I don’t want to take anything away from Phillips or Rogue, as I like those particular products and in general like a lot of beer from those breweries. But most beer styles do not materialize out of nowhere. Here’s an illustration.

I had the other day a remarkable product from the Raven Ridge Cidery of Kelowna, BC. This was d’Anjou Pear, which I am pretty sure is the only iced perry in the world. That uniqueness does not mean that iced perry was developing in a vacuum. Raven Ridge has been an ice cider specialist since 2002, the first (and maybe still only) such specialist about of Quebec. Ice cider originated in the 1990s in La Belle Province. The first ice cider producer, Face Cachée de la Pomme, took inspiration from the icewines that put the Ontario wine industry on the map. What the Ontario winemakers did was to basically produce to a higher standard of quality and consistency a product that has existed for eons in Europe. In other words, d’Anjou Pear may be an entirely unique product but it is the result of an evolutionary process dating back goodness knows how many decades.

I was meditating on why Black Toque didn’t seem to me at the time like a landmark product. It came out in 2003 or 2004, so my first exposure would have been in 2005. I realized that it was similar to another product I’d had back in 2003, Corporal Punishment from Scotch Irish Brewing in Ontario. That one was described as “Bitter Brown Ale”. So using “bitter” instead of “India” to describe the hop level and “brown” instead of “dark” to describe the colour. Aside from being of regular strength rather than IPA strength, Corporal Punishment had the same profile melding dark malts with big hoppiness.

Corporal Punishment was a similar brew – albeit hoppier – to what was once described in homebrew circles as American Brown Ale. The word “American” was used to denote the extra hops, the same terminology as was used to separate Pale Ale by hop level at the same time in those same circles. I remember specifically a beer called Blue Ridge Hopfest Brown Ale, which appears to have now been discontinued. This is a relatively bitter, dry-hopped brown ale.

Hopfest itself didn’t come out of nowhere. I don’t know about today, but in the mid-1990s American Brown was certainly a widely recognized beer style among homebrewers. At some point in the 80s or even 70s, homebrewers were throwing extra hosp into their Newcastle or Sam Smith Nut Brown clones to sex them up a bit. Thirty years of evolution later we now have a style that people wish to give a new name to. It isn’t the style that we started out with. There is no guarantee that today’s examples will be anything more relevant in ten years than Blue Ridge Hopfest is today. The point is that it is very rare that an innovative idea comes entirely out of nowhere. There is precedent and there is evolution. When that evolution runs its course, we are left with a product that has found the right niche in the marketplace. Sooner or later, as we beer geeks and especially us beer style theorists know, a name will become commonplace. I have long sought to rid Ratebeer of geographic style names except where absolutely necessary (e.g. Berliner Weisse), because geographic style names run counter to the prevailing trend of globalization in craft beer style. So despite being a proud Cascadian, we probably won’t use that name on the site. Does that mean India Dark Ale the best name? Maybe. But maybe we’ll let the industry sort this one out.

However it shakes out, just know that this type of beer is delicious and it is coming for a brewpub near you.

I can safely report that the optimistic signs have panned out, in my opinion. It’s not a matter of two or three new beers that I like. It’s the whole vibe around the scene. Granted, things are a little bit skewed because of the Olympics, but if anything that’s made beer hunting more of a challenge. I haven’t had the time to check out every little place in town that’s getting on board. But here’s the thing – I probably don’t have to. I can read about them, and hear about them from other people.

And really, that’s the biggest sign of a beer scene’s improvement. When I left the loop was small. I was in that loop, but for anybody not in that loop I don’t think it would have been that easy to track down the beer scene. Nowadays the exposure level is much higher. Yes, there is still a lot of work to go. But instead of one weekly cask night, we have a lot of weekly and even daily casks. Seasonal beers, and even one or two of the regular beers, have become bolder, brasher, and as a result have captivated beer fans in the city like never before. We don’t have just one good store, we have a lot of them. Quality is everywhere.

