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Serving With Style(s) ft Tito Orellana
201 Playsin 5 minutes
“The human component sometimes goes beyond the beer component of working in this industry.”
Tito Orellana arrived in Australia from Chile with his interest in beer already piqued. Upon arriving in Melbourne in the midst of craft beer’s explosion – with signs blaring: “GOOD BEER WEEK” plastered on walls across the city – his interest soon became a full-blown passion.
In the decade-plus since those early days, he’s moved from basic hospo roles through some of the country’s best beer bars and breweries to become an Advanced Cicerone and judge at major beer competitions on both sides of the equator.
Today, Tito is the beer ambassador at Carwyn Cellars – an incredibly rare role in hospitality and retail that speaks volumes of both employer and employee – and one of the most respected beer educators and event hosts in the country. He’s also launching a new project, Edubeer, designed to make life easier for any Aussies wanting to understand how beer styles are supposed to look, taste and smell.
He’s a wonderfully charismatic guest who touches upon his travels and love for music as well as his specialist subject, and offers some lovely insights into his first experience judging at the World Beer Cup in Colorado earlier this year.
Before we get to this week's main chat, we cast an eye over the week's news: a new collab in WA designed to keep the beer gas tax conversation going; the crafty rebirth of an historic Melbourne corner boozer; entering the Sydney Royal Beer & Cider Awards; and our latest guide to enjoying beer at its best.
Start of segments:
- 0:00 – The Week On Crafty
- 13:52 – Tito Part 1
- 40:51 – Industry Insights from American Canning Machines
- 41:57 – Tito Part 2
To find out more about featuring on The Crafty Pint Podcast or otherwise partnering with The Crafty Pint, contact craig@craftypint.com.
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Transcript
Catch-up and Fiery Gas Tax Debate
00:00:04
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Crafty Pine podcast. I'm Will. I'm James. How are you going, Will? I am doing very well. How are you, James? Oh, you know, it's a pretty ah full-on ah time at the minute. You'd kind of think get Pine of Origin out the way and, you know, it'd be a bit of bit of downtime. and Maybe there was for a week or so, but as will become, I guess, clear in a few weeks' time, there's been something bubbling away in the background for a long time that's coming to fruition and that's ah taking up rather a lot of my time as well now. So it feels like we're sort of from part of out of the frying pan into the fire at the minute.
00:00:39
Speaker
Speaking of a hot and fiery world, I caught up with Rhys Lopez from Evil Megacorp late last week to chat about a collaboration he's done with the Conservation Council of WA. Basically, I guess, to try and keep that conversation going around gas taxing gas, offshore gas rather, and then comparing it to the beer, excise on beer as well. um Yeah, it's kind of one of those situations where obviously the Prime Minister during the budget or ahead of the budget said, well, no, we're not going to move on this. There's going to be no change, but i think it does.
00:01:18
Speaker
it continues to bubble away to a degree i'd be surprised if it wasn't an election issue um given that you know david procock is pretty good at uh i think sensing the popular move mood uh the greens are calling for it there's members of the liberal party calling for it there's also one nation arguing we should tax our offshore gas more so it'll be interesting where it goes Yeah, it does increasingly feel like ah sort of, you know, you need Pocock to be in a far more influential position. He seems to be taking an excellent line on pretty much every policy out there.
00:01:52
Speaker
ah He's definitely, he seems to be the hardest working politician in
Gas Tax as Election Topic?
00:01:56
Speaker
Canberra. And yeah, um yeah he's he's a pretty impressive figure, I think. And um yeah, it it'll it be interesting to see where it all lands. I'd be surprised if it doesn't um keep bursting up in a way because, yeah, I mean, there's a lot of anger out there in the community, isn't there, about lot a lot of stuff. So I feel like this is one area that they could potentially be changing to the future. degree Ideally, we probably wouldn't be taking all this gas out of the ground to burn anyway. But my kind of view is that if we're going to do it, might be nice to not not be ah paying
00:02:29
Speaker
as a consumer of gas, not be paying too much for it while I have my few sort of remaining hot showers in winter before it gets too hot for those. Yeah, and I guess, you know, Rhys is a good person to talk to on this. As anyone who's met Rhys or, you know, listened to our podcast with him last year, he's very sort of well-versed, very knowledgeable on a depth and breadth of of topics. And I guess doing this in partnership with the yeah the Conservation Council,
00:02:53
Speaker
it's It's people who've got it very much to their heart that they know what they're talking about. And I guess anything like this that keeps the conversation going is hopefully good for, you know, the country's economic welfare down the line, good for the planet and maybe good for beer at some point.
00:03:07
Speaker
Yeah, he's certainly um very opinionated, Racy. Yeah, it was pretty hard to ah get him off the phone, of course. ah he um As always with Racy, you start going down some pretty big rabbit holes pretty quickly. Well, he also, you know, it's a one man brewery, so he's probably just pleased to have someone to talk to.
Melbourne's Pub Renovation and Craft Beer Focus
00:03:24
Speaker
That's true.
00:03:26
Speaker
um And I guess so so someone else who you've been chatting to just just this week as well. um The team but behind the Friendly Society is, I guess, an old, but, you know, an old new pub or a new look for an old pub in Melbourne.
00:03:40
Speaker
Yeah, well, so um listeners would probably, um potentially some might have been to the Caring Bush. More recently, it did have craft beer. It had a meat-free menu as well. It was um sort of refurbed and reset up by the team at the Old Bar. That closed a couple of years ago um quite quite suddenly, and there was there was quite a bit of media attention around it as well with the owners talking about the how difficult hospitality is. And it's now been taken over and being given the building's original name of the Friendly Society's hotel by the most recent general manager at the Cherry Tree, which is ah which is sort of one of Melbourne's legendary Backstreet pubs. So the Weston family have taken it over. Nathan was managing the Cherry Tree. His son was working there as well, Leo. um Claire, who Nathan and Claire have run cafes together for
00:04:33
Speaker
a long time so it's very much a family pub uh they've been running hospitality venues in the sort of Richmond Abbotsford area for 20 years actually they were you know some of the first people to sell mountain goat and and all that kind of stuff so a lot of craft beer history there and they've got a little over 20 taps and they'll continue pouring uh pretty interesting beers And I was i was intrigued, is ah are they sort of looking to keep that sort of GB through Cherry Tree lineage alive as well? Or, you know, just it's a fresh start with a a new crafty pub?
