Purity, skin in the game, and when Capitalism spits on you
I recently had a quite brief conversation with a person who is intimately acquainted with a local brewery here in Fort Wayne, IN, and whose livelihood is dependent upon selling the beer that said...
Legacy drinkers and the assault on
Belgium, England and Germany
I *think* that I coined the term legacy drinker. I never remember hearing it anywhere else. If that's not true, apologies. So, what does 'legacy drinker' mean? My definition varies from day to day...
Ambivalence, indifference, me, evolution, and Stone in 2015
Before you read this please know that I'm not really sure what I am trying to convey here, so I think this post is more likely to turn out to be a stream of consciousness rather than anything...
Session #94 – The Round-up
As usual with The Session, some posts are more interesting than others. Here's the round-up for #94 in no particular order. Miguel gives us this post at Amante De La Buena Cerveza. Unfortunately I...
Atlanta Cask Ale (#ACAT) 2014
So here I am, on the morning of another Atlanta Cask Ale Tasting (#ACAT), but this time I am not getting ready to head to the event later in the day. The #ACAT of 2014 will be the first one that I...
Pant-wetting fanboys and the US beer scene
Last night I got into a bit of a clumsy discussion on Twitter that ended very unsatisfactorily for me. Frankly it was my own fault, and I wanted to clear up my thoughts a little. In a nutshell, I...
Ding’s Christmas Wish List 2013
Here I go again with my annual Christmas wish list. The things I want Santa to deliver to my beer world. It goes without saying (I think), that the old chestnuts of me wanting the abuse of cask beer...
Me on (in) Draft (Magazine)
Last Wednesday I received an email from Chris Staten. Chris is an editor at Draft magazine. He asked me to respond to a few, simple questions about my public beer persona for an article that he was...
Twisted South – the article that never was
In February of this year I was asked by a person that follows me on Twitter to write a counter-point article for Twisted South magazine. After 0ver 9 months of being told that 'it will be published...
Why I’ve stopped going to The Brick Store
After my decision last January not to attend Atlanta Cask Ale ’14 this coming January, the very event that I thought would be the one that kept me sane in terms of real ale in America, I started to...
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Hypocrisy, FRESH and on tap!
It's always heart-warming to be reminded from time to time that there are so many of us out there that belong to the, 'mistreated by beeradvocate.com', club. My own story is well-documented, and...
Session #80 – The Craft Beer Bubble
The first Friday in October '13 brings us Session #80, where Derek Harrison at It's Not Just The Alcohol Talking asks, 'Is Craft Beer a Bubble?'. I'm no economist, and in any case economics is a...
Session #79 – The round up and a few rebuttals
OK, Session #79 is now over and the thoughts of many have been recorded for posterity. There weren't quite as many posts as I was expecting, and some of the writing wasn't very good, but here's my...
Session #79 – USA versus Old World Beer Culture
OK, here we go with the blog post that you've read before. Why do I say that? Well essentially this is a post that I've written umpteen times over, just in varying guises. In those past posts I have...
Session #79 – The announcement. Friday, Sept. 6th – USA versus Old World Beer Culture
The Session, a.k.a. 'Beer Blogging Friday', is an opportunity once a month for beer bloggers from around the world to get together and write from their own unique perspective on a single topic. Each...
Beer Review: The Wrecking Bar, Ding – The English Bitter
Ding Points: 70.00 Pour: 70.00, Nose: 70.00, Palate: 70.00, Mouth: 70.00, Global: 70.00 Tasting Notes: I have not spoken to Bob Sandage about 'Ding', so I cannot comment on its origin with any...
Session Beer Day. Reflections
Well that was fun. Actually it was surprisingly uneventful, but four interesting things came out of it. Firstly I was surprised that I didn't lose any Twitter followers, at least I didn't lose any...
Session Beer Day 2013
So, it's here again, #sessionbeerday, this time on Sunday, April 7th, 2013. Mmmm, well it wouldn't be right for me to let the 2013 'event'* pass without comment (here's 2012's session beer day...
ACAT 2013 – The follow up
OK, following yesterdays 2013 Atlanta Cask Ale Tasting, and in the wake of this post, I wanted to follow up with a quick run down of the events and the beer as they unfolded. Firstly it was great to...
My cask tears – Atlanta Cask Ale Tasting 2013
So, I'm writing this just a few hours before attending Atlanta Cask Ale Tasting of 2013. In fact, I'm writing as the judging for today's event is actually taking place and I'm texting one of the...
Ding’s Christmas Wish List 2012
Following last years Christmas wish list, here goes the 2012 version. 10. Fresh Cotleigh beer in the Atlanta area, please. 9. Death to all, 'Special' beer 'days' (e.g., 'IPA Day', 'Stout Day' etc.)...
Beer cellaring – a new perspective and a re-think
To be honest, I never had any interest in cellaring beer until about 2003-04. I read some articles about this relatively new idea, and also became acquainted with kp. Keith (kp) is a pretty...
The search is over, and at the same time, just beginning
Yesterday was a pretty significant day in my little beer world. Was it a day that was characterized by me finding a long sought after bottle? No. Was it a day that I tasted and reviewed a super-rare...
Growler Stores, Place Reviews, Competition, Cumbaya and Boycotts
In my beeradvocate days, before the unforgivable debacle, I took pride in reviewing just about every beer venue that I traveled to. My view at the time was that I was doing the web site and...