I think Vancouver is going to explode. What it will take is the next wave of microbreweries. All the hard work thus far has been done by established brewers, most of which have been in business for over a decade. In other spots in the Pacific Northwest, the economic downturn brought a whole crew of “plan B” entrepreneurs to the business, taking advantage of their newfound freedom to pursue their passion. The same thing is going to happen in Vancouver. And when it does, look out. This scene will go to another level. I don’t write about the beer scene in BC anymore, and I’m enjoying being just a fan. Over the next two years, I think beer fans in Vancouver will have a lot more to get excited about than they have over the past two years. That is a lot of excitement.

One feature of the Olympics is that different countries and provinces have set up pavilions. They vary a bit in content, but most of them incorporate some sort of food and drink component, and there is always some local flavour. For example, the Atlantic Canada pavilion does a daily tasting menu, featuring the fish and flora of the region’s cuisine. We had mussels, a fantastic smoked salmon cream cheese roll, raw oysters, lobster canapés and things like that – all delicious. They poured beer from local microbreweries including Propeller, Garrison and Picaroons. Some of these beers are not normally available in Vancouver, so this is quite special.

Other pavilions are also breaking out local microbrews. I’m told Ontario is, but I haven’t gone in there yet. Quebec has a four pack of microbrews from the Archibald micro outside Quebec City. They’re also offering tastes of ice cider, Face Cachée Neige Première, which is one of their more accessible brands (that is to say, less deliciously intense). I’d heard the Saskatchewan was offering Paddock Wood stuff, but all we found when we went there was Pilsner and Canadian. (For non-Western Canadians, Pilsner is a budget brand from Molson that is especially, and inexplicably, popular in Saskatchewan).

National pavilions also bring the local beer, although in most cases it’s just stuff we can buy in the liquor store. So Slovakia is pouring Zlaty Bazant; Ukraine has Obolon; Germany is pouring Köstritzer and some sort of boring pilsner; and of course Holland House is pouring boatloads of Heineken.

The beer experience is not really why you go to any of these places, though. You go because it’s a blast. You get a taste of local flavour and the vibe is awesome. Now if you’ll excuse me…

Allow me to be your official beer ambassador to our great city. For the next few weeks, sports fans will be fixated on Vancouver and thousands upon thousands will visit. But even though we’re in the great nation of Cascadia, our beer scene is a little trickier. You can’t buy beer just anywhere, and there are a lot of pitfalls in searching for the good stuff. That’s why I am writing this guide. You – the beer lover – deserve to drink gold medal beer this Olympics, not some also-ran nonsense.

At the end of this article I have provided links to a couple of resources that may come in handy for beer lovers attending the 2010 Olympic Games.

Let’s start with the start. The official sponsor of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics is Molson Coors. Their beer will be everywhere, and will have exclusivity at all official venues. Two things you must know about their beer. 1) It is not very good. It is bland industrial fare of dubious quality and it always overpriced. 2) It is local. You can drink Molson Coors product without feeling a sense of guilt because it actually is a local brew. They make it in the middle of the city, on Burrard Street. It is Vancouver beer, so at least it’s got that.

But moving beyond the official stuff, there is some great beer out there worth drinking. It is not always easy to find. The bar/pub/restaurant scene here is heavily oriented towards the corporate, far more than in other West Coast cities. So this guide will help you navigate what could be a bit of a minefield of overpriced industrial swill.

First, the brewpubs and taprooms. There are five of these in the city, all easily accessible to Olympic visitors. Three are downtown – Steamworks, Dix and Yaletown. Each of these makes a healthy range of brews, and generally to a high standard. Seasonal products are the most worth seeking out in almost every case. The big exception for me is Dix IPA, which has been awesome for years. Dix will do casks on Thursday evenings, if you are keen for such things.

