Generic year end post

Yay! It's been another wonderful year in Beerland. Innovation continues unabated, even if it is mostly in the form of pricing and can design.

I've been doing my best to keep up with the times. Several sludge IPAs have passed my lips. If only because I'm not going to waste a beer ordered accidentally. Some fruity sour things, too. But in the acceptable form of Catharina Sours. Usually I wouldn't spit in a kettle sour.

My beer style of the year is Sludge IPA with Fruit and Shit. Which just edged out Kettle Sour with Fruit and Shit. A really close one this year. Not that I drink either on purpose. (See above.)

Best new beer. St. Bernardus Abt. Well they changed the label this year. That makes it new, doesn't it?

Best cask beer. Not having been to the UK much, I've not drunk much of the one true beer. Did have a nice pint of London Pride a couple of weeks back.

Best US beer. Dovetail Helles is hard to beat. But Sierra Nevada Pale Ale on cask did. Why don't they always serve it this way?

Best continental beer. Perhaps a beer you haven't heard of: St. Bernardus Abt. I predict it's going to be big.

Best beer brewed to one of my recipes. Quite a few to choose from here. Goose Island's Black Eagle was pretty tasty. And I've drunk quite a bit of Butcher's Tears Monster Soup SSS. But, just for being very different, I'll have to go with Good Word's Donker Lagerbier, based on a 1930s Heineken recipe. A beer I'd wanted to try for a while. And they gave me free beer all day.

Best beer in an unexpected place. Club Colombia Negra in Cartagena was a very pleasant surprise. Almost like a Dark Mild.

Best beer overall. Bit of a surprise this year. It's St. Bernardus Abt. Who would have guessed that?

Best selection of cask Milds. Can only go to Machine House who had five on when I dropped by in August. 

Best beer festival. After years of running all over Europe chasing festivals, I'm now using these three criteria to determine if one's worth going to.
- Plenty of seats.
- Half litre measures.
- Within walking distance of my home.

I attended both eligible festivals: Pivo and Bayerischer Anstich Fest at Butcher's Tears. Both full of lovely Lager served in a proper measure.

Best pub crawl. An afternoon trawling around Atlanta with Stan was good fun. But best can only go to the fortnight-long pub crawl masquerading as a holiday with the kids. Especially our day in Mexico.

Best Wetherspoons. Not visited that many this year. Of those, the one in Folkestone just edges the others out, as it was the cheapest. Which is how I judge my Spoons.

Best brewpub. Has to be Good Word as they plied me with free beer all day.

Best book has to be Statistical Handbbook 2022. Unhindered by too many words and stuffed full of juicy numbers. Yum!

Best junket is a difficult one. I've been on so many. The year has just been all oysters, caviar and champagne. My Brazil trips were fun, but I had to pay for my own airfare. While Ale Through the Ages at Colonial Williamsburg not only paid all my expenses, I also got a fee! And I did get to geek out for several days with some of my best beer chums.

That's it for another year. Thankfully. Be interesting to see if I've got the energy for this next year.