Your most significant beers of 2013?

[admin]

For me:

Most siginifant beer in general has been geuze.
Most significant local beer: Devil's Half Acre
Most significant homebrew: Jason Carroll's pistachio & vanilla ale or St. Fursey's Framboise.

[nigel_c]

For me:

Most siginifant beer in general has been Belgians (belgian dubbel + tripel l in particular)
Most significant local beer: Galway bay Of Foam & Fury
Most significant homebrew: The constancy and standards of Jacob's beers are second to none. (a fellow hop head)

Great year for Irish beers in general. Lots of new brewerys opening and the already established ones trying new and exciting recipes.
Looking forward to 2014.

Cheers 

[Bubbles]

Most significant beer for me over the last year has been my rediscovery of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale - the version on tap. A completely different beast than the bottled version. After all these years of chasing hoppier and hoppier beers, I'm finally appreciating malt-hop balance in American styles. Having said that, the two biggest hop bombs that have impressed me this year are To-ol's Final Frontier (as DANK as they come) and Sierra Nevada Hoptimum (jaw-droppingly bitter). A bit unoriginal, I know, choosing SN twice, but their beers are just so fantastic and above all, consistent.

For local beers, I'm going to pick Galway Bay's Full Sail. In my opinion, it was the first Irish "IPA" that actually lived up to the name. And I've probably drank more pints of it in 2013 than any other craft beer. With Metalman Pale Ale a close second.

For homebrews, there's a few that have stuck in my mind. AndrewL's medal-winning Black Pepper Saison. Ciderhead's Galway Hooker clone was a triumph - so much so, that I've assembled the ingredients to do my own version, though I doubt I'll make anything as good as this. And of course, anything I've tasted by Rossa was superb - baltic porter, Bramling X pale ale...

Happy Christmas to everyone, and enjoy your brewing over the holidays! 

[mr hoppy]

Commercial: Thornbridge Raven, Traquair House Jacobite Ale and Dangerously Close to Stupid
Local Commercial: Kinsale Black IPA on draught, seeing Franciscan Well's Rebel Red for sale in Tesco recently was significant
also, I've been drinking in the Well for 10 years and I never thought I'd see the day
Homebrew - 1. Taf and Blackbrew's beers opened my eyes to how much impact really heavy late hopping can have, something that isn't evident from past their best imports
2.- the barrel: I learned a lot more from just watching how other NHCers brew than I expected to. To be honest I've learnt a huge amount over the last year thanks to various NHC heads, and I'm not exactly a newbie!