Realbeer Members Top 10 beers of 2009

[Mike Neilson]

Well I thought I would start a topic of the best beers of 2009, my list from 10th to 2009's most memorable most Inspirational and when I was drinking them I was just smiling from ear to ear!!

10) My Smoked Porter, Gold Medal @ NHC

9) Townshends No9 Stout @ Beervana

8) Epic Porter 2007?? or was it 06???

7) Rogue XS Stout 2006

6) MMMMft4CH (Me Joking and Tyler colabaration)

5) Green Flash IPA

4) Yakima Monster Batch 1

3) Pliny the Elder

2) Hallertau Porter Noir

1) 8 Wired HopWired
Has to beer the best beer of '09' not only because its that good its because 98% of its Kiwi!! but because it was raw!! Drinkable and a Shootgun of flavours I couldnt drink this beer enough!! Cheers Soren and long let Brian and Andy to continue to brew along their fantastic range!!!

Cheers

[Greig McGill]

Jeez you guys are hard on Greg Koch. Imagine you'd brewed the best beers you could, but you sacrificed stability for flavour, so you controlled distribution carefully in order that the consumer always got a great experience. Then you found out someone was shipping them half way across the world, drinking them, and ragging on them. Wouldn't you at the very least do exactly what he did and post here explaining your thinking, and stating for the record that the beers shouldn't be sold here? He's just looking after his rep. I reckon he deserves huge props for taking the time to explain himself, not abuse.

Anyway, bitch over. Here's mine. Not in any order, and not including homebrews, or foreign beers (just the way I'm gonna roll).

I'm with Reviled for both his first two choices and the batch preference.
* Halertau Maximus batch 2
* Epic Armageddon batch 1
* Invercargill Biman
* Invercargill WASP
* Invercargill Pitch Black
* Yeastie Boys Nerdherder B
* Yeastie Boys Kid Chocolate
* Yeastie Boys His Majesty
* Emerson's Hoppy2 Porter
* Townshend Cathcarts NTA

It seems my list is heavily dominated by two brewers and one brewery!
Huge props to Steve Nally, and the Yeasties for making my beer-year awesome.
Runaway mad props to Martin Townshend, who is not only the best brewer of English style beers in NZ bar none, but is a really nice guy to boot. Not like that Stu bastard... ;)

[Reviled]

"Jeez you guys are hard on Greg Koch. Imagine you'd brewed the best beers you could, but you sacrificed stability for flavour, so you controlled distribution carefully in order that the consumer always got a great experience. Then you found out someone was shipping them half way across the world, drinking them, and ragging on them. Wouldn't you at the very least do exactly what he did and post here explaining your thinking, and stating for the record that the beers shouldn't be sold here? He's just looking after his rep. I reckon he deserves huge props for taking the time to explain himself, not abuse."


Thing that comes to mind with that Greig is that alot of the Stone beers would come under the 'IPA' category, and seeing as an IPA traditionally travelled half way around the world, it seems dumb to say, you can only drink this beer if its fresh, and in the USA.. Sure the beers gonna be at its best under those conditions, but is it 'undrinkable' if it travels? I mean, we werent really ragging on the beers, just saying, good beer, but past its best... We all know they dont travel the best, but drink and enjoy anyways!!

[Greig McGill]

There's a difference between the origin of a style and a modern interpretation. ;)

[nzbrewer]

I have added a poll on the new tab. You are allowed three votes as ten votes would just be dumb, as we would vote for all of these

[Reviled]

Wheres the poll? Is it on the home page?

For some reason when im at work I can never load the main page, it just allways freezes up on me :(

[Matthew]

The Poll

[Stu McKinlay]

5 from NZ and 5 from the rest of the world.

Best of NZ:

Townshend Cathcarts NTA - The most balanced beer in NZ and a real lesson for other NZ brewers, it has an ultimate malt/hop/yeast/water balance. Perfectly drinkable.