‘Craft’ beer – what the hell is it and does it matter?
Warning: A Stream of Consciousness follows, that may or may not make much sense! A pretty lively and interesting conversation got thrown up on Twitter yesterday, and as usual it was an event (in...
The dearth of an American, ‘Beer Middle Class’
Most people reading this will be more than familiar with my opinions about the lack of beer culture here in the USA. My thoughts are well documented, and boil down to the fact that I do not see...
Beer Blogging – what the hell are people thinking?
This post has been on my mind for some time, and like most of my thoughts on a particular subject, they tend to require a whole bunch of things to come together before critical mass is achieved and...
Me, Lew, session beer and ‘session day’
OK, this post is not a rant about session beer (at least not a FULL rant about session beer), but rather some reflections about Lew's quest and the subsequent creation of 'session day' on April 7th...
Beer Snobbery
This is an important post. I'm tired of experience, discernment and real knowledge being mistaken for 'snobbery', and people considering all opinions to be equal and all beer knowledge to be...
Hopslam – it’s an annual annoyance, but for a new reason this year
It's January and I was expecting the hype machine surrounding Bell's Hopslam to piss me off (again) this year, but didn't really anticipate it aggravating me in the manner that it did. I was...
Ding’s Christmas Wish List 2011
Dear Father Christmas, Here is my wish list for this year. I hope that you can help me with some of these, I would love to find them under my tree. Your friend, Ding. I wish........ 10. That frozen...
‘Top 10’ myths that the US craft beer fad has perpetuated amongst the newbs, and (most disappointingly), even…
...amongst those that should know better. It's the time of year when many people reflect on the 12 months gone by, and often those reflections take the form of 'Top 10' lists. Such lists, whilst...
An awakening confirmed, and then re-affirmed by (another) return to my roots
About four years ago I drove like a madman, across the city (Atlanta), visiting four or five beer stores in the quest to find a few bottles of a relatively uncommonly distributed beer. A week later...
It would be really interesting to have an off-the-record chat with Jason Alström over a beer…
...or even Todd, but I would draw the line at the acidic Candice! In the past couple of weeks I have received a whole bunch of electronic correspondence about the apparently continuing spiral of...
In defence of the Oxford Companion to Beer (sort of….well, not really)…….
The much heralded arrival of 'the only beer book you'll ever need', AKA 'The Oxford Companion to Beer', has been characterized by some well respected folk (including a number of contributors to the...
Discretion. Where’s it gone? Actually, it was never here!
A little background: When I moved to Atlanta, GA in the summer of 2000, one of the first questions that I asked one of my new colleagues was, 'Where can I buy great beer in this town?'. Being a...
A beer revolution? No thanks!
If you are really, really 'into' beer and live in the USA, there's no way in the world that you don't know what the (beer) abbreviation 'CBS' stands for. If you are really, really 'into' beer but...
I’ll be down the PUB; or will I??
DISCLAIMER: I don't know if this post will make much sense since I am trying to get a load of stuff whizzing around my head into focus, but for now this is my best effort. I hope it conveys...
No wonder I STILL can’t find any session beer in the USA (and, please re-run the numbers Ken)
Anyone who knows me, also knows that my constant bitching & moaning about the lack of session beer in the US is a feature as fundamental to my being as my 'Englishness', so it has become a bit...
Beer Thoughts
Two weeks solid vacation with some superb beer behind me, it's time to get back to blogging. Some of you may have gathered by now that this blog only exists as a result of me being ejected from...
ABV’s & session beer; sanity & insanity – Part 2
Continuing my quest to highlight the misuse of the term session beer, here is part two of the 'Sanity & Insanity'. Read Part 1. References to Insanity William Bostwick in the Wall Street Journal...
ABV’s & session beer; sanity & insanity – Part 1
Following Sunday's, Session Beer rant, I'm going to start listing 'References to Sanity' and 'References to Insanity' as I come across them on the web. Here's the first installment, much more to...
New York Ale Project’s take on Session Beer, featuring….
...yours truly. Thought it was time to air this again in the wake of my session post of yesterday. Session Ales - The Ultimate Battle For the record, if standing up for tradition and fact makes me a...
Session Beer – an amalgamation of years and years of thoughts
OK, it's time to tackle the session beer post. Anyone that knows me (or has read my comments in beer cyberspace over the years), understands that this is a serious subject for me, and that I get...
10 reasons why it was better when fewer people knew about good beer
1. When a limited beer was released it used to be possible to stroll leisurely down to the store, anytime within the first couple of weeks of it being out, and pick up as much as you wanted. Now one...
What’s in a style? And are you in ‘Raptures’ over them?
OK, as far as I can tell there was no Rapture yesterday, so since I am still able to, I thought I should go ahead and blog about the Rapture's relationship with beer styles - yes, there IS a...
NOT a post about the ABV of session beer, but…..
...still me bitching and moaning about session beer! OK, I'm gonna hold the "correct ABV of session beer" rant for another post (that's going to be a long one!), but I just wanted to get this quick...
A ‘golden age’ of brewing? My ass…and BTW, get off my lawn
As I travel both literally and virtually around the US beer scene, I am constantly reminded by those that purport to 'know' that we are currently enjoying a 'golden age' of brewing. I suppose, that...