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Stone Arrogant Bastard Ale Best Damn Beer Shop ABV: 7.2% Origin: Escondido, California, USA Website: www.stonebrew.com Stone is the original bad boy brewer, with brand values that deliberately risk alienating certain groups of potential customers in order to boost the affinity of others. Offset by an obvious sense of humour and backed up […] Rodenbach Grand Cru Top Tastings 2012 ABV: 6% Origin: Roeselare, Oost-Vlaanderen Website: www.palm.be Beer writers and experts tend to have different drinking habits from ordinary beer drinkers. To keep ourselves well informed and authoritative, we’re usually tasting beers we haven’t tried before, and find ourselves passing on the popular and familiar by. In […] Panil Barriquée Sour Top Tastings 2012 ABV: 8% Origin: Torrechiara, Emilia-Romagna, Italy Website: www.panilbeer.com Italian craft brewers and drinkers seem to have taken easily to perceiving beer through a similar mindset to that used for wine. It’s an artisanal product with a definite provenance, served with food from attractive 750ml bottles. Some of […] The unlikely handpump that lured the bloggerati — Greene King Old 5X on cask at the Great British Beer Festival, London, August 2012. Top Tastings 2012 ABV: 12% Origin: Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, England Website: www.greeneking.co.uk It has to be admitted that these days the Greene King bar is rarely the hottest place […] Gueuze Girardin 1882 (Zwart etiket) Top Tastings 2012 ABV: 5% Origin: Sint-Ulriks-Kapelle, Vlaams-Brabant, Vlaanderen Website: www.brouwerijgirardin.com Girardin is arguably the most consistently and rootedly traditional of all the lambic breweries. The others were either founded since the self conscious revivalism of the 1970s or, like Cantillon, heavily influenced by it – or at […] FiftyFifty Eclipse Imperial Stout 2011, white wax version Top Tastings 2012 ABV: 9.5% Origin: Truckee, California, USA Website: www.fiftyfiftybrewing.com Craft brewers, particularly in the United States, are increasingly recognising the potential for “event beers” and limited editions in capturing the growing market of beer connoisseurs prepared to pay over the odds for something […] Deschutes / Hair of the Dog Conflux No 1 — Collage Top Tastings 2012 ABV: 11.6% Origin: Bend, Oregon, USA Website: www.deschutesbrewery.com, www.hairofthedog.com Two of the best known and highest achieving craft breweries in the general vicinity of Portland, Oregon, got together to produce this long anticipated collaboration beer. Over two years in […] European Beer Bloggers Conference 2012 Birra del Borgo Equilibrista ABV: 10.9% Origin: Borgorose, Latium, Italy Website: www.birradelborgo.it Even the most experienced beer taster ultimately comes up against subjective judgement and hazy guesses about brewers’ intentions when evaluating beers, particularly those that push the envelope of categories. Plenty of professionals struggle with lambics and […] Zythos Bierfestival 2012 ABV: 9% Origin: Baarle-Hertog, Antwerpen, Vlaanderen Website: www.dedochtervandekorenaar.be De Dochter van de Korenaar Peated Oak Aged Embrasse, Zythos Bierfestival, Leuven 2012 De Dochter van de Korenaar (‘the ear of corn’s daughter’, a poetic expression for beer) is a Belgian brewery, but only just. It was founded by a former home […] Top Tastings 2011 ABV: 13% Origin: Chicago, Illinois, USA Website: www.gooseisland.com Goose Island Bourbon County Brand Coffee Stout I’ve been a fan of Chicago’s Goose Island beers ever since receiving some review samples of their pale ales when they were first imported to the UK (see Goose Island Honker’s Ale), and their pioneering […] |
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