00:05:07
Speaker
Well, they've got the old um ah tap board to to put up. So Nathan i managed to get that from the Cherry Tree and and some other stuff they put up as sort of decorations as well. so So sort of physically it lives on a bit. um you know You know, And definitely I think people will, who love the cherry tree will find a lot of what they enjoyed in the friendly
Craft Beer Selection Challenges in Melbourne
00:05:30
Speaker
societies. It was really interesting to talk to Nathan about tap lists and picking things, you know, he's in this area that's right near stomping ground and Bodrigi and Molly Rose and like a number of great ah brewery venues. So he's sort of focused with the taps is to go to get beers from more so much smaller breweries in like the outer suburbs or regional areas. He said he always really loved with, ah because the Cherry Tree was Pint of Origin venue doing Regional Victoria. He was kind of like, you know, i loved getting a couple of kegs from Mitter Mitter Brewing in the high country and kind of showcasing those beers that people might have only drunk on holiday and that kind of thing. But yeah, the conversation definitely cut through of like picking a tap list now is hard. He said they had someone at the Cherry Tree on it.
00:06:14
Speaker
Basically, it was their full-time job because the amount of emails you get, the amount of reps coming in, know, It's pretty overwhelming. So he's kind of, I guess, mantra is to work with a lot of the smaller guys, but at the same time, we'll still have carton draft on tap because you need to keep things simple for people walking in who really just want to order one beer before a game of footy or before going somewhere else. Yeah, and I always love what the Cherry Tree did there, sort of keeping some of those smaller breweries on from a regional brewery outside of Pine of Origin, sort of all year round. You go in and there'll always be two or three taps of breweries that you might not see anywhere outside maybe one or two other venues in Melbourne. I know Dave and the team at the Woodlands um do something very similar with regional New South Wales, the same with the Lincoln and Tasmanian breweries. You know, you know it might be smaller breweries who...
00:07:03
Speaker
don't have a focus, you know, in Melbourne or the mainland if it's Tasmania, but they just, it's nice for them to have that presence, that little bit of, you know, i don't know, sort of pat on the back or a nice bit of marketing for them, you know, all year round.
00:07:14
Speaker
Yeah, and Nathan actually said it works out quite beautifully for them because if people know those beers, it's probably because they've tried them while being on holiday or something like that. And it's a very easy sell to be like, here's a Blackman's beer on tap and people immediately go, oh yeah, last time i drank that was during summer holidays when I wasn't working for three weeks and it was a beautiful sunny
Beer Awards and Educational Tips
00:07:34
Speaker
day. So so it can work really nicely for both the venue and the brewery as well.
00:07:38
Speaker
Yeah, cool. And I guess sticking in Melbourne for now, and part three of your rebooted guide to the crafty stops along the marvellous 86 tram is going live this week as well.
00:07:50
Speaker
Yes, won't quite be on the site when this episode goes out, I think, but it will be soon if you're listening to the episode straight away. But yeah, heading along Plenty Road now. So we've done Gertrude and Smith Street and then High Street. And once upon a time, that's probably where you would have ended it. But now, of course, with, well, Toolboy Moose have been there for for almost a decade now. and But further along as well, there's great places like Hard Out, Steam Jacket Brewery, which used to be future ah Future Mountain. And yeah, there's a lot of really awesome small bars along that part of the city. It's, it's yeah, absolutely. When I was calling into them, I was like, I need to spend more time around here. There's something really wonderful about the sort of ah northern Thornbury, Preston Reservoir part of the city at the moment. It's where a lot of interesting new businesses are going in.
00:08:38
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, for sure. um And from from Melbourne to Sydney, or I guess casting the net across the whole country, if any brewery brewers or cider makers are out there, ah entries are currently open for this year's Sydney Royal Beer and Cider Awards. You've got until June the 17th to enter, so we'll include a link to that in the show notes as well. um And I guess that sort of segues nicely into another story ran this week, a I'm not sure if Bryony Levy will be judging in Sydney this year, but she does tend to get around and judge at many, many competitions in beer and cider and olive oil and you know many other things. But um I guess Bryony has sort of stepped into a real sort of educational role for us on the website, producing some great pieces about you know how to taste beer, um how to present beer in venues or whatever. Her latest piece that we ran this week is all about, um I guess, giving people some...
Meet Tito Orellana: Beer Ambassador
00:09:30
Speaker
insights into why it matters and and some tips on how to make sure you buy beer in the best condition it can be from wherever you're buying it you know in retail how to store it at home how different styles should be stored how it's basically essentially making sure that you're picking up the best beer you possibly can from the best you know retailer you can and um looking after it the best way you can at home before you put it into your glass and knock it back Yeah, I mean, Briony even has, you know, those simple things I feel like sometimes I forget, like if you drink a beer that's not very good, maybe try the other can as well rather than being like, oh, this has to be an awful beer. Sometimes there's, you know, technological challenges brewers aren't always aware of. Something happens on packaging day that can cause a beer to be wrong and a limited number in one batch. And, you know, I think one person you're very unlikely to buy a bad quality beer from is ah this week's guest.
00:10:25
Speaker
Yeah, um Tito, who many people will know from his work at Carbon Cellars, but he's worked at a number other places in Australia since moving to here from Chile back in the middle of the last decade. um As he told us, his first week in Australia, having moved here, he went out and there's massive signs for Good Beer Week, and he was like...
00:10:44
Speaker
What is this all about? I've come to my dream country having sort of um become the first of his mates to really get into into beer or what limited is sort of yeah craft beer was available in Chile at the time. But yeah, he's he's also, he's been he's ah another beer judge. He's not not long back from the World Beer Cup in in the States. He gives us some great insights into what that was like. Not the judging, but the beer scene around Colorado, just some of the conversations he had with people getting advice to a brew day, et cetera, et cetera. But also he's now an advanced Cicerone as well. So he's been sort of he'd been working through that from his time at stomping ground.
00:11:18
Speaker
He's now one level. down from the top level you can be to be a Cicerone so he gives us some sort of insight into that program as well the benefits of venues whether it's a brewery venue or a bar in in putting their their staff at least through the certified um server um qualifications um but aside from that Tito is just a very uh Very charming young man.
00:11:37
Speaker
he he is, he is. And he's working on a new project as well that we talk about in the episode. ah ah We'll let him explain it, but it's called EduBeer and he's he's finally put together some social channels for it as well. So those will definitely be linked in the show notes. So when you hear Tito talk about it, you can find find out what he's sharing and where.
Tito's Journey into the Beer Industry
00:11:58
Speaker
And i notice it's great as well because it was something that I'd had in mind going, oh, it the the project he's in work is like, there should be something like this. And I remember talking to one of his former colleagues, Lindsay Asterita at Stomping Ground about it, going, I really feel this needs to happen. She's like, oh, Tito's doing this. I'm like, excellent. He's going be way better at doing it than I am and have have more time and knowledge to pour into it. So I'm excited to see what that comes to. um So yeah, we'll have the chat with Tito coming up after the break. um For now though, Will?
00:12:27
Speaker
Enjoy the chat. And if you do make sure you like subscribe, leave a comment, ah do anything you can to get this podcast in front of more people. Cheers. Cheers.
