The Naming of Beers is a Difficult Matter...

... it isn't just one of your holiday games.  Or so T.S. Eliot might have said, had he been writing about beer rather than cats.  And it is a tricky matter; if you take a look at the beers in any decent shop you'll come across a full range of naming styles.  Even though our homebrew isn't aiming at a market beyond family and friends, I reckon it's still important to try to get a good name for each and every brew - and now that it's spent a couple of weeks conditioning it's ready for it's first serious tasting this evening.

So where to look for name inspiration?  Well, other breweries have a variety of approaches, with most seeming to have a 'house theme' which they will stick to for naming all or most of their beers.  Fyne Ales, for instance, have a predominantly West of Scotland/Western Isles theme - Vital Spark, Somerled, Highlander, Sanda IPA etc - which certainly suits the beautiful location of their brewery.  Flying Dog brewery stick with an appropriately gonzo take on a canine theme throughout their brews - Doggie Style pale ale, In Heat Wheat hefeweisen, Raging Bitch IPA etc.  And being a big Terry Pratchett fan I love the idea of the Discworld Ales - Bledlow's Silence, Modo's Midden and so on - though I've yet to try any of them, which is something that I really should rectify as soon as possible.

Then there's the 'comedy' beer name, where bad puns go to die - Hoptimus Prime, Modus Hoperandi, Brewed Awakening etc.  Don't get me wrong - I'll happily drink a beer with a pun-tastic name, but it's not my first choice for naming our own beer.

My dad, on the other hand, is a fan of puns.  Suffice it to say that he dubbed our Christmas brew 'Blawnag Ale'...  We agreed to disagree on that one!

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago I was  pondering all of this for a while and was struggling for inspiration.  So who better to ask, I thought, than the man who knows everything - Richard Osman from Pointless.  Since he's never wrong about anything, the following brief Twitter conversation will probably explain why this brew is now officially called Pointless IPA.  'Nuff said!