Cyber Beer's Top Rated Beers Of 2018

Top Rated Beers Of 2018

Here are the 16 beers I rated 5 out of 5 in 2018

January

Tiny Rebel
Chocolate Stay Puft
5.2%
at The Cellar, Chester

March

Goose Island 

Burbon Country Brand Stout (2017)

14.1% 

at Dead Crafty Beer Company, Liverpool

Brass Castle
Bad Kitty
5.5%
at Head Of Steam, Liverpool

De Dochter Van De Korenaar

La Renaissance 1.5 Year Barrel Aged 

7% 

at Barcelona Beer Festival

April

Saltaire 

Triple Chocoholic 

4.8% 

at Kelham Island Tavern, Sheffield

Brew York

Imperial Tonkoko

7.5% 

at Beer Heroes Chester Craft Beer Festival

May

Founders 

Kentucky Breakfast Stout (KBS) 2017 
11.8% 

at Mikkeller Beer Celebration Copenhagen

3 Floyds 

Dark Lord (2018) 

15%

 at Mikkeller Beer Celebration Copenhagen

Kane Brewing Company 

A Night To End All Dawns

11.4%

at Mikkeller Beer Celebration Copenhagen

June

Grupa Zyweic 
Zyweic Porter
9,5%
at Hard Rock Cafe, Wroclaw

Browar Stu Mustow
WRCLW Imperial Stout
11%
at Wroclaw Good Beer Festival

August

Brew York 
X-Parrot Tropical IPA
6.5%
at Midnight Bell, Leeds

September

Dugges / Stillwater Artisanal
Tropic Thunder
4.5%
at Dead Crafty Beer Company, Liverpool

November

Mauldon's 
Black Adder
5.3%
at The North Western (Wetherspoons), Liverpool

Samuel Smith's 
Organic Chocolate Stout
5%
at Ye Olde Boot Inn, Chester

December

Hook Norton 
Twelve Days
5.5%
at The Brass Balance (Wetherspoons), Birkenhead

New Year’s Eve 2018

So.....  It’s New Year’s Eve 2018 and I’m off to Chester in First Class on Virgin Trains!

I’ll be celebrating midnight at The Cellar, but as I get in at 3:30pm, I’ll be hitting a few bars before that and getting to my destination for about 8pm.

Wishing everyone a Happy and Beery New Year.

Some interesting projects planned for 2019.

Have a good night and stay safe.

Cyber Beer

Excited for Collabageddon 2018

Its that time again....

10 UK breweries, 10 UK bars, 10 unique beers....  it can only be Collabageddon!

The 2018 edition has brought together Hale Brewing, Blackjack Beers, Elusive Brewing, Wild Weather, Pilot, Burning Soul, Twisted Barrel, 8 Arch, Anspach & Hobday and Bexar County.

The collab list is as follows....

Anspach & Hobday v Elusive
Bexar County v Burning Soul
Blackjack v Eight Arch
Burning Soul v Blackjack
Elusive v Pilot
Eight Arch x Bexar County
Hale v Twisted Barrel
Pilot v Hale
Twisted Barrel v Wild Weather
Wild Weather v Anspach & Hobday

I will be heading to Liverpool's Dead Crafty Beer Company to try five of these beers....  Whish five, I won't know 'til I arrive just after Midday.

Dead Crafty are launching five today (Friday) and five on Saturday.  I, unfortunately, am not available tomorrow, so I only get to try half.  But its half more that I tried of last year's event!

If you're coming down this afternoon, I'll see you there....

More blogging about the beers a little later.

Cyber Beer On Tour: Trip 1: Mikkeller Copenhagen Beer Celebration (MBCC) 11-12 May 2018

My second year at Mikkeller's beer festival in Copenhagen, the all session (pink) ticket costs the equivalent of around £300!  All you beer is included, but it comes in a collatable small glass, lined at 5ml.  

The sessions are coded by colour and all the beers change!  There is a beer list mobile app available.

The sessions are Yellow, Blue (Friday) and  Red, Green (Saturday).  Tickets are available for individual sessions or all sessions (Pink and Gold).  The first session starts about 10am and finishes at 2pm. The second session runs from 3pm - 8pm.

