Tonight is the British Guild of Beer Writers Awards Dinner at the Park Lane Hotel, Piccadilly.
Each course of the dinner will be matched with appropriate beers and prior to the dinner there will be a 90 minute reception when a wide variety of beers will be available to sample.
I will be attending as I have done on many previous years.
However this year will be slightly different.
Having recently undergone a nephrectomy ( i.e. having a kidney removed) and being now on dialysis for four hours three times a week, I now need to restrict my liquid intake to between a half and a litre a day. Having very little natural kidney function left it means that any liquid I consume must be taken off during my next dialysis session. And a maximum of a litre an hour is what can normally be undertaken on dialysis.
I will therefore have to be very careful about how much beer I consume. It is going to be sips rather than gulps. Perhaps I could adopt a wine tasters approach and spit out the beer. after I have swirled it around my mouth to appreciate its taste, and forego the appreciation of the finish and after taste.
I'm not sure how well that would go down.
Or I could just appreciate the appearance and aroma of the beers on offer! Just look and sniff.
In any case whoever has the pleasure of sharing a table with me tonightt is sure to benefit from the extra beers that I will not be drinking.
Having been a beer judge for many years I am also now having to consider whether I can continue. this ardurous, though pleasurable task. There would have to be more spitting out and less swallowing down if I did.
I will give it a try the next time I am able to accept an invite to judge.
I'm sure I will enjoy this evening's event aand I hope I will manage to be able to restrict my liquid intake. Because come 8.00 tomorrow will be the time of reckoning when I'll discover how much liquid needs to be removed during my dialysis session. You are weighed prior to a session. From this figure is deducted your "dry weight" and the result is the excess liquid. Every kilogram being a litre of liquid.
Perhaps as it is liquid and not alcohol that is the key here, I should switch to malt whisky instead!
Any opportunities for whisky judging out thete?