00:12:41
Speaker
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Speaker
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Speaker
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00:13:32
Speaker
Tito, welcome to the podcast. Thank you for having me. That is our pleasure. For those who haven't met you or maybe don't know you in the beer industry, tell us a little bit about Tito. My name is Tito Orellana, or Orellana. um I'm an advanced Cicerone and BJCP certified beer judge, and um I currently work as the beer ambassador at Carwin Sellers.
00:13:59
Speaker
Carwin, I do a bit of, like, my title is beer ambassador, but i really work with socials and events, so, like, you'll usually see me whenever we're trying to push some stuff on social media, or you'll catch me in all the...
00:14:10
Speaker
All the car win events, yes, hosting, gathering people out, telling them to shut up. So do you often get behind the bar there as well, or is it more around events, hosting and all that? Usually just around events where like either like the staff will need like that extra support, when we're like really busy, when we have a ah new big beer launch and there's like multiple things on tap that everyone wants to try at the same time.
00:14:32
Speaker
And then I'll i'll jump on, sometime sometimes covering some breaks. And yeah, that's basically it. Would there be many ah bars or pubs around Australia that would have an um be beer ambassador role like the one you have? I don't think so. think I think I have a very unique role that I kind of made my own.
00:14:52
Speaker
yeah And what um brought you to it or was it sort of a conversation with Carl and they're like, we're looking for someone to do this. Did they have a beer ambassador? Yeah. and or So, yeah yeah. So Charlotte, who's from New Zealand, she used to be the first beer ambassador. I even remember when the role came up for graphs, but I was unfortunately on a student visa around that time. So I could i couldn't take any full-time work. She ended up taking the role. She was amazing. But then with COVID, That role wasn't needed anymore, unfortunately. And yeah, it just changed. And then by the end of 2020, I started working at Carwin Salas. And um at the beginning, I was like just working at the bar 20 hours a week and all that. But once I finished... Social media course that I was doing that i I basically took only to be able to stay in Australia while COVID was happening I
00:15:47
Speaker
i they There happened to be that they they needed a social media manager. So one day um Benny, Ben Duol, little Benny um Little Ben, hey he He called me and he was like, hey man, like we actually need a social media manager. Would you like to take the role?
00:16:06
Speaker
And yeah, definitely. um Like i I said, yes, the role became social media and events coordinator. I was already working with Ben, like he was always like kind of throwing ideas at me about a lot the different events that we were doing while I was working at the bar. So I think it became a very natural fit.
00:16:27
Speaker
to be trying to like put my ideas on what to do for these events since i think i had not only the the view as a like beer professional that ah that knows all this stuff and like knows about the history of like sometimes the beers that we're trying to sell in the bar and like you know when we're doing a tap take cover of like 12 very expensive like beers from this specific country just knowing what actually makes them special and why they're worth it outside of the hype or anything like that became very important for the world so yeah that's how we'll were you there for the um the pastry stout um cake pastry pairing event no that's that predated you that predates me yeah um bring it back i know we want we really want to that's one of the ones that like we're like wasn't the one day midnight or something and ran through to the morning or something as well yeah
00:17:18
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, the 24-hour bakery. That was the name of the of the event. And yeah, very special. Also around that time, like there wasn't that many breweries that were doing that many pastry beers, like pastry sours or pastry stouts.
00:17:31
Speaker
um So I think it would be very interesting to do something, to do something maybe with beers made specifically for the event or to be launched at that event. I think that could be something that we could do.
00:17:43
Speaker
But yeah, I think we're still like slowly taking on a different challenges while we're you know trying to assess the current state of the industry and you know hospitality and beer separately.
00:17:55
Speaker
yeah Yeah, for
Tito's Hospitality and Cicerone Experience
00:17:56
Speaker
sure. And you're talking about taking out there doing that course to stay in Australia. What brought you to Australia in the first place? Yeah, so actually um just this past April was my 10th anniversary since I moved Australia. um Back in 2015, I've
00:18:16
Speaker
i've been working in hospitality for a very long time. And I reached a point where I you know had finished my career my my degree, and a bachelor's in a hotel and restaurant management.
00:18:29
Speaker
And I was working a lot of freelance hospitality, if you could call it like that, because wages are not that good in Chile and very dependent on on tips. But I was like doing a lot of like catering or like specific dinners that were done with just one single chef brought to houses or brought to offices just to do this type of thing.
00:18:49
Speaker
And i it happened to me that I was just like kind of bored. I was like, oh, like i'm i'm making I'm making some money. i'm able to travel. I went to Europe and I was like so in love with everything there and how different each country was.
00:19:02
Speaker
I was like, need to insert myself in a different country. Let's go to a place where there's one massive country with one culture. Only 26 million people instead. Yeah, but but like it happened to be that I was playing a lot of music with a friend of mine who lived very close by. We'll meet up twice a week. And he was like one day like, hey, man, like I love this project that we're working on, but I'm actually moving to Australia next year.
00:19:25
Speaker
And then I was like, oh, are you now? So I was actually looking to move to Europe and hadn't thought about Australia. But once he told me that he was moving and he told me, yeah, come around with us.
00:19:35
Speaker
um i started looking a lot into Australia. And I looked at Melbourne and I looked at the amount of ah music schools that it had and the hospitality scene and all the way Melbourne was built around all these like different international communities.
00:19:51
Speaker
I thought this place is going to have an incredible food scene because of all the different cultures, all the hospitality. um I read a lot about like the kind of like... what is it called the lockdown laws in sydney like late nights that were not locked up laws thank you and i was like yeah i don't i don't want that i don't want that like we start really late partying and like going out in chile so i want somewhere that can go later but also a lot of music schools were based in victoria so it's like a place with such hospitality and that amount of music schools gonna have a lot of
00:20:26
Speaker
a lot of bands, a lot of live music. And that's what I wanted. I wanted hospitality, I wanted music, I wanted the nightlife. And that's why I moved here. You found it. Yeah. And were you into beer specifically at that stage? You about working in hospitality. Did you have an interest interested in beer, craft beer before you... Yeah, I mean, like i I used to drink just like any of the cheap beers and I started like drinking a ah little bit of craft and was like, oh, this is kind of cool. um But it wasn't until like I did a like, ah um how do you say, during one assignment for uni. is that they basically divided the entire class into different just non non-wine alcoholic beverages.
00:21:08
Speaker
And I got beer and with a couple of classmates we just bought basically the whole lot of different colors and like styles that we could find in in the supermarket because they sell beer in supermarkets there.
00:21:23
Speaker
um And I was like fascinated by it. i was like, this is incredible. Like I've never tasted anything like this. And then it became for like, do I buy a six pack of something cheap or do I buy two nice beers to try? And I kept on doing that. And my friends knew that I was like really into craft beer. But I never thought about if having a career based around it until I came to Australia.
