Rounding up contributions to The Session #144: beers at home

We hosted Session #144 last week and asked people to tell us about the best beer they could drink at home right now. Here’s what they came up with.

Al Reece at Fuggled goes for his home-brewed best bitter served through a ‘kegerator’: “If you have ever travelled much in the US, you will know that best bitter is rarer than the proverbial hen’s teeth, as are various other styles that I love…”

Alan McLeod at A Good Beer Blog dug into his stash and pulled out a can of Godspeed Světlý Ležák: “$3.55 a can plus shipping plus tax. Except this one came during the holiday sales tax holiday. Sweet. A credible beer. My beer of 2024.”

Alex Mennie at Mennie Drinks on Substack chose the general concept of ‘shower beer’: “Nowadays – renovating a flat – the shower beer is a sacred signifier that the day’s work is done. It’s normally a supermarket session IPA.”

Andreas Krennmair at Daft Eejit Brewing highlights what a great city Berlin is for those who drink at home, and names beers in a range of categories, including his own homebrew: “The number 1: Augustiner Lagerbier Hell. I mean… it’s Augustiner. Some people may find its slight sulphur note a bit divisive, but it’s a Berlin staple for a very good reason, in a place that previously was dominated by German Pils for decades.”

Barry Masterson has come out of blogging retirement at The Bitten Bullet to enthuse about two reliable local beers from his part of Germany: “Herbsthäuser Edelpils and Distelhäuser Pils… are fairly local, certainly regional beers, from medium-sized privately-owned breweries… If I want something more floral-toned, brighter and hop forward, I’ll pick the Distel… If I want something with a little more malt-toned backbone, perhaps a little more chew to it, I’ll pick the Herbsthäuser.”

The Beer Nut says “every ticker knows that the best beer you can drink at home is one you’ve never had before” and this time, for him, that meant Thornbridge Jaipur Noir. He also took the opportunity to review some other Thornbridge beers, one of which almost made him change his mind.

Daisy Alys Turnell wrote an acrostic poem which she shared on Bluesky: “The… Back of my fridge is a magical place…”

Ding, a Brit living in the US, hasn’t found American bars to match up to English pubs and so does most of his drinking at home these days. He says it’s “90+% bottled (generally not cans), and mostly from Belgium”.

Eoghan Walsh knew his choice would be from Brasserie de la Senne – but which beer? Not Zinnebir, as you might expect, but Petit Boulba: “It has the same distinctively floral and herbal-bitter aroma as its bigger brother, the same light palate and lingering mineral bite. But where the stronger beer is stereophonic, adding a touch of bready sweetness and the merest hint of stone fruitiness to its citric and grassy base, Petit Boulba is the same beer in mono.”

Gary Gillman is in no doubt that the best beer to drink at home is Pilsner Urquell, which he calls “the Pasha of beer”: “Urquell by my lights is the best-tasting widely-available beer in the world. Take the word of a student of beer, more Faculty status by now, of over 40 years’ standing.”

Jacob Tilley at Not My First Draught says his home drinking is defined by a habit of ordering online from interesting breweries: “Every month when payday rolls around, I like to treat myself … this month is Track Brewing Co. in accordance with their announcements of the ten-year anniversary of Sonoma, a beer that means a whole lot to me!”

Jay Brooks at Brookston Beer Bulletin couldn’t limit himself to a single beer but instead nominated “a group of a few types of beers that I like to keep on hand so I can pick what to drink based on my mood, the weather, what I’m eating, if I’m drinking alone or entertaining, or even what I’m doing”.

Joey at BeerCityGuides on Instagram didn’t name a specific beer but says “a beer from a place far flung… that you’ve carefully selected on the last day of a trip, placed in bubble wrap, smothered in cotton wool, suffocated in socks, then couriered among clothes in your delicate suitcase”.

Jordan B went for Labatt Blue which they call a “gas station lager”: “Ican treat Blue with total disrespect. Sling it back straight from a bottle with an incomprehensible date code. Tasting notes? Beer, I guess.”

Katie Mather at The Gulp names Reissdorf Kölsch and Sobramesa Stout with the disclaimer that she’s doing some work with the latter brewery: “I drink more at home than I used to, and that’s 100% down to budgetary requirements… I’ve found myself drinking at home when I’d normally be at the pub, becoming one of the people within that grey, faceless mass that are implored to Support Local. Use it or lose it. Well, I’m afraid I did lose it — have I mentioned recently that my bar closed down a couple years ago?”

