Part 2 of my round up of my favourite beery-related things of the past 12 months in which I feature the best beers I have come across. And whilst I talked about pubs last time, I didn't have room to mention the taprooms I visited this year, so here they are....
I always find that within the period in and around Christmas and New Year when the days merge into each other that it is very easy to get distracted, even though you might not actually have that much to do in between the informal catch-ups and the pre-planned events. And so this has been the case with getting on with this blog, which I could have started at any time in the past week or so. Anyway, here we are, I've finally got on with it at last, so off we go!
The Taprooms
I visited a number of taprooms this year, some for the first time, along with visiting a few brewery taps which whilst not actually at the brewery were the official taps, such as Polly's in Mold and Atom in Hull, both of which had their own charms and are well worth a visit. And then it all becomes a bit of a blurred concept with the example of Brew York, whose taproom is still on the old site on Walmgate in the middle of the city whilst brewing operations have largely upped sticks to a larger site with a shiny new brewery in the city's outer suburbs. In October I visited the Skinners brewery taproom in Truro which was very welcoming and had surprisingly good beer, whilst in July I made a pilgrimage to Two by Two's brewery in Ouseburn which was likewise very friendly with the beer as excellent as ever.
Back in February I took a trip to Cheltenham to visit Deya's taproom, a trip I had been wanting to make for some time. It is situated on an industrial estate in the suburbs of this busy town, but conveniently is only a few minutes walk from the railway station, so I saved the final couple of hours of my visit to pay a visit before I caught my train back home, hoping to end my trip to the town on a high.
"I wandered into a yard with a large tank with DEYA branding, empty pallets, and tables and benches which would be unlikely to be used on this wet Friday afternoon. The taproom itself was large with a huge mural on one wall with a sign exhorting us to Drink Fresh. There were rows of tables and a large listing on one wall of the beers available on hand pump and from the line of taps below. Down the full length of the room could be seen the impressive brewery with its gleaming stainless vessels with a capacity of 40 hectolitres."
DEYA was set up by Theo Freyne in 2016. He'd worked previously for legendary US brewer Doug Odell, and came back with a mission to create beers in the hop-forward style of Odells here in the UK, beers which were unfined, unfiltered, unpasteurised, and highly drinkable. Things really took off for the brewery when they launched the serial award-winning Steady Rolling Man, a 5.2% juicy hazy pale, which is one of the UK's definitive craft beers, and was of course available here and naturally one of the beers I sampled.
Much as I enjoyed my trip to DEYA, there was one taproom that continues to impress every time I visit and that is the one operated by Track in the brewery-heavy area close to Manchester's Piccadilly Station. Sitting within one unit in an industrial estate dominated by Cloudwater whose own taproom and beers underwhelm these days, it continues to hit the right notes both in terms of beer quality, good food offering, and a cracking atmosphere in the shadow of shiny brewing vessels, although when I visited last time the beer was not quite as good as on previous visits. But overall, with an honorary mention as well to Sureshot a few railway sleepers away on Sheffield Street, my Taproom of the Year award once again goes to Track.
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| So they win again...Track Brewery Tap, Manchester |
The Beers
Undoubtedly one of the events of the year was the much-anticipated return of Boddingtons in cask. This came about due to an agreement signed between current brand owners Anheuser Busch and Middleton-based brewers JW Lees. It finally appeared in September and so I headed over to Manchester to find a pint of the new beer. After a couple of false alarms I managed to track down a pint in Sam's Chop House, a place I had never visited before. "...to my relief, like a shining yellow beacon, there was a hand pump with a Boddingtons(clip)..."A pint of Boddingtons, please" I said to the smiley girl who came to serve me. Just a normal request, but it felt weird saying those five words again after such a long time, words that back in the 1970's and 80's were regularly on my lips."
I continued: "I looked at my freshly-poured pint. It appeared somewhat darker than it used to be, certainly than the straw-coloured version I had first encountered when I hit Manchester...in the 1970's, more a light golden brown colour, crystal clear, with a creamy head...It had a hint of citrus fruit in the aroma. I took my first sip. There was a light malt flavour, a little toffee, and a refreshing but dry finish as per the original version I remember. The beer had a soft mouthfeel which was more like later versions, and certainly more in keeping with many of today's beers. By 'eck, it was a good pint...and it didn't last long! It isn't a re-creation of a previous beer...the yeast used is Lees' house yeast rather than from the original Boddington's strain...and the hop bill includes Jester...a modern British hop with New World hop characteristics which give a touch of grapefruit...in summary the new Lees version of Boddington Cask...is a re-imagining of how a cask version of the beer should be to meet the needs of the market in 2025. And based on my first pints of, Lees have done a great job...and it is a worthy baton-holder of one of Manchester's most iconic beers."
Good as it was though, the Boddingtons that day did not make the list of cask beers that I rated as 4 on the National Beer Scoring System scale that I recorded within the blogs I wrote during the year which is as below:
Stand outs from that list were the Echelon from Almasty, which was on great form on both occasions when I visited the Free Trade Inn, the Bathams Bitter I had at the Tamworth Tap, and the two versions of Bluebird I had at the Black Bull in Coniston, whilst the Parade was a re-creation of Beak's excellent keg beer of that name in cask form at a slightly lower strength. It is though impossible to pick a best pint of the year particularly when I factor in beers I have had when I have been drinking off duty in some of the wonderful pubs we are lucky to be blessed with here in Calderdale. I have though pulled together a list of my favourite cask and keg breweries that I have come across over this year.
Top for Cask:
Two by Two, Track, Pentrich, Bathams, Sureshot, Round Corner, Fyne, Marble, Thornbridge, Almasty
Cask brewer of 2025: Two by Two
Top for Keg
Deya, Verdant, Polly's, Track, Two by Two, State of Kind, Two Flints, Anspach & Hobday, Beak, Tartarus
Keg Brewer of 2025: Deya
Brewer of the Year
On balance, I do have to go once again for Two by Two who have excelled all year on cask and not done a bad job on keg either. The fact that there are at most 5 people who work at the brewery, who are based in the Ouseburn area of Newcastle, makes it all the more remarkable and how they manage to conjure up a succession of these magical hazy delicious beers from a multitude of hops is a work of pure alchemy, with the beer pictured below an absolute classic.
In the meantime I would just like to wish you all the best for 2026 and a massive thanks to you all for reading all these rambling thoughts from over the past year....
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