Emerson's Bourbon Porter - my favourite NZ beer of all time. I had one in Jan, with Jono - my old Australian friend - who coined the phrase "i love beer, i love bourbon, this beer is going to save me a lot of time at the bar". Have another one in the cellar for tonight,

8 Wired Hop Wired - almost as good as Monk's Habit (in its prime) as the best hop driven beer in NZ. A little more bitterness and i'll be drinking flagons of it.

Pot Kettle Black - the first was pretty damn good but this year, and especially around BrewNZ week, it was pretty close to my perfect strong ale.

Three Boys Wild Plum - one of the best fruit beers I've ever tried. Tannins work so well with the sweet ripe plum. I got my bottle from BrewNZ leftovers... where can I get more???


Rest of the World:

Fullers Vintage Ale 2008 - wow!

Oud Beersel Oude Geuze - I gave Fritha a sip and she screwed up her nose saying "Fuck that is awful, there is taste in there I can’t describe but it shouldn’t be in anything I consume." Magic.

Burton Bridge Empire Ale - deserving of the capital letters: IPA. Another beer with great esters and a lovely balanced bitterness... and this one packs a lovely hint of the Burton snatch.

Jolly Pumpkin Oro de Calabaza - think Duvel in oak barrels. You're not even close!

Deschutes The Abyss - A black hole of dark chocolate, liquorice and rich malt that is so good, so balanced, so integrated, and so unfairly drinkable that it almost sucked away my desire to brew or to even drink another beer in my lifetime. A velvet fog of a beer. And there weren't any non-terrestial intelligences at the bottom of the bottle.


There's a plenty of lovely beers that I've left out but I won't mention them here....

[denimglen]

Oud Beersel Oude Geuze - I gave Fritha a sip and she screwed up her nose saying "Fuck that is awful, there is taste in there I can’t describe but it shouldn’t be in anything I consume." Magic.

Fuck that's classic!

I've thought about using my girlfriend as a screening device to weed out the bad beers, if she get's that 'smacked face' look I know it's a beer I'll like haha.

[Greig McGill]

if she get's that 'smacked face' look

Crikey! Glen the Muss! He's a likeable chap! :)

[Tony]

Jeez, I usually refrain from these kinds of 'choose your favourites'. But in the spirit of things, a few have really stayed with me in 09.

3 Boys Oyster stout
YB His Majesty
Armageddon
Smoking Bishop
Emerson's (on tap)
Ben Middlemiss's- Dortmunder pilsner

I see quite a few of you have included your own or someone elses' (home brew), and rightfully so. I think we all strive to brew the 'perfect brew' and that's what motivates many (me at least anyway, so I don't have to spend so much on commercial beers). Martin Bridges, Barley wine was outstanding. I continually become more impressed with improvements in my own beer also, but they invariably never get to reach their true potential, before they are consumed.

[Soren]

I'm almost embarraced about all the attention HopWired is getting... I don't know what to say, except I'm glad you like it and I hope I can keep up the standard in the future.
My list: I wont even try to put these in order but outstanding beers I have had this year includes:

Yeastie boys: PKB (every version I've tried), his majesty and nerdherder B
Emersons weizenbock and JP
Mikkeller: black Hole, big worse barleywine, stateside IPA
Alesmith IPA and grand cru
Stone Smoked porter
Hop Rod Rye
Imperial stouts: Nøgne ø, rasputin, pink elephant
Rogue shakespeare stout
Unibrou La terrible
Macs brewjolais
Smoking bishop
pliny the elder
3 boys oyster stout
Epic armageddon
probably a good handful more that I forget, next year I'll write notes:)

That;s the PC list, the non PC list would include a few 8 Wired, Renaissance and my homebrews.

Happy new year!

[denimglen]

I'm almost embarraced about all the attention HopWired is getting...

Don't be. But you should be embarrassed that none made it to AK and into my gut ;-) Hopefully a future batch will. Good work brother.