Laura Hadland at The Extreme Housewife reflects on questions of brewery samples and supermarket beer before narrowing it down to three, then to one: “I want something familiar, that I know I love. Something that never lets me down. That leaves me with William Bros Talking Head APA, Siren Soundwave IPA or Ossett’s White Rat. They are all reliable and formidable quality. I’d be happy with any of them. But for today’s fictional drinking experience, I’m plumping for the White Rat.”

Lisa Grimm likes to drink at home on Friday nights, being too exhausted for the pub after the working week, and has three beers in steady rotation: “Ballykilcavan Bambrick’s Brown Ale, 5.8% [is] probably the most perfect ‘all-weather’ Irish beer; goes with nearly everything, and great to pair with dessert, too, if I remembered to pick some up.”

Matthew Curtis at Total Ales cuts straight to the chase. For him, it’s Augustiner Helles, which he describes as “the perfect beer flavoured beer”: “I find it possesses hop, malt, yeast and water in the perfect balance for my tastes, meaning they are all present, and loud, complex but not complicated.”

Michael Deakin at 8-Bits and Bobs chose Westmalle Dubbel as his go-to drink-at-home beer: “Deep into the traditional British season of ‘second winter’ there are few pleasures greater than that of sinking into a nice hot bath, with your bottled beer of choice balanced precariously on the rim… For me, that would be a chilled bottle of Westmalle Dubbel. I can almost hear the clattering of clutched pearls from Belgian beer fans as I tell you that I do intend my lovely, dark, trappist beer to be coming straight out of the fridge, and that I will be drinking it directly from the source.”

Paul Newton at Beer Prime on Substack went for bottle-conditioned Jaipur after pondering various options on the way, and the importance of buying from indie businesses: “My friends and I lament news of the latest closure with the same old lines, like ‘I wish I’d used them more’, or ‘I was going to go there next week.’ Of course, it is never one individual’s fault, but you can only do your own bit and just hope that others do theirs.”

Phil Cook at Beer Diary came out of hibernation for The Session and named National Bohemian, AKA Natty Boh: “As of a few weeks ago, ‘home’ is Washington D.C.. Naturally, there’s a fair amount of disorienting culture shock going on, the many superficial similarities (between here and Australia, nevermind New Zealand) somehow making the differences starker.”

Phil Edwards at Oh Good Ale shared his list of always-in-stock standards, including Orval and Westmalle Dubbel: “The stash has growed somewhat over the years, to the point where I’ve now got 11 ‘regular’/multiple-purchase beers.”

Stan Hieronymus at Appellation Beer stuck closely to the brief and picked a beer he had at home at the moment of writing, Scratch 131: “Daria and I first drank the 131 at the brewery two days after Christmas of 2023. We brought three bottles home, opened one when spring arrived and another as fall neared because I knew it belonged on my Craft Beer & Brewing Best in 2024 list.”

Stephen O’Kane has made his first contribution to The Session at his blog No Fly Zone and chose BrewDog Punk IPA as the best option from his dad’s fridge: “My dad simply mostly enjoys beers at ~4.0% – anything weaker than 3.5% is almost not worth it, and anything more than 4.5% is ‘strong stuff’.”

In a short post on BlueSky Stu named two beers – McEwan’s Champion and Greene King Abbott Ale – but also added that he’d choose something more interesting from his local indie bottle shop nearer payday.

In the comments on our session announcement a bunch of people named specific beers, many of which feel as if they’re from the canon of classics:

• Brugse Zot
• Budvar
• Five Points Gold
• Gale’s Prize Old Ale
• Guinness Foreign Extra Stout
• Hobgoblin Gold
• Jever
• La Chouffe
• Orval
• Pilsner Urquell
• Saison Dupont
• Shepherd Neame Double Stout
• Sierra Nevada Pale Ale
• Thurston’s Horsell Hooker
• Timothy Taylor & Northern Monk Unity
• Unbarred Bueno Shake
• Westmalle Tripel
• Wye Valley Butty Bach

Phew! We think we caught every contribution but let us know if yours is missing in the comments below, or by emailing contact@boakandbailey.com

Session #145 will be hosted by Matthew Curtis (editor of Pellicle) at his personal blog Total Ales. Keep an eye on his blog and/or Bluesky to find out the topic in the next week or so.