Win A Year’s Supply of Coopers Beer

Such are their vast numbers in London town, you’re famously never more than five metres from a rat … or one metre from an Australian. Unless of course you’re trying to get served by one – an Australian, not a rat – in one of the city’s pubs or bars, at which point they invariably contrive to be well out of earshot, too busy wearing flip-flops in the winter; working out how they can fit 36 fellow shackle-draggers into a two-bedroom flat in Earl’s Court or serving another customer an order of drinks they didn’t ask for before slowly counting out the wrong change.

And decent Australian beer has, up until now, equally elusive. Michael Jackson, the beer writer not the baby dangling dude, once said “the more macho, muscular and tanned a society, the blander its beers. See Australia”. And he wasn’t wrong. In revenge for us sending over those of less savoury characters a couple of centuries ago, the Australians seemed to have returned the favour and not, alas, the flavour – see Foster’s, Castlemaine XXXX et cetera.

But, fair dinkum, Australia is actually now brewing some bonza brews and is home to a cracking craft brewing culture with lots of winemakers now turning their hand to brewing.  Perhaps the most impressive drops from Down Under come courtesy of the Coopers Brewery in Adelaide, which happens to be the same town in which England recently gave Australia a proper spanking in the cricket.

Founded in 1862 by Yorkshireman Thomas Cooper, Coopers is Australia’s oldest and biggest craft brewer and specialises in boss bottle-conditioned beers including a Burton-style pale ale, a superb Sparkling Ale and a Vintage Ale which beer boffins get really rather excited about.

Coopers make their beer using the Champagne Method, with the second fermentation taking place in the bottle. This means you need to roll or turn your bottle before you drink it to incorporate the yeast (it’s good for you) – the result is a glass of famously cloudy Coopers beer.

Anyway, the reason Dwink is telling you all this, is that it’s offering you the chance to win a year’s supply of Coopers. That’s 365 bottles of Aussie ales. In fact, it’s more than that as it’s 16 cases which means you’ve got 19 bottles spare. It’s a gift that keeps on giving.

How to Win:

All you have to do win is simply upload a video showing how you prefer to turn or roll your bottle before you drink it, and send us the link.

Here are the rules (ironic given that it’s a penal colony):
• All videos must be uploaded to YouTube (no other file sharing site)
• Once uploaded, send your link to coopersbeerforayear@yahoo.com
• Videos must not exceed 30 seconds
• You may enter as many times as you like
• Entries must be recieved by midnight on Wednesday December 22nd
• By entering, you give permission for your video to be used by both Bibendum and Coopers

More rules are here:

And you can see some of the early entries here

The best video will be chosen on Christmas Eve, and the winner notified on December 28th, so you’ll be able to start 2011 drinking the finest thing to come out of Australia since Ailsa’s comedy hamburger telephone.

You can even choose to have the beer delivered to you in time for New Years Eve.

If Coopers is not stocked in your bar, ask your local Majestic to get some in for you, or order online from www.slurp.co.uk or www.sanza.co.uk

Get rolling (or turning) and good luck.   

Dwink