00:21:47
Speaker
The scene there was like still growing. There were quite a few craft breweries, but a lot of the beers were still called, you know, just the amber, just the blonde. and just the dark and yeah so it was incredible to move to australia and then see the scene here like honestly like on my first week went out to the streets and i see this massive light poster that says good beer week 2017 i'm like what is this well are we um like you know do you remember the first brewery in melbourne you walked into or i remember any early beer experiences I remember the first beer venue that I went to, um and they it was also the first venue that I dropped my resume at. um Because moved into St. Kilda, like many people do when they're moving into into into Melbourne.
00:22:40
Speaker
And I went to the local tap house. I just went on Google, I searched for beer. And yeah, there was the Fifth Province, Fairy Wimples. But then I saw the local Tap House and I saw the tap list and was like, oh my God, I need to go and apply to this place. It's sounding very similar to my wife and I arriving in Melbourne eight years earlier. Tap House being the first places you go to. Sinkie would have been there at the start as well. must be well-trodden path into the beer industry. Yeah, honestly. It's such a beautiful venue, like the upstairs with the deck and all the old fittings and everything. It's just such an impact for me to go see there. It's like, oh my God, this is a beer venue. And you'd have landed right in the peak of like craft beers explosion as well. Like the 2010s was when things really accelerated. And that would have been, you know, if it's 2016, 17, that would have been absolute boom time. Yeah, absolutely. Actually, it was kind of funny because I moved here and like that boom had already started and you could see all these things happening. Like I said, like having a good beer week happening around that same time.
00:23:45
Speaker
and And in Chile that was just like one year away from starting to happen. So like I moved here and that's when the industry really blew up in in Chile. And a lot of, yeah, basically.
00:23:58
Speaker
And a lot of these like um smaller craft breweries started popping up, bringing all the like newer styles, you know, started to see some New England IPAs and like some other kind of IPA, some sours.
00:24:12
Speaker
More barrel-aged stuff and none of that really existed much in Chile except for a few breweries that were like really spread out and no one was like bringing all the stuff together except for maybe one or two shops. Santiago is a big city so it was really hard to move around and that's around the time when no one was really getting that much stuff delivered home.
00:24:33
Speaker
yeah So yeah, that was a massive like kind of change. and I moved here and I started working in hospitality pretty much immediately. um but I worked a bit in, I'd say, like more wine-related stuff. and then um I started working in the city as a bossy and realized that I knew more than a lot of the buttons that were on me. So I demanded that they put me in a different role. Yeah. And yeah, I just worked as a waiter at the beginning. um Even on my first year in Australia, I got my first like tattoo and I got a hops tattoo. Yeah. I wasn't even. i was looking for, I'm pretty sure that's hops on his arm there. Yeah. And I, ah I wasn't even working in the industry. I was just like, this is the only thing that I can connect with like my history in like hospitality. And you know, it's been,
00:25:19
Speaker
10 years since I started working hospitality and I just did that for myself like a self um birthday present yeah and Funnily enough a year after I had this tattoo I was working at Stomping Ground which was the first brewery that I worked in yeah and was that was that where the sort of the progression through the Cicerone program started then because they've always they were one of the first to be really on the case with pushing and people to do that sort of training? 100%. Like Matt Marinette. Cassie was cassie one of the first through as well? Yeah, I mean, like ah Cassie was there. She was already a Cicerone. There were a few Cicerones there um which I hadn't even like heard about. like I was kind of focused on working in wine or like hospitality, but one of my friends that I had worked with in another venue had started a stomping, and he was like, Hey man, they're doing this beer training every single day, like every single Wednesday. Like you will love it here. you and Like every week he will like message me again. It's like, man, you need to come here. Like, I feel like you will really like working in this venue.
00:26:20
Speaker
And yeah, like I just started working there in very early November. So heading into the crazier time of the year. But yeah, beer trainings were happening.
00:26:32
Speaker
Matt Marnick was the venue manager around that time and for him beer education was something extremely important for service.
00:26:42
Speaker
but I seem to recall his Twitter handle back in the days when people still use that was the beer geek. Yeah, I think. um Yeah, so like he had this program going and then once the busier Christmas time in hospitality finished, um they were like, hey, we're going to do training for the upcoming CIS-HERON exam.
00:27:06
Speaker
That's around the time that Cesar was still doing all the handwritten exams and also takes an exam on the same day. And we started a 10 week program in January.
00:27:16
Speaker
And yeah, i just I never looked back. Like i started learning about it. And also, I don't think I've ever been so interested in... studying and just reading about like history, learning a little bit about um chemistry um and and also microbiology, I guess.
00:27:37
Speaker
And yeah, just fascinated with all of it. And after that, they basically had this whole idea that once you become a Cicerone and you're working for Stomping Ground, you can start participating in the events and like hosting them and then hosting the the trainings as well.
00:27:55
Speaker
So like it's something of like not only they're encouraging the people to become better beer professionals, but they're also allowing them to grow as beer professionals by doing these other things. And yeah, it was an incredible experience. I'm very thankful to to Stomping Ground and and Matt particularly for motivating me and...
00:28:19
Speaker
knowing that I was like really into this and that I could do well. And yeah, it's an honestly the start of the oh this career that I kind of ended up going
EduBeer: A Beer Education Project
00:28:29
Speaker
into.
00:28:29
Speaker
And just to step back, just in case anyone listening doesn't know what the Cicerone program is, can you give people an idea of what it is and guess what the purpose is? Yeah, so the Cicerone certification program is a program that has different levels of study to progress as a beer professional.
00:28:49
Speaker
So it starts with the certified beer server, um which is like an online test that you take where you learn um basics of beer styles and a little bit of history and just how good and good beer service is done.
00:29:07
Speaker
how how, why ah clean beer glass is important and how to get that and how to pour a beer without wasting too much fun and, you know, some quick troubleshootings.
00:29:19
Speaker
And then you progress into becoming a Cicerone. So level two is the certified Cicerone. Level three is advanced Cicerone and it gets more and more complicated learning more about tasting and going way more into depth and also more learning like the the technical stats of each one of the different beer styles and then the last level, level four, would be ah Master Cicerone.
00:29:47
Speaker
which is just like... Is that something called that right now? You need a bit of a break because you've just done advanced, right? Yeah, I mean, like, now it'll be two years since I did my advance. I think I did need two years of a break after how intense it was. Yeah.
00:30:06
Speaker
But yeah, i think I think I do want to do it. um I just really need to think about the time and cost that that involves. Not only because of the amount of beers that you need to try, and and obviously, beers not getting any cheaper, but also the amount of time that you need to invest.
00:30:25
Speaker
And I kind of want to travel to a few places that do certain beer styles. I would love to go to Europe.