Across False Creek from the downtown peninsula is Granville Island, a market/artist zone that is very popular with tourists and locals alike. There you can find the Granville Island taproom, which features seasonals brewed on site and some more forgettable brews trucked in from Kelowna. Dockside Brewing in the Granville Island Hotel has struggled of late, but has a new brewmaster now. They might be worth checking out because when his stuff goes on tap, it will be an improvement. Plus, they have an awesome patio. No, sitting on the patio at the Winter Olympics is not a stupid idea. It’s spring in Vancouver now. Also on Granville Island is Osake, an artisan sakemaker. I dig the microbrewed sake there – it’s not just for Japanese Olympic visitors that I make this recommendation.

Vancouver is a little weak for beer bars, but there are a few spots up and running that are worth checking out, particularly for those out-of-town microbreweries whose products on tough to find on tap. The best is the Alibi Room, located at the opposite (east) end of the Gastown neighbourhood from Steamworks. Along the way is Six Acres, another solid beer bar. St. Augustine’s on Commercial Drive lies southeast not far from the Broadway/Commercial Drive Skytrain station. Stella’s is at the other end of Commercial, and they have a location on Cambie as well, right near Firefly. The Railway Club is a live music joint first, but has long had one of the best selections of draught in town.

One feature of the Olympics is the different pavilions for nations and provinces. While all of these are going to be party destinations, not all will be good beer destinations. The Germany and Saxony (sure, why not?) houses will have big industrial bier from Deutschland. Many provinces are selling beer from their own provinces – Alberta, Saskatchewan, Atlantic Canada and the North for certain. The others – if I find out I’ll post it.

To get bottles to go, there are a number of good stores around town. Brewery Creek on Main Street is the best; also check out Firefly on Cambie and Viti, which is downtown on Seymour. These are all private stores – the big player in retail are the government stores. Most of them suck. The best in the city is at 39th & Cambie, south of Firefly and Stella’s. The best one downtown is on Alberni, between Burrard and Thurlow.

It should be noted that Vancouver is an exceptional food city. We have a great variety of cuisines, with the focus being on Asian. While there is a degree of hyperbole in some circles, make no mistake you can eat well in Vancouver. Drinking well with your delicious meal is a trickier matter. But you can do it. In Gastown, Boneta has some tasty beers on its list. Nearby, on Beatty Street towards downtown, Chambar has a Belgian orientation, the result being a handful of quality brews from that great beer country. Possibly the most famous restaurant in Vancouver, Vij, carries draft from Storm Brewing and the proprietor’s casual place next door Rangoli has a couple of nice options as well. It has been a slow process getting Vancouver’s quality eateries to embrace craft beer, but slowly they are coming about. Bin 941 is another good option for civilized food and good beer.

As for microbreweries, there are a number of them. The most local ones are R & B Brewing and Storm Brewing, both from the city and available all over town. Russell from suburban Surrey and Dead Frog from Aldergrove in the Fraser Valley are both well-distributed in town. Red Truck is the brand from the Mark James company that owns five of our brewpubs, including Yaletown and Dix. Other BC breweries are represented in town occasionally. Watch out for the non-micros. Rickard’s is a Molson brand. Granville Island is also now owned by Molson and aside from the stuff at the taproom their stuff is not made in Vancouver. Okanagan Spring is mediocre fare from national brewer Sleeman, who also masquerade as craft brew from time to time.

What follows is venue-specific information.

Downtown we have hockey at GM Place, the opening and closing ceremonies at BC Place and a whole host of stages set up for cultural events, and most of the hotels. Dix Brewery is the best situated here, right across from BC Place. Viti is the only serious bottle shop downtown. David Lam Park in Yaletown has a lot of cultural events, and is not far from Yaletown Brewing.