The festival itself is in an event space called Oskenhallen, which is a former warehouse in Copenhagen's Meat Packing District.

The floor layout was slightly different this year and seemed to be dominated by US breweries!

Most breweries had two taps per session, however there was a smaller "showcase" type section for microbreweries for the likes of China and South Korea, who had one tap each.

Some of the larger UK microbreweries  such as Cloudwater, Beavertown and Magic Rock were in attendance and always had long queues.

The longest queue, however, was for Swedish brewer Omnipollo, who's line ran the entire length of the festival!

Seating is provided, but unless you turn up right at the start of the session all the tables will have gone!

There is also a large outside area cordoned off at the front of the building with additional seating and toilet facilities, as well as food vendors and an area for Gold ticket holders.

The beer festival is the conclusion to Mikkeller Beer Week, which occurs at various venues throughout the city.

Accommodation in Copenhagen is also expensive.  I paid £1000 for a budget hotel a mile from the festival site

When you pay for beer in a bar its minimum £7 a pint (0.5l), though there are some amazing craft beer bars.  

MBCC and MBW is and expensive trip, but defiantly worth the experience just once.  Copenhagen itself is an amazingly beautiful city.

Beer News From Liverpool 04/04/18

Beer News

23 Club / Clove Hitch

It is with a heavy heart that I tell you that Liverpool's first craft beer bar, The 23 Club in the basement of 23 Hope Street, has closed its doors for good along with The Clove Hitch bar and restaurant that occupied the rest of the building.  I am lead to believe it has something to do with the condition of the building.

The 23 Club basement bar has had problems over the last year, the most significant lead to it being closed for about 13 weeks last summer. 

There may be some light as I have heard a rumour that a company from Manchester is interested in buying the building.

Liverpool Organic Brewery

I have recently heard that Liverpool Organic Brewery has called in the receivers and are currently looking to sell the business off as a going concern.  I hope a buyer can be found and we won't lose such great beers as Kitty Wilkinson.

This is purely the brewery.  Real Ale Events is unaffected.

Problems on Android devices

It has recently been brought to my attention that certain formatting aspects of the Blogger API do not work on the default Android web browser!  A friend has been having issues using is Android phone.  My soloution to the problem would be an immediate upgrade to an iOS device!!!!

I'm kidding guys!  I love all my readers, whatever OS you use. 

My honest solution would be to install an industry-standard browser such as Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome.  It confuses me why Google don't just bundle Chrome with Android.

As an iOS and PC user, the blog has been viewed on the mobile versions of Safari (default iOS browser), Chrome, Firefox,  Edge and Amazon's Silk browser on the Fire tablet. as well as on the desktop versions of  Chrome, Firefox and Edge.

I have encountered no issues with formatting.  Obviously the formatting for mobile devices greatly differs from their desktop counterparts, but that goes without saying. 

Taking The High Rope To Success

In 2014 two guys met at Liverpool's Home Brew Club.  Finding a shared interest in wrestling and beer, Neil and Ben collaborated on a beer for a home brew competition against their Manchester counterparts.  Liverpool Home Brew Club emerged victorious.  This winning beer would go on to become Top Rope's Overkill IPA.

In early 2015 the pair made the decision (most likely over a beer or two) to start their own microbrewery. Equipment and ingredients were ordered, recipes were concocted and Top Rope Brewing appeared in a shed at the end of a garden in Liverpool!

Shortly afterwards, Neil and Ben won 3 out of 5 categories in a homebrew competition run my BrewDog Liverpool.  This served as both a test for future recipes and an amazing sendoff from the homebrew world.

With a brewkit, recipes, artwork and obscure wrestling references in place, this wrestling-obsessed duo were ready to make beer the professional way!



Fast forward to 2018....

Business has been a success, the beer is flying out faster than the garden shed can handle.  It been a good base for these guys, but its time to move up.

And in spectacular style, they have purchased the now defunct Deva Craft Brewery at Sandycroft between Shotton an Chester.

While fans of Deva will be sad to see it go, it is a great site for the expanding Top Rope Brewing.

I wish Neil and Ben all the best in their new venture and success for 2018.

I can't wait to see what you guys come up with next.  I ma always looking forward to you next brew.