Golden Pints has been a nice bookend to the year since, well, it started. I think it was Mark Dredge, Andy Mogg and the late Simon Johnson who had the idea, in those heady times spent waiting for the latest beer from Stefano and Kelly at Thornbridge, or whatever Dom, James and Colin had rustled up at Marble, and a couple of Scottish lads called James and Martin.

How times have changed. 2017 has been a long, strange year, and this is written from the comfort of a “don’t sleep here” style bench in a draughty airport. I have spent so much of the year outside the UK that there is bound to be a slice of unobtanium in here, and some ignorance about what has been happening at home. Consider that a health warning.

2017 was a year of hazy beer, and even hazier politics.

Best UK cask beer. A year of great change for me, which meant revisiting old favourites rather than chasing new ones: Adnams Ghost Ship, Harvey’s Best Bitter, Fuller’s. Even Tiny Rebel bucking the trend of quietly killing off a cask range deserves applause, and the beers back it up. Harvey’s takes it, largely for its comfort-blanket quality. We still do a poor job of celebrating cask. It is genuinely unique to Britain and we treat it like furniture.

Best UK keg beer. Tiny Rebel, Wylam and Magic Rock have been the go-to whenever the opportunity came up.

Best UK bottled beer. A cop-out: the box set Fuller’s released with the great and good of UK brewing. Good idea, every beer excellent, and a strong calling card for what British brewing looks like now.

Best UK canned beer. Chubbles, from Cloudwater, a post-IndyMan gift from Katie and Paul. Three of the four cans disappeared in a sofa-and-Netflix moment, me blissfully unaware of the ABV. I woke at 4am.

Best overseas draught. Jever and the other dry, bitter, hoppy pilsners have been my default all year, and Het Anker Hopsinjoor has been consumed in quantity. But Lambrate’s American Magut has been my undoing: numerous pints, numerous occasions. That’s the winner.

Best overseas bottled beer. Woodstock Brewery of Cape Town, for their Sugarman wine barrel aged dubbel. A close run against Lambrate/Beavertown Magic Tram, Duvel Tripel Hop Citra and Frontaal’s New England IPA.

Best overseas canned beer. Garage, of Barcelona, both a production brewery and a brewpub. Their New England IPAs, the Soups, and the collaborations with Other Half have all been excellent.

Best collaboration brew. The 3/9 project, which was a little crazy but genuinely enjoyable to be part of. Yes, I was involved. The Other Half collaborations I kept bumping into around Europe deserve a mention too.

Best overall beer. Orval. Easy.

Best branding. Jever. They have upped their game and the quality of the branding and communications now stands with the best anywhere. There must be something enjoyable about working for a brewery with one, perhaps two beers, and having to make all of it count.

Best pump clip. As long as it isn’t knotted hankies and seaside-postcard humour, I’m fine with it. Tell me the style, the ABV, where you are in the world, and maybe a hop or two.

Best packaged beer label. Cloudwater will get plenty of mentions, and having heard a presentation from the people who do that work, deservedly so. Northern Monk too, a brewery that is still relatively new to me.

Best UK brewery. Burning Sky. Yes, Mark is a mate. So what. Hoppy or sour, blond or black, fruited or not, there has not been a beer of his this year that failed to impress.

Best overseas brewery. Schoenramer, Jever and Orval have all given me enormous pleasure. Picking between them feels like a category error.

Best new brewery opening. Burnt Mill. Thoroughly impressed by the beers, the branding and the people. Worth watching.

Pub or bar of the year. Alebrowar’s pub in Gdynia, Piwna Stopa in Poznan and the Outland Brewery Tap in Paris were all excellent, but it has to be Lambrate Adelchi. It is bloody lovely.

Best new pub or bar opening. I have spent the year revisiting old haunts, so new places have been thin on the ground. Cafe Beermoth in Manchester was the notable exception.

Beer festival of the year. If it isn’t Beavertown Extravaganza then you’re simply wrong. I was hugely grateful to Logan for effectively putting it on for my birthday, and I’m looking forward to the 2018 edition, ideally without having to drive to Germany the following morning.

Retail. Waitrose, I suppose, with Booths excellent and Edeka in Germany unbeatable for a good-value local German selection. On the independent side, Mother Kelly’s impressed, and do check in on my old colleague Bryn at Drink Folkestone. There are so many good independents now, and they are all working extremely hard. Along with pubs, they are the gateway for the beer drinker. Support them.

Best beer book. I bought a new copy of Kunze. That is a hundred and fifty pounds’ worth of insomnia solution right there.

Best beer writing. I read people I trust: Boak & Bailey, Joe Stange, Will Hawkes, Evan Rail. Keep it up.

Simon Johnson award for best beer twitterer. I miss Late Night Nick on the Beavertown account. Most social media is now tiresome and depressing, which I suppose is the flavour of the times. Anyone who can raise a chuckle in that mire deserves an award, and most of them seem to be in Scotland. I can only assume it’s the weather. Chris from New Wave, though Pilot make me laugh often enough.

Best brewery website and social media. Harbour, for the scenery, surfing and skateboarding. Vetra, for clean, clear branding, and one to watch. And ZeroDegrees, an old favourite and a brewery that was years ahead of its time, which has had a proper dose of marketing. As the industry matures, how we say what we’re trying to say matters more and more. If you’re commissioning a new brewery website, go and look at the Awwwards food and drink category first.

So: 2018 looks like being more fun still. Are there too many breweries? What is craft? Is big brewing bad for small brewing? I’ll leave those to everyone else.

Some of the breweries mentioned are clients. Some aren’t. Deal with it.