Short track speed skating and figure skating will take place at the Pacific Coliseum, out by the PNE on the east side of town. This area is a black hole for beer. My best advice is for pre/post-event drinking at one of the good spots in Gastown (Steamworks, Alibi Room, Six Acres) or at Stella’s on Commercial before walking over to Hastings Street and catching an eastbound bus. If you’re not from Vancouver, you should know that Hastings Street near Gastown is not a pretty sight. It’s the crappiest neighbourhood in all of Canada. It’s pretty safe, though, despite what it looks like. The folks there have got bigger problems than hassling tourists. Don’t worry about catching a bus there, it’s not a problem.

Some hockey takes place at the University of British Columbia. You would think this area would be better for beer, but it’s not that good. Most pubs should have a smaller brewery or two, but I would temper my expectations. Some of the stores out there – Liberty Wine Merchants at 10th @ Sasamat and Point Grey Beer and Wine on Broadway are worth checking out.

Curling is in the middle of the city near Queen Elizabeth Park. There isn’t anything good adjacent to the venue on Main Street, but further north on Main (towards the mountains) is The Whip, a good bar that has cask ale on Sunday evenings; and further north on Cambie is Stella’s on Cambie. In the area are three stores – Brewery Creek, Firefly and the government store at Cambie & 39th. If you must stay close to the venue, Locus (Main @ King Edward) has Phillips IPA on tap along with a couple of other micros.

Speed skating is in Richmond. There is a brewpub in Richmond, Big River, but it is nowhere near the speed skating oval. That kind of trek is recommended only for the truly dedicated. The Flying Beaver is not far, and it is owned by the Mark James Group (who own five brewpubs) but their selection of craft beer has always let me down in the past. Still, that’s not a great area for beer. And the Flying Beaver is always packed so you’ll get a raucous atmosphere no matter what you’re drinking.

Cypress Bowl in West Vancouver is home to freestyle skiing and snowboarding. The North Shore (as the area is known) has a few spots worth knowing about. Taylor’s Crossing in North Vancouver is brewpub in North Vancouver with some nice balanced beers, well worth checking out as the North Shore’s only brewpub. Sailor Hagar’s in North Vancouver – right near the Seabus terminal – used to be a brewpub. Their beers are now made elsewhere, but they are proprietary beers so would be worth a beer lover’s time. Not near the venues but worth checking out in North Vancouver is The Raven, a pub in scenic Deep Cove that carries a good variety of craft brew. Coming back from the North Shore on the Seabus drops you off across at Waterfront Station, across a small parking lot from the original Steamworks.

There are a lot of events in Whistler as well – most of the skiing, bobsled/luge, ski jumping and further north the cross-country. It’s a resort town, so they are well set up for partying, although in general this does not translate to a support of craft beer. High Mountain / Whistler Brewhouse is the only brewpub. They’ve got an IPA on tap all the time now, and some excellent seasonals. Hopefully they’ll have some good strong stuff ready to go.

It is also worth mentioning that in the town of Squamish, halfway between Vancouver and Whistler, Howe Sound Brewing makes quality brew, best enjoyed on the deck with a stunning view of the Stawamus Chief.

Intrepid beer hunters will find more craft beer outside the city. Central City is the most accessible. They are on the Expo Skytrain line, about 35 minutes from downtown. Exit at Surrey Central Station and head towards the mall. Don’t leave without both an IPA and an ESB.

Much further south in Surrey is Big Ridge; and even further in the Fraser Valley in the northern part is Mission Springs. Mission Springs is quasi-accessible on transit, via the West Coast Express. But you’ll have to stay the night in Mission to make that work.

The bold will find a further stack of breweries both on Vancouver Island via BC Ferries, and south of the border, where Whatcom and Skagit Counties both boast a clutch of breweries.

Links:

BC Beer Blog
YVR Taplister

Ratebeer Vancouver
Ratebeer Vancouver map
Ratebeer Whistler
Ratebeer North Vancouver
Ratebeer West Vancouver
Ratebeer Richmond
Ratebeer Surrey
Ratebeer Victoria

USA (Whatcom and Skagit County) links:

Bellingham
Deming / Mount Baker Highway
Mount Vernon
LaConner
Birdsview/Concrete
Anacortes

Craft beer in recent years has been marked by intense bouts of innovation. Most innovations do not stick, but every now and again they do. The Strange Brewfest is one of those events that allows small brewers to try things they would not normally try, to experiment with the bizarre, and to take unnatural risks in the name of finding beerological excellence.

