speaking about "local hangouts in Houston", I really like The Gingerman. Fantastic beer selection (not to mention, gorgeous Rice coeds on the prowl....)
No trip to Houston is complete without a reverie at the Gingerman.
Alcoholic strength of some American beers by weight and volume
http://www.realbeer.com/edu/health/calories.php
While we're on the subject of beer consumption, no one, in my experience, can touch the Belgians. They make Aussies and Germans look like rank amateurs. I spent some time in Belgium in 1981 and have vivid memories of watching Belgians sitting at cafes, slamming beers for 6 or 8 hours at a time. Most workers there are unionized, and work short hours like the Frenchies. They get off work at 2:30 in the afternoon, rush to the cafes, and drink 4 or 5 beers per hour until 9 or 10 in the evening. When the cafes close, there is a sudden human wave of loud, drunk Belgians staggering down the street. It's a sight to behold.
At one point while I was there, it was a national holiday, and all the young Belgian men I saw were dead drunk by 8:00AM. I think the only sober people in Brussels that weekend were American tourists, and the Muslim immigrants.
We see a lot of posts on FR about Belgian behavior that doesn't appear rational to us, but the way those folks drink, it shouldn't surprise us.
"...The only way Texans would ever drink less beer is if the days got shorter...."
Texans mostly seem to drink watery beer (Coors, Lone Star, etc). (Let me admit here that I almost single-handedly kept the Pearl brewery in business back when I was in Grad School). Wonder how they'd do on a steady diet of Maredsous, Scaldis, or Bigfoot.
That's because Australian wine is so good.
Number one imported to US.
Trust me, you can still drink a lot of beer even with the day only being 4.5 hours long.
I was at a night club (OK, a dive) some time ago in Corpus Christi, and a young Aussie fellow was there, having a good time. The girls all thought he was cute, and were delighted with his jokes and accent, etc., so as one might expect, some jealous and drunk country bumpkin tried to pick a fight with him.
I took him to one side for a moment and advised him that down under, those guys do "fisticuffs" for fun, so he just might be biting off more than he could chew.
"Aww, I can handle him," he said, and they stepped outside. Sure enough, the Aussie punched his ticket in fairly short order, then bought him a beer. They wound up getting along OK before the night was over.
I'll have to stop in at the Gingerman next trip. We mostly played in the clubs in the NE part of town, a few inside the loop. Ever been to Lyin' Larry's?
Speaking of watery beer, I wouldn't touch a light beer of any stripe. My all-time favorite is Shiner Bock, which may be a tad lighter than Moose Head or Sam Adams, but not by much. I used to favor a French beer I found when my wife and I went to Paris in '95, Kronenbourg, but I can't find it around here anymore.
Not any more, I can't. Maybe that's why they kicked me out of Texas.
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