The Best Beer to Drink at Home (The Session 144)

In praise of the shower beer.

The best beer to drink at home is the shower beer. There is no debate. 

I was a late convert to the shower beer. I believe my first - or at least the first memorable one - was in the communal shower at Palermo Marina in June 2008. I’d just crewed a beautiful Swan 57 yacht 3,500 nautical miles from Guernsey with a bunch of strangers. Some of whom had briefly become friends. Some of whom hadn’t. Either way, we’d arrived late the night before. Early morning perhaps. And come daylight all I wanted was a hot shower I could stand up under and didn’t need to hold. 

The shower block was a small square room with two curtained cubicles and a table in between. On the table sat an espresso machine. Oh, Italy. 

The beer was a stubby supermarket bottle. You know the ones. Probably only about 20cl (if that). Definitely no more than 2.5%. But that, the espresso (far better than any shower block espresso had any right to be) and the ability to stand fully upright, hands-free (aside from the aforementioned beverages) under warm water for the first time in a week or two was bliss. 

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.

For shame, I need to get better at ordering from my favourite breweries online.

Gipsy Hill’s Hepcat is a particular favourite. Fierce Beer’s Day Shift, when I have it.

The plaster dust washes away. The paint is scrubbed from under fingernails. I stand up tall, grateful for the warm running water. And feel content.