00:30:37
Speaker
and try like a call service directly or like and try these beers, not just the traditional ones that you get imported that a lot of times they're not at their best, but try all these things fresh um while while studying, while learning about the history. I think it allowed me to, first of all, have a great time. I was about to say, it doesn't sound like the worst. Work trip going. But also to like immerse myself really into all this. i If I want to become a master's historian, I don't want to just like pass a test. I write i really want to like know that I actually know all these things from the source.
00:31:17
Speaker
and And if there's any, you know, bar owners or pub owners or, you know, brewery venue owners out there, why do you think it matters for, you know, staff or even owners to do this sort of training?
00:31:29
Speaker
Yeah, I think like in in any case, just even just having mean like certified beer servers just allows you to have staff that know their products so much better.
00:31:41
Speaker
um It allows them to have a standard of how these ah some of these beer styles and how these beverages in general should be poured and it allowed them also to guide their, well, Cicerone or Cicerone means guide. So basically to guide someone to the right product, to the right beer.
00:32:06
Speaker
A lot of people that are going to Cicerone because you learn about keeping and serving beer styles, history, um draft systems, and beer and food pairing, they get the chance to also so um like work with the seller and you know how to keep beers and how to pour them at the best. and And also how to troubleshoot draft systems, which a lot of times you get staff that like just don't know how to how to do it. And there's always like a manager or maybe a supervisor that knows had this stuff. But when you have people who understand this in a different way, um they might find solutions for your draft systems where you don't usually see them.
00:32:51
Speaker
And ultimately happier customers, you'd hope, at the end the day. Exactly. In the end, that's what you do. It's all about just creating a better experience for your customer. And you're working on a bit of a sort of project to help the people in beer do that, right, in Australia? Tell us about it. Yeah. So um one of the things that I noticed the most um while I was studying for the Cizeron program is that it's really hard to get some of these traditional styles, especially from Europe or from the U.S.,
00:33:21
Speaker
um and get them fresh. um Nowadays, the the industry in Australia is spectacular. And there's far less being imported as well anyway. Yeah, exactly. like There's far less being imported because the industry just makes such great beer and they make all these different styles. So like a lot of times you you don't see that many American beers being imported anymore. Even as a carwin sellers that we do Pano Virgin USA, it gets harder and harder to import beer. Now we work with specific importers to get that beer in.
00:33:56
Speaker
But before you would get like just multiple people like offering it. Yeah, knocking at the door going, hey, take some of us, take some of us, yeah. um So I think, and I mean, like you you'll be able to find like your German beers and um some some British ones occasionally, some some American ones.
00:34:17
Speaker
but a lot of times they won't be at their best state. And I think because Australia is making such great beer, there are a lot of a lot of commercial examples that do fit these guidelines perfectly. yeah And people don't know that. And like sometimes these are hidden behind you know the beer name, the wacky beer name, but like, oh, that's a Swickle beer, actually.
00:34:43
Speaker
Or they will have a... They will have ah a beer that they just call a draft, yeah but it turns out that one is a Kolsch, or it's actually a German Pils, or it's an excellent Helles, but they're not going to call them their traditional name. They're just going to call it a draft, and they're going to call it a Laga, just so it's more commercially viable to be sold. And then the idea with this is that I guess if someone's doing, say, the BJCP um training or just looking at, say, the BA style guide guidelines from the States, they'll always have a list of beers that are kind of like the platonic ideal of what their style is.
00:35:19
Speaker
And they're the ones you can't get over here. So you're trying to create like an alternative suite of beers that are regularly available in Australia that you can go, this is the beer you should be having to understand. Exactly. So um just because like, you know, there will be like seven or eight different beers that they put on that list. Maybe only one makes it to Australia and maybe only one makes it, but only once a year.
00:35:42
Speaker
um So ah I think like it'll be good to just have ah a place that people can go in. It's like, oh, this brewery does do a red ale, but it comes once a year, but it will be their red ale, you know?
00:35:54
Speaker
um or like the the American Amberle that people are like looking for. Or they'll have like, where I can find an Imperial stud that is only an Imperial stud and it actually fits the guidelines for like the the classic Imperial stud. Ah, this one comes out every year.
00:36:12
Speaker
And there's others that will be constantly coming out. It's like an American pale ale. Which one of all these pale ales that you see in Australia, it's an actual American pale ale? And some are hazy, some are XBA, some are super lean, some aren't as multiple as they might be in the guidelines or something. where do you fit it? So that's what I've been trying to do. I have a little list and I want to continue growing it.
00:36:35
Speaker
I've been talking to like a few brewers, but I do want to get their name out there and eventually... try to get more breweries to um send let me know about their styles and tell me like, hey our lager is actually this style, why don't you try it and see if you think it fits during the guidelines. And I felt like ah I wanted to do this for a very long time because the more I've been in involved in the industry since I took my Cicero and then did my BGCP training,
00:37:03
Speaker
um the harder it's been to like go back and find those styles like english sales are so hard to find nowadays um and i know i know you have a bigger appreciation for them yeah they almost always seem to be pretty cooked as well like any hot character seems to have Gone by the time they get here. And then they're papery or like almost a honey-like character, a few of them. And yeah, like this is not what it tastes like. It shouldn't be like this profile. It shouldn't be just this pure bitterness. Where's that like nice, bright, mold character complexity with that little bit of floral hop that you might be...
00:37:41
Speaker
Finding those styles and yeah, i just want to create something that kind of holds all those styles together. So it's easier for people studying for this, but also homebrewers who want to like tackle a different different beer style because they they want to do something different. Rather than just reading it should be like, they can taste one and go, oh, this is what I'm aiming for. Yeah, exactly. Or professional brewers that also want to try something new and try different different styles. Because a lot of times, unfortunately, you also see breweries that will do a beer that is called a certain style and then it actually doesn't fit that style at all.
00:38:20
Speaker
Just marketing told them that was going to sell. Yeah, exactly. Like, you know, um a higher ABV, be it like Doppelbog or a Scotch Ale or something like that. And then, like, you try them and it's, like, really one-dimensional, none of that mold complexity. They're even lower ABV, like 5.8% instead of, like, a style that might start around, like, 7 8.
00:38:43
Speaker
So those those kind of things, like, to be able to say, like, oh, yeah, like, I'm not... I'm not saying that you should call that beer differently, but, you know, I want to have something that it actually fits the guidelines. Yeah, because a lot of beer might not want it to fit a style, but it sort of vaguely does, so it fits there. Yeah, somewhat it gets somewhere around there, and, like, that's fine. Like, like there's there's also this thing about, like, not not trying to make everything fit, like, a specific style and do a modern take on on this, like,
00:39:14
Speaker
i You see a lot of modern breweries making like traditional styles but like a little bit more hobby, which is how the US has gotten really famous for. And you see so many American something something, American something. And that's just part of history of craft beer. It's just like grabbing something and making it.
