Session #58 A Christmas Carol – An interim round up

Well, a few days have come and gone since the opening day of The Session or Beer Blogging Friday, so I thought I’d best get to work on a summary. This is only an interim round-up as I know we have a few more posts definitely on the way.

Also, Thursday just gone was the British Guild of Beer Writers awards dinner, so I’m hoping that by now, the hangovers have cleared and yet more of the UK’s finest decide to put pen to paper or fingers to keys.

It’s been a real experience hosting The Session and one that I have enjoyed immensely. Some of the posts have been heart wrenching trips down memory lane, others quirky and down right hilarious, but all celebrating good beer and I thank everyone heartily for taking the time to join in. CHEERS!

We’ve a great post to open the round-up, where Simon from Reluctant Scooper is in absolutely cracking form as he re-tells the classic tale in humorous style, but with a serious cautionary tale hidden amongst the captivatingly funny text, with “Scrooged: or A Cautionary Tale Of How Beer Got Fecked“.

Zac from Building International Coalitions Through Beer and Pavement who went along a similar line as I in terms of a beery confession about Christmas past, which involved a trip to the roof to emulate Santa’s little helper, with almost as scary consequences as the “Ugly Sweater” competition..read his post here.

Last months host Steve goes with “A Dickens of a Christmas” on his blog Beers I’ve known. Steve gets over an early years “tongue burner’ on Scotch Whisky, not letting it put him off his garage full of winter warmers. For the future, I too want to find that special place mate.

Dave at Broadford Brewer had me laughing at the first paragraph with this introductory quote “here’s my small silver coin of a post to be wrapped neatly in the plum pudding blog round-up”. He’s also got some interesting beery choices for Christmas, I like it. Read it here.

In his imaginatively titled post “Barley’s Ghost”, The Beer Nut, goes for beers of the past, present and future which are still around, (happily I have a couple of them). Some great news for Irish drinkers and hopefully for the rest of us too, check his post out here.

Paul at Sockster’s Brewhouse has a Dickens of a Christmas indulging a passion for dark mild over the “Bank-s” holiday with “Sarah Hughes’, stirred some great memories of pre-Christmas lunch drinks, read it in full here.

Sean from Beer Search Party puts a completely different trust on the topic, being from the much balmier at the time of year Los Angeles, some great sounding beers to be supped nonetheless, read all about them here.

Richard from Travels With Cap’n has a Black Tuesday to look forward to with a few friends on Hanukkah along with a beery plan to sample lots of Oregon’s finest brews, read it here.

Alan from A Good Beer Blog takes time to reflect on where his blog has been over the years in terms of “Beers Of Christmas Past, Present and Future“, it’s funny how things don’t quite read the same a few years down the road.

Stan from Appellation Beer asks the interesting question “What would Scrooge drink?“, can you put a name to your favourite and would you buy him a beer?

Jon from The Brew Site, looks back at some beery Christmases with family & friends drinking Jubelale and canned session brews and looks forward to sharing something special and interesting here.

Reuben from A Tale Of Ale goes all Bah Humbug on us, moving from Lambrusco, then living the “High Life” on Samichlaus.

Leigh at Good Food Good Beer takes us on a journey on his post The Best Day Of The Year, a real fly on the wall experience about how things are in his and his family’s houses at Christmas, carefully eyeing that special beer but just drinking…what family drink.

Craig from Drink Drank defies time itself hatching a fascinating plan to brew a beer from the past, for the present and the future in his post Marley’s Ghost, I’d love to hear how this turns out and maybe some of my UK brewing friends could try it too for a transatlantic tasting session?

Matt from Hoosier Beer Geek puts his spin on a subject that seems to be on quite a few lips (keyboards, blogs) of late, that is are we all guilty of treating beer as “my precious”, I know I am. Read about the path to self redemption here.

Kenny from The Beer Monkey breaks on in song on the Christmas Karaoke with a rib tickling rendition of The Twelve Beers Of Christmas. I challenge you not to be singing along as you read this one 😉

Boak And Bailey remind us all to put the beer snobbery aside and enjoy the true sentiments of Christmas offerings, no matter what they are or where they came from. “There never was such a goose.”

Tiffany from 99 Pours must have a soft spot for old Scrooge-face if the beers she’s preparing to serve misery guts up are anything to go by. I think I need to work on my mean streak, it obviously pays big dividends, read it and weep here in Beers That Will Haunt Old Scrooge

Bob from “It could do with a few more hops…” pushes aside the spiritual visitations and relays how he has already come to terms with his own demons. The beastly dark side of beer geekery and how it can potentially ruin a good pint. Looks like there will be better things than “lumpy Mikkeller” in the Arnott household this Christmas..read on here

Jay from a beer in the hand is worth two in the fridge is looking for beer Resurrection and harding for an Abstrakt Christmas, hoping to convert his Father in law to the good cause. Read all about it..

Paul from Source Deli dips another toe into the beer blogging arena and joins The Session for the first time with his post “3 beers of Christmas Dinner or The Non-Stop Rise of Beer Part 2“, where he plots and plans the beer matches for Christmas dinner before succumbing to family tradition..

Then of course there’s my own witterings on Beersay, “A Christmas Carol” and as Broadford Brewer commented: “Leading the way with confessions followed by true redemption with what can only be described as an amazing selection of beers!!! If you are sharing them they we’ll have to dub you Ebenezer Good!”

I’ll give it a few more days before I put the final summary post together so please give me a shout if any of you are busily creating something you’d like to add. Hopefully some of the fine work above will serve as inspiration. You can add your links HERE

Thanks again everyone.