Case in point was not my first beer at the Strange Brewfest – that was Chuckanut Brewery Märzen to get my palate primed – but the second. That was Elysian Hibiscus Sour, a sketchy balance of hibiscus and pediococcus from a normally reliable brewery. Over the course of the next several hours, I was able to sample some truly whacky creations. Beers were made with bonito (fish flakes), peppermint (three of them!), wormwood, dandelion, watermelon and one aged in Tabasco barrels. Oh yeah, and the bacon stout.

Now, I love bacon as much as the next guy, but ever since Garrett Oliver announced he wanted to a bacon beer I thought maybe this whole bacon thing had been taken a little too far. While Brooklyn was not on hand with their beer, Big Time was. And you know what, I liked it. A stout with a distinctly bacon-oriented finish. Maybe I have underestimated my adoration for cured, salted pork products or maybe there is merit to this bacon beer thing after all.

All told, the fest was a great time. It was outdoors, a little rough for this time of year (last year my outdoor January beer fest was in Jupiter, FL, a much more suitable location to combine fresh air and drinking in the dead of winter). But the chill washed away quickly as the beers got ever stranger.

Josh’s Top Three:

Grove Street Peppermint IPA
Laht Neppur Booted Beer (wormwood)
Big Time Kevin Bacon Stout

We love big beers. No mystery about this. The Top 100 beers list is chock full of monsters both malty and hoppy. In fact, I’m going to have to crack an imperial stout just to get in the proper frame of mind to write this article. Intense flavours are something that most beer geeks in the world value. This contrasts with beer lovers, who often prefer more subtle flavours and simpler styles. No problem – the Ratebeer Best has a number of style categories, too.

Every year, some new brewers arrive on the scene and immediately being to pile up the awards. This year, Tampa’s Cigar City Brewing was one of those breweries. This brewery is a beer geek’s wet dream, with well-crafted regular brews and a neverending supply of specialty and one-off variants to explore the possibilities of the palate. Other brewers making waves this year were de Molen from the Netherlands – makers of a couple of my favourite brews last year and SoCal fan favourite The Bruery.

If you haven’t seen it yet, check it out here. Then join the conversation about Ratebeer Best here.

One Kaiwei establishment, however, is distinctly different. I am unsure of the precise nature of the relationship, but there is a Belgian involved. So while the house beers are Kaiwei Yellow and Kaiwei Black, the rest of Café Brussels is a Belgian beer bar. The Café is housed in a heritage-protected building with high ceilings and lovely tilework on the floor. The walls are adorned with myriad football pennants and Tintin posters. The menu is full of Belgian classics.

The beer list at Café Brussels is well-chosen. Many of the brands come via Beijing beer bar and importer Morel’s, and many of the big names are represented. They are served in proper glassware, with the proper coaster. This to me makes all the difference – a Belgian beer bar needs to do this.

We decided to take advantage of the opportunity presented to us to do something we had never done. We ordered all three Rocheforts and tasted them side-by-side. First, I must congratulate Café Brussels on getting these beers not only in stock but on form. They, along with the Westmalle Tripel and Orvals we also consumed, were in great shape despite traveling halfway around the world in uncertain conditions.

All three beers looks similar – there is little to choose from in terms of appearance. Nosing them in order, the florals of the 6 really jumped out. That beer is full of soft, sweet malts, dates and dark fruits. The 8 I found to have an aroma profile more fruitcakey in nature, with the florals a little but subdued and more chocolate coming out. The 10 is another matter entirely. The florals are barely there, but quite a bit of alcohol comes out. The alcohol barely expresses itself at all in the 8, despite what you’d expect from a 9.2% beer, but in the 10 they are fully present.