00:39:31
Speaker
a little bit more modern, more ah palatable for the for whoever buys beer regionally. um But yeah, I think that that's the that's the whole purpose of this little side project of mine. Does it have a name?
00:39:47
Speaker
um I'm still trying to figure it out, but I think I kind of want to call it just the Australian company Beer Commercial Example Register or something like that. The whole idea is I want to put all the guidelines right next to it and then just add those commercial stuff at the bottom. So it's easy for someone who's studying the style. They can also see all the parameters and a little bit of that is the description.
00:40:12
Speaker
All done by BJCP or the American Brewers Association, which is the basically what they tell you to look at when studying for Cicero. Cool. Well, Tito, I think let's take a quick break.
00:40:26
Speaker
that Cheers. Cheers.
World Beer Cup Insights
00:40:30
Speaker
Hey brewers, here's the latest industry insight brought to you by the legends at American Canning Machines, providing the very best canned packaging solution for brewers around the world. It was another massive turnout at CBC 2026, where the energy was high and the common theme for breweries was retooling for today's market.
00:40:48
Speaker
Smart breweries are reshaping their businesses, right-sizing to focus on both their taproom experience and the distribution channels that they can control. Where possible, there's an increase in consolidation between breweries to maximise efficiencies and reap the benefits. Breweries are creating hospitality experiences that go beyond beer, with broader menus and drink offerings, play spaces for kids, food trucks, live music, live sport and more.
00:41:13
Speaker
They're carving out their space in communities, And that's driving greater demand for distributed product at higher prices and margins. If you're looking for guidance through a similar period of change, ACM have solutions ready and waiting for you.
00:41:26
Speaker
Give Scotty at American Canning Machines a call on 0431 755 602 today. Tito, and you're relatively freshly back the World Beer Cup. What was it like?
00:41:40
Speaker
freshly back from the world beer cup what was it like It was honestly, I think, the most incredible experience as a professional that I've had. I think, first of all, like the fact that I got to do phase one, which is at the Brewer Association warehouse, and it's in Colorado. And Colorado is such an iconic like beer capital within the US.
00:42:06
Speaker
It was just insane to go to so many places and see so much craft beer being poured everywhere. um It really like makes, like it forces you to immerse yourself immediately into the industry and how many things can I try while I'm here without ah you know getting too drunk or anything. Still being able to still be able to actually assess beers properly. yeah But the competition itself was just fantastic. Just getting the chance to rub elbows with some people who have created iconic beers and
00:42:40
Speaker
have participated in the beer industry since its beginning, you know, they've been around since the late 80s with breweries and just like moving around and doing all this stuff and hearing stories while we're judging and everyone's so low key and everyone respects each other so much, listens to each other. I think I had some great table captains and it was just such a beautiful, engaging experience to sometimes talk about one beer.
00:43:10
Speaker
And just like really go in depth and you can see everyone's passion and knowledge. No one showing off about about it or anything. was just absolutely incredible. And is it something you apply for? Were you invited? Like, hey how did you get there? you do have to apply.
00:43:26
Speaker
um and you have to get ah multiple referrals from people who have participate participated in the competition before. um i I think like i'll ah think people know that I'm like pretty social, especially with Ad Cowen.
00:43:41
Speaker
um But I've managed to meet so many incredible professionals that have gotten the chance to go and judge there. So I got their backing to to go. um One of them including someone that I met in the U.S. when I went to do my advanced intern exam.
00:43:57
Speaker
And she's judge that literally goes around the world judging beer competitions and just have her support me was like yeah incredible so yeah got selected um a lot of people will go straight into like phase one of the competition which is four days of judging and it's yeah pretty different experience from um the the avas which is the biggest other competition that i've done before yeah And so how big is the the World Beer Cup? Is it 8,000 entries each year or something like that? So it's so about four times three or four times the size of the ABBAs and I'm assuming hundreds of judges then? and Yeah, hundreds of judges in in the two different phases.
00:44:38
Speaker
So you do phase one, which is, as I said, like four days, full days of judging, morning session, afternoon session. very similar to what the AIBAs are here.
00:44:50
Speaker
But then there's phase two, which is wherever the craft beers conference is moving within the US. This year it happened to be in Philadelphia. and And in Philly, yeah, it's it was three more days of judging.
00:45:06
Speaker
But then you have the craft beer conference and also the awards, which is really cool. Did you do both rounds? Now, only this one. There's different judges for each round, do you? Yeah, different judges. As far as I know if anyone repeats the plate. You'd spend a long time in America as well if you wanted to do. Well, that's the thing. I got invited to go to the Craft Beer Conference, but that was a good 10 days after I finished. And I'm like, it's not that cheap to stay in the U.S. for 10 days.
Comparing Australian and US Beer Scenes
00:45:31
Speaker
yeah and then how does it work i are you in from sort of you know till 4pm each day different beer styles or yeah it's around like um i guess like 8 30 um or 9am that they'll begin and then they'll try to finish around midday maybe midday to 1pm to have lunch and then the afternoon session from like 1 30 or so um until 5.
00:45:59
Speaker
And then you stay, you do a different table with different people in the morning and different one in the afternoon. So you get the chance to actually meet a lot of people and go through a lot of different styles. But the way that it works there, different from the AIBAs, is that over there they...
00:46:18
Speaker
they will have all these in one category, but they'll do different phases of judging. So you'll get the first phase where the system that you do it through a tablet or laptop You basically fill out this entire like description of the style with different bars that you move around and it's very specific for the different parts of the beer, just talking about ah appearance and aroma and like any faults that you might find and flavor, general impression, any notes, that sort of thing. And that's phase one and everyone fills it up. So like the brewers will get a massive like ah description of their beer by five to six different people per table.
00:47:00
Speaker
But then once that a few of those those beers will move through to the next phase, you no longer have to do the full judging of that beer. Then it just becomes about like, you know, you checking your guidelines, you have your own notes, and then the brewers will get the feedback only from the table captain of why that beer moved to the next phase or not. So because some categories are just massive, like, for example, hazy IPA nowadays, like everyone wants to make the best haze in the world.
00:47:31
Speaker
and you have like seven faces until like it gets to the last table where you have like only six beers and only three will get medals. Yeah, and so a faulty beer sort of getting knocked out immediately, they're the ones that are just gone generally straight away. Yeah, very usually like happens to be like that, but there's certain beer styles where some faults are accepted. So sometimes they're a little bit higher than it should be, but everything else about that beer is really great. So they might move forward. to the next phase.
00:48:01
Speaker
um But they're basicly not going to make it to seven. But they're probably not going to make it to seven. Yeah. So it has to be like the best within the lot that actually fits the guideline. Like that's that's the main thing. Like sometimes you'll taste some incredible beer, but like that beer is not even closer to, close to like the darkness of a stout. Like, are you know, and it doesn't have the roast, but it's like the most delicious brown ale that you ever had in your life, but it's in the stout category. So fortunately that one won't, it's not going to make it.
