“Guinness isn’t the highest rated stout anymore,” declared a headline in The Drinks Business.1 “New data,” they said, reveals “which brand comes out on top.” I soon spotted that the source of their fresh numbers was Untappd, the beer logging and rating app — hardly a representative sample2 — so I knew this wasn’t going to be rigorous. But it’s always fun to poke around with these things, so I took a closer look. I didn’t expect things to get so weird and worrying.
Keeping track of the beer references in the crossword has become as much a part of my daily routine as solving the puzzle itself.3 So it’s time again to take stock, see what made the cut, what patterns emerge, and consider what their sense of what people might know (or care about) can tell us about the status of beer and its subculture in the wider public consciousness.
Continue reading Ones wise on Weizenbocks — beer in the Times crossword, 2025
This weekend, the earthly remains of Rogue Ales (1988-2025) will be auctioned off, having been divvied up into nearly a thousand occasionally baffling lots. Like a few other breweries,4 my experience of them took a winding path: initial excitement as a much-hyped treat from afar, before fading into the background, then causing cringe as their shtick staled before a decline that, in hindsight, felt inevitable. Others have discussed the cause of death; it’s the treatment of the corpse that interests me today.
Voting is now open for the 18th GABS Hottest 100,5 and Mountain Culture — having placed #1 for the past three years running — recently launched their latest campaign, this time with a Ted Lasso theme. With the tactics and intensity that secured their blockbuster win in the 2022 competition, they’ve helped cement a “new normal” for the poll, one of relentless targeted promotion from a few loud voices. It undermines the countdown’s value and appeal — and, frankly, doesn’t reflect well on them.
Continue reading Upending the you-know-what: the Hottest 100 and Mountain Culture
The Session is a long-running and recently-rebooted series in which bloggers (and posters of other kinds) collectively contemplate a given prompt and respond however it moves them. For the May 2025 edition, I invited folks to think about the beer and pubs in art and fiction (broadly defined) that captured their attention, and to say a few words about why. And so now it’s my pleasure to share the many different (if interestingly overlapping) places people’s minds went from there.
Continue reading Beer and pubs in art and fiction — a roundup of The Session #147
Sometimes, I still wonder about a late career change into puppetry. I grew up with The Muppet Show and the wider Jim Henson universe of creatures (Sesame Street, Fraggle Rock, Labyrinth; all that) and it had a lasting impact. I’m always quick to recommend one particular incarnation that has been unfairly overlooked, and I’m going to take the opportunity6 to do so again here and now — partially because of its excellent depiction of pub life, and one perfect jab at craft beer.
Continue reading An after-work drink with Rowlf, and a doppelbock in Deadloch
The first fun fact I noticed about the recent Australian International Beer Awards was that the two headline Champion Beers were both dead straight lagers: the dark lager from Western Australia’s unassuming Wedgetail Brewing, and the flashy and award-laden American version of Trumer Pils7 — opposites, in some ways, but united in being untrendy simplicity that stood out among a crowd of thousands. For the rest, I needed a few days with a messy dataset and a massive spreadsheet…
Continue reading Medals & math: calculations and crucial context for the 2025 AIBAs
I’m going to try and convince you that this an interesting graph. It charts the relative performance, at last year’s Australian International Beer Awards, of all the beers that were entered twice; once in keg, and again packaged. This year’s judging is currently underway in Melbourne, so the process is on my mind, and this is a rare opportunity to test a common belief that breweries more able to sacrifice a whole keg are at an advantage.8 Short answer: only a little, if at all.
Continue reading Keg 𝑣 Bottle & Can — a natural experiment at the AIBAs
I’m hosting the May 2025 edition of The Session,9 and I’d like to take us out of the ‘real world’ for a moment to share the beers and pubs in art and fiction that have grabbed our attention, whether they were sublime, surprising, moving, amusing, somehow significant, or symbolic of something — or awkward and out of place, if you like. Gather your thoughts, or keep an eye out over the next few weeks, and let’s enjoy them together at the end of the month.
Continue reading A break from the real — your invitation to The Session #147
Launched at Australia’s biggest beer festival and allegedly the first local commercial hazy IPA, Hop Nation’s ‘Jedi Juice’ had a strong following. Its mix of a trending style, nostalgic reference, and pop art Princess Leia proved a hit. In 2019, many of its fans were outraged when, after a complaint, the alcohol advertising regulator ruled it in breach of standards, prompting the brewery to slightly change its branding — though they still often reference the saga. So, for May The Fourth, let’s look back.