When tasted, these defining characteristics are manifested in each beer. The 6 is soft, floral and sweet; the 8 has a more muscular character but with light florals and an uptick in dark malt intensity. The 10 is big beer indeed, very rich and complex with balancing fruit.

Tasting them in reverse order revealed other differences. The 10 on a second consecutive sip lost some of the brashness that appeared when it came on the heels of its lighter siblings. The 8 remained the best-balanced of the bunch. But getting back to the 6, well, it tasted kind of watery after the other two. I still liked the florals but on the whole the sweet, nuanced, balanced 6 does not exist after drinking the 10 and 8, only pale shadow of its bigger brothers. So perspective is important.
I determined, however, that my view that of the 8 being my favourite still stands. That is one well-balanced brew. With the dark malt richness of the 10, some alcoholic muscle and yet the sweet florals of the 6, I think the 8 is the best of all Rochefort worlds. I scored the 6 higher than the 10, which I don’t know that I would have expected. The 10 is good, but on the whole the alcohol detracts from the balance a bit too much, certainly relative to the other two. I like a big strong beer, but with the 6 and 8 to show me how much Rochefort beer has to offer, I was a bit disappointed by the heavy hand of the alcohol on the 10.

But we here at the Oakes Weekly are serious beer hunters and not easily dissuaded. That doesn’t mean we’re always successful. Case in point – crack OW researcher Beershine uncovered a new microbrewery, Typhoon, located on Lantau Island. Unfortunately, fate conspired against us. We had planned to visit Lantau anyway. But our attempts to get from the peak at Ngong Ping to the brewery’s home village of Mui Wo were duly thwarted by some truly horrific weather and an equally awful bus schedule.

No problem – Typhoon isn’t a brewpub anyway. They had only launched a few weeks previous, but they had an account – The Globe. So off we went. Well, the Globe was closed as they are in the process of moving to a new location, around the corner from the old location. That new location was not open, and with Typhoon only offering cask ale at present, no other accounts stepped forward. Thus, the brew was unavailable for the duration of our visit. Typhoon 8, the brewery’s flagship best bitter, will be available sometime around the middle of January, for any intrepid beer hunter passing through Hong Kong after that point.

The established micro in town, the East End Brewery, has three outlets. Their beers are passable but sadly they no longer make seasonals. They make three for themselves, and one more for the Lan Kwai Fong Beer Bar. That place, the Globe and the East End locations are pretty much the only places to get a variety of beers, although standbys like Chimay, Duvel and some German stuff are available in lots of bars. A couple of Canadian bars had the bottled line from Toronto’s Mill Street micro. Cool. I remember when you had to go to the brewery to buy their bottles and now you can buy them halfway around the world. Fresh, too. The Tankhouse was in great shape.

The availability of good beer is by all accounts improving. Upscale grocers like CitySuper carry in the range of 100 brews, especially from Belgium, Japan and Germany. In corner stores, the local lagers all suck, but the variable Malaysian Guinness and the tasty Tsingtao Stout can be found as well.

I should also give a shout out to Cervejeria Macau. We didn’t see this one in Hong Kong, but the Blond Ale from the other SAR can be found all over that tiny city-state. It is probably the hoppiest and tastiest of all national beers, save maybe for Pilsner Urquell. I’ve had Macau Blond Ale a few months old, but let me just say that fresh on its home turf it is practically a hop bomb – certainly by Asian standards it is. You’ve got to have one to wash down Macau’s ubiquitous pork chop sandwich.

So let the lessons be learned – Hong Kong’s beer scene is slowly improving. It’s not quite a wasteland. With an improving import list and a new micro, Hong Kong is slowly catching up to the rest of Asia’s premier cities.