00:48:28
Speaker
Yeah, you want you want to drink it, but it's not going to win a gold medal. Exactly. It's not going to get a gold medal. And different from the ABAs, this is like the Olympics. it's only It's only one gold, one silver, one bronze. yeah And that's it. And that's per category. And there's no overarching trophy.
00:48:47
Speaker
It's like just per category. And would you did you sort of notice, i mean, I'm assuming you'll have tasted a few different and styles over the four days. um How would you sort of um compare the the overall quality of the beers you were trying at the World Beer Cup to say when you do judging and in Australia?
00:49:05
Speaker
um I'd say for for a few specific styles, you could you could definitely definitely like tell the difference of live there the way that like people drink their beer there, like um judging some red ales and that sort of thing where for them it's like...
00:49:24
Speaker
what they love the most and they still keep on drinking and those styles have kind of not really grown in popularity and a lot of people have taken them out of their like core ranges um then you can really see the quality of those beers over there but Honestly, I think they're very much on par. like The one that I didn't notice that was like considerably better and I was like pretty blown away was the non-alc category. Because like yeah they're are at a whole different level there. like The market is so much bigger.
00:49:59
Speaker
ah So having the absolute best non-alc there really means a lot. And we're coming from all over the world as well, right? Exactly, they're coming from all over the world. yeah which the ABS also does, but i think the World Beer Cup goes even beyond. When you judge non-alc, is it done by non-alc style as well? Like non-alc Haiti, non-alc Lager, non-alc Pale? Or does it just get done as a sort of big non-alc category? Still a big non-alc category. Yeah, definitely. So you could be comparing non-alc stout to a light lager? Yeah. Yeah. like Okay. Yeah, we need to get some more like lager versus like hoppy or like fruited ones and i when we did, ah i think I think I got to do finals actually for that one.
00:50:42
Speaker
So i got to try like yeah the best one. And it was great to like, you know, like everyone's trying them and it's like, this is the best. And we're all like, all right, let's see our votes. And like everyone voted the same one as the best. I was like, okay, like that's just literally hands down. It's not just my appreciation. Like it really is the best the best. cool And what about the beer scenes more generally in the States? Like were there any beers blew you away or anything you saw was very different to Australia?
00:51:08
Speaker
Yeah, um I mean, I did get the chance to go to two incredible lager craft breweries. Bierstadt Lagerhaus, one of them? Bierstadt Lagerhaus, one of them. like and but But then also Prost.
00:51:23
Speaker
and Is that in Denver as well? Oh, Colorado? Yeah, just outside of Denver. um And they had like some of the most incredible like ah production facility that I've seen. Like, honestly, huge open fermenters for lagers and ales.
00:51:38
Speaker
like And you see the vats there just like open but like surrounded with glass and no one can go in with the lab at the back and like just seeing everything and like, you know, the horizontal tanks and the special machines that I've never seen before.
00:51:54
Speaker
One of them looked like a UFO and it was just to extract like this, ah you know, like at the end of Men in Black when the two towers that like ended up being like ah actual like spaceships. like So one ah one of those machines looked like that. And it's it's to like extract that like ah potential sulfur or like of flavors just before they get into the packaging. It's just this type of stuff that was incredible.
00:52:20
Speaker
But even just like the ah the ipa is there, just like we have some incredible stuff here, but I went to one of the breweries called c so Cerebral Brewing, and they had won off a few awards at the JABF. So i for me, that was in my mind when when i was going to head there.
00:52:39
Speaker
And I went there, and I was just trying all the hazes, and I was like, every single one is just insanely good. They're wildly drinkable, aren't they? Yeah. Well, in like that 7%, 8% sort of. Yeah, exactly. And they will pour you a big pour of it and you won't realize after you like, I feel like, oh God, like, it's catching up. But yeah, no, absolutely blown away by the scene. But one of the things that I actually like,
00:53:05
Speaker
really blew me away about the beer industry there is just the amount of young people that were like going into, and you know, their pubs, but they mostly, they they'll have, you know, one course banquet maybe like on tap.
00:53:19
Speaker
All the rest will be local IPAs just craft beer, some classics there like Odell's or New Belgium. um and yeah they'll all be drinking beer yeah yeah and i think in my it's got to be a bit of a colorado thing but i've seen the amount of young people just like drinking craft beer was really impressive but maybe they're you know we follow if the cycle's moving a bit quicker over there and people are coming back in that's what we can what we can hope for over here we can hope for yeah exactly having said that we need to stop the uh you know the big hospital companies from booting everyone off tap as well though yeah and then that's the thing that was just so great to like yeah they they will have some of the big beer names there but it'll be just one or two it won't be half of the tap list taken over by them yeah yeah what about um any other beer experiences that have blown you away when you've been traveling whether in australia or overseas
00:54:15
Speaker
I mean, i've I've gotten the chance to do so many incredible things um and working at Cowen. um I got the chance to get involved with Denver and Lydley within my first year of working at Cowen.
00:54:30
Speaker
Behind the very special beer glass. Behind the beer glass. That was just insane for me to like go from being a bartender and especially after COVID which was um really bad for me as an international student back then where you know the businesses cannot really support you and I'm a casual worker.
00:54:54
Speaker
um to move to Carwin and first of all it's a bottle shop so I can actually get a few shifts like working at the bottle shop um but also getting the support from the government and getting the chance to participate in these events and like participate in the making of this glass and being considered a professional At the same time, it's like, oh, Tito has like you know beer studies and he will be like our own beer professional that's participating in the and the design of this class was pretty special.
00:55:30
Speaker
But in the US, I got the chance to participate in a brew day, which was... really improvised and it's like, hey, would you like to come in and like we're doing this special beer um for for an event and just getting to meet brewers there and like spend a day like, you know, I've done a lot of brew days with with Cowan, but like getting invited to the one in the US, it just feels like a a little bit extra special, very unplanned and it just not amazing.
00:56:01
Speaker
um But yeah, I don't know, like there's so many like cool events and I try to get I really like chatting and meeting people and getting involved with the core of like each business and like who are the people like that that really care, that that they're passionate and things like that is how I managed to go to see like spend a weekend can at Wildflower on the, doing Swansea working there with Mish, who invited me over, and then participating on their last big bottle share and then being able to stay and like,
00:56:43
Speaker
be with the the family and the business and the workers there. Yeah, you know, it's ah like those moments are things that I like i hold dear in my heart um and like are the things that like have marked me the most, I think.
00:56:59
Speaker
Just being able to get the, like I feel like the the human component sometimes goes beyond the the beer component of being of working in this industry. Yes, the connection, isn't it? Beer is kind of the the thing that might bring us together or the lubricant, but I think if you ever hang out, you know, whether it's during Pine of Oralways, people from another brewery, you very rarely talk about the the the beer once you get past it. Yeah. It's family or it's music or it's something something else.
00:57:27
Speaker
Yeah, no, exactly. Like, it just like it it takes everything to just the next level. Like, it's so special to be able to participate in the in those things.
Chilean Beer Scene Evolution
00:57:38
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:39
Speaker
ah You talked to earlier her about how you felt this sort of the beer scene in Chile sort of took off the year after you left, but obviously you've been traveling back back and forth a fair bit. um if you Have you had much chance to sort of see where the beer scene is in Chile now and how it, I is there a particular sort of culture culture or trends, you are the particular flavors or styles that, you know take off there more than they would over here?
00:58:00
Speaker
Yeah, um I think there's ah there's a few things like that in in Chile people still love an amber ale. It's great. I love it. like I just like the fact that I can go to any of the beer venues and I will find an an amber or red ale that will taste really good.
00:58:19
Speaker
um I think lagers are slow slowly starting to take over a bit like they did here a a few a few years back, and now some of them are actually like sticking around.
00:58:30
Speaker
um They love their dark beer. like In Chile, stouts are a year-round beer. It's not like here where... like In summer, you barely see any around, only if they're in core ranges. And ah a lot of breweries have taken their dark beers of their core range because they don't move as much.
00:58:53
Speaker
But in Chile, it's an all-year-round thing. Are they lighter stouts then, or is it just any sort of stout? just that People just love their malts. They love their malts, like multi-beals. But cases have like really taken off. And there's some breweries that are making some absolutely incredible cases.
00:59:12
Speaker
Also, the tap rooms have changed quite a bit. There's been a lot of places that have opened up and closed since, also with COVID in between. The scene is like struggling in the same way that I think a every like beer scene is struggling worldwide.
00:59:29
Speaker
just in terms of like younger people maybe not drinking as much or people taking a bit of a step outside of like a drinking alcohol and just longer breaks or drinking less.
00:59:42
Speaker
um But and it's nice to see like some styles like, you know, Catarina Sours, which is such as Brazilian style of fruited sours that like is really popular there in in Chile.
00:59:54
Speaker
And yeah, like Oktoberfest that are like really focused on quality of a good lager. um And the tap rooms are just like becoming so much nicer and like better food and slowly like elevating those elements, I think, has changed.
01:00:11
Speaker
um tama Tamango, for example, is one of those breweries that have really taken on the hazy IPA mantle and they're leaders in the industry, I believe.
01:00:23
Speaker
And they just opened over the last couple of years this like beautiful restaurant in a really nice part of the of the city that has some amazing food at the same time that they're pouring 15 different and beers, mostly IPAs from their taps. And that's amazing to see because you can tell that like there is definitely a market and a group of people that love their elevated gastronomical experiences around beer.
01:00:55
Speaker
So you're not missing out when you go back to see, you know, folks back home. Yeah. No, I'm not. I'll make an effort to go see how the venues are doing and what's new, what's great.
01:01:08
Speaker
So people you know in the industry there, when they come back, it's like, oh oh, here's the here's the expert returned from overseas. Tito, can you let us know how our beers going? Well, like I actually had never really gotten that involved with the air craft beer industry in Chile. It was because of an American advanced Cicerone that like introduced me to a couple of Cicerones over there. And that's how I kind of kept contact. Even during COVID, I got an interview to appear on a podcast over there. But I was like, hey, I'm like currently unemployed. like You know, the whole city shut down. yeah really Exactly. So, um but last year I was going back and Natalia, this advanced Ciceroan, first advanced Ciceroan from Chile, She organized a little season get-together and I got the chance to meet a lot of people from the industry.
01:02:01
Speaker
And we happened to repeat that at the end of the year when I went back. And on the first weekend of January, we met up again and like I saw all these people and just we just chatted. And it it was a much bigger gathering. So I feel like I'm finally like getting to meet the people there. But like yeah, I don't think i' like anyone really knows me outside of those people that...
01:02:22
Speaker
have gotten involved or they're following socials and I'll get tagged or like something like that. but i Here he is promoting other events. i guess What color is his hair this time? So yeah, ah I don't think I really have a name in the industry there. um But I would love to get involved and maybe like do something and bring some Australian beers over and maybe do an event with ah with a local beer venue and do a big tasting.
01:02:47
Speaker
That seems to be like something that works out really well there. Pint of Origin Chile for 2027. A boy can dream. yeah
The Cultural Connection: Beer and Music
01:02:57
Speaker
um And I guess I know you're saying that you're not currently playing in a band, but you did have a big jam session over the weekend. I know music's been a big part of your life. So um before we sign off, um do you have any favorite beer and music pairings?
01:03:12
Speaker
Yeah, I gotta say, like, I love my, like, ah British punk with some good bitters.
01:03:20
Speaker
For some reason, American Pale Ale's, immediately think of, you know, ah pop punk and that sort of thing. I just think of, like, Green Day and, like, Blink-182, and I just think of...
01:03:31
Speaker
um you know, um West Coast hops and that sort of thing. um and i And I think this might be because of of Chile and a lot of US breweries and the way that they make their labels. But Imperial Stats and metal, that's just, it's almost a given, you know? Is there any is there any style of music and style beer or style beer don't like? I feel like you have such a broad taste in in both.
01:03:57
Speaker
ah I don't really think that there's any like beer styles that I don't like. um i I really try to challenge myself whenever I don't like something to try it so many times that eventually i end up liking it.
01:04:11
Speaker
Immersion therapy. And music as well. You just turn it up to 11 and sit in the room. Yeah, i'm i'm I'm always open to like listening to things. I think it's all based around the mood that you're in. Like, ah I'm not going to say that i like I listen to a lot of like black metal or anything like that, but sometimes I'm hanging out with mates and like they'll be like listening to their music and like, oh, this is a vibe.
01:04:35
Speaker
Yeah, I'm really open to all of that and just continue blending styles, both in music and beer. Right. Wonderful. Thank you for joining us, Tito. Thank you. Cheers.
Podcast Conclusion and Credits
01:04:45
Speaker
Cheers, guys.
01:04:48
Speaker
The Crafty Pint podcast is produced and edited by Matt Hoffman. You can get all your beer-related news and reviews on the Crafty Pint website, craftypint.com, and can stay up to date on future podcast episodes via our socials.
01:05:02
Speaker
We wouldn't be able to produce the podcast or the website, events or festivals we run without the support of the beer industry, whether that's suppliers, bars, breweries or bottle shops. If you'd like to support the show or partner with The Crafty Pine in other ways, please reach out to Craig via the details in the show notes.
01:05:18
Speaker
And if you're a beer lover who'd like to support what we do, you can join our exclusive club for beer lovers, The Crafty Cabal. Visit craftycabal.com for more. And until next time, drink good beer.