Best New Brewery: Not always “new” but “new to me”, which usually means it’s pretty new. In this case, not so much. I’m not sure what brewery could possibly qualify among the multitude of killer Franconian brewpubs, except to say that there are many contenders. Wichert of Lichtenfels was great; I’m a fan of zur Sonne in Bischberg; Göller of Drosendorf feels older than dirt but the beer is genius. Freidel’s Keller in the Hallerndorfer Kreuzberg is a damn fine new brewpub. But I guess all things considered, the best new brewery for me this year was the Kommunalbrauhaus Neuhaus. Not at all a new brewery, but the hoppy, dry, minerally, extremely delicious zoigl from the Neuhaus pubs is beer I still dream about.

Best Brewpub: The line between “brewpub” and “microbrewery” isn’t drawn so clearly in Franconia as it is in the west. So I could just wimp out and give this to an American brewpub. But I only went to a few and although many were quite nice, the Oakes Awards are pretty prestigious. You can’t just hand them out willy-nilly. So this is actually a tough one. Schlenkerla would win, but the ausschank is just that, not a brewpub. Hmmm…in this case Friedel’s Keller probably wins. It is a true brewpub – though many others in Franconia are as well – but we made a point to inconvenience ourselves to go back to it, so it’s fair value for the win.

Best Festival: Only a couple of these this year, two of which are not strictly beer festivals (Annafest & Sandkerwa). But the Weekend of Spontaneous Fermentation is very much a beer festival, being singularly devoted to the task of exploring, indulging and loving lambic. You wouldn’t bring your kids, or anyone who isn’t a lambic whore, but for those of us who love lambic we are very, very glad that this festival exists. A great pilgrimage.

Best Crawl: Beer crawls are always fun. In Franconia, they take the form of bike rides through the country side. When everything comes together – the weather and the beer in particular – you can’t really ask for much better. I won’t even single out a single Franconian bike ride as being inherently better than all the others. They are all amazing.

Anglo-American Beer of the Year: Normally a hotly-contested category, beers of this type were actually hard to come by after leaving Miami. But it ended up being such a beer that one. Brewed for Ungstrup, delivered by way of fonefan/charlotte and Patrik Willför, was Lang & Kaal. Maybe I liked it because I am lang and kaal. Maybe it is just great beer. De Molen takes this award, I believe the first Oakes Best Beer Award for a Dutch brewer.

Belgian/Specialty Beer of the Year: Easy winner here – Cantillon Frambozenlambik. It blew away the field at the Weekend of Spontaneous Fermentation. I would never have expected that to be possible, with all the stellar lambic on display.

Stout/Porter of the Year. I probably drank more Malaysian Guinness than anything else in this style, but this award is about quality not quantity. Believe the hype – Hunahpu’s rules.

Lager of the year: For once, the most hotly-contested category of the year. I saw for once because this was the first year I really spent quality time in a top lager place. Last time through Germany, eons ago, I mostly went through Cologne and Dusseldorf. This time, all Bavaria. Although it is almost cruel to choose one single outstanding lager, I found one. First, it’s a communal beer, but not a zoigl from Oberpfalz. It’s from Franconia, and it’s a marzen. The best marzen on the planet. I knew from the minute I smelled it. Reindl Kommunbier from the Reindl family in Neuhaus an der Pegnitz.

Wheat Beer of the Year. I don’t count lambics, but I had a ton of weizen this summer. The best was from a really great Franconian brewery called Kundmüller in the little village of Weiher, near Bamberg. Weiherer Weisse is exactly as I want my weissebier to be. Served at the brewery, of course.

Pub/Bar of the Year: Schlerkerla, as if there was any doubt. Classic tavern. Classic beer. And five minutes from our home for three months. Couldn’t tell you ho w many times I went.

Session of the Year: Probably the most fun was the jump-up in Gros Islet in St. Lucia. We had myself and Sunshine, plus this couple she knew that lived on a boat down there, plus their friends, and the Friday night party was just getting going. Nobody else needed a beer but I did, so I popped into the closest bar. What did I see in their fridge? Something nobody else had – Banks Milk Stout from Guyana. We spent the rest of that awesome night pounding back milk stouts, getting drunker, shooting the shit, and finally I discovered the glory of the kidney skewer grilled over fire. Unforgettable.

Pint of the Year: Last day in Bamberg, also last day of Sandkerwa, we spent the whole afternoon at Schlenkerla. Six or seven rounds and a haxen later, we ended things by taking a pint to the Obere Brucke and having one last rauchbier, right there as the sun set over the town. Brilliant. We then jumped on the train and left Germany.

Brewpub Meal of the Year: Well, most brewpubs in Franconia have the exact same menu. When they don’t, it is often a very good sign. Brauerei Beck in Trabelsdorf seems the easy winner here – we only ate twice but it was excellent both times. Beer cuisine – like malt used in breading and bock in sauce. It is all very delicious, a standout experience to be sure.

Drainpour of the Year: DIACETYL! I have never experienced so much butter in my entire life. And I’ve been to Maine. I wrote about the Frankenbutter. I gagged on Perge Pilsner in Turkey. I nearly regurgitated the 2500 dong bia hoi from down the alley in Hanoi. I had it in a wine from my little Turkish mountain village. I got it from a Carlsberg in Hong Kong. I even had a butterbomb in Bangkok and all I did was change planes there!

Vintage beer of the year: Gonna have to go with that Fond Gueuze 1988. I’m pretty sure anyway. That’s the second time Belle-Vue has won this award. Now they need to stop sucking and start making beers like that again!

Style of the Year: Kellerbier! Call it zoigl, landbier, vollbier, zwickelbier if you want, it is basically the same stuff. Franconian country lager by a country mile.

Beer Glass of the year: I suppose this would be the 500ml krug from which I drank all that kellerbier. Either that or the 500ml glass from Schlenkerla. It wasn’t really about the glassware this year, since there’s only so much you glass you can carry in your backpack.

The city is a lot safer and more relaxed. You can walk five feet without getting hassled now. The streets are paved and it is safe to visit most districts at night. They’ve even paved the road to the Killing Fields at Choeng Ek. There is a greater variety of restaurants, the ethnic food scene in particular being awesome. Throughout Vietnam, we could barely find ethnic that wasn’t Italian. Here, in three days we rocked food from North Korea, Reunion and Myanmar. We hung out at a bar called Zeppelin, run by a returned Cambodian, who brought his extensive vinyl collection back from the West and spins nothing but great tunes. We even tracked down a beer bar, where we drank some nice German stuff like Schneider.

The first brewpub in Phnom Penh was Man Han Lou. It’s on a main drag far to the south side of the town, but was close to our hotel so that worked out well. They do four beers – a blonde, a green, a red and a black. Green? They basically take their blond and add spirulina extract to it, the same way innumerable American brewpubs create their enthralling raspberry ales. The difference of course is that there is some novelty value to an emerald green beer made with algae. It tasted fresh, in a seabreeze sort of way, and I quite liked it.

Their best beer was their stout. Cambodia is one of the dark lands, so the stout here is good. My favourite last time was Angkor Extra Stout, but this time it’s been less impressive. The best now is – and Beershine agrees – is Black Panther Stout. Klang Stout appears to be retired, but ABC is still on the market. Add to this Malaysian Guinness FES is now in Cambodia. This in addition to the regular swill.

There’s still a range of not so good swills available. A new brewery opened in 2008, Phnom Penh Brewery, with a pair of crappy brews. Another new brewery, Kingdom Brewery, is set to open on the northern outskirts of Phnom Penh in 2010. It should be interesting to see what happens in this market. It’s not a big market. The Khmer don’t drink a lot of beer. But money is beginning to flow into Cambodia, the country is starting to come into its own after the decades of strife, and I guess the influx of new beer reflects that.

Next week – the annual Oakes Awards! Will Franconia dominate?