Hello. I only occasionally peruse this NG and have never posted. Hope
I am not rehashing old topics.

More often than not, when I buy a craft beer (micro US domestic or
imported), it is totally skunky. There are a lot of great beers out
there, but it is so hard to find them fresh. They just sit so long on
the shelf that they are sometimes beyond drinkable.


Case in point, Sierra Nevada ... in my neck of the world, it is almost
always skunky (I live in the western burbs of Chicago). Same goes for
a lot of great European beers like Pilsner Urquell. I
have heard a lot of great things about PU, but every time I buy the
stuff, it tastes skunky.


I recently travelled to Slovenia (just south of Austria) and visited
their main breweries (Union Pivo and Lasko Pivo). At both locations,
there were thousands of crates of filled beer bottles sitting outside
baking in the sun. That is fine when served locally but does not make
for good export. Coming to my area, they probably sit outside at some
train depot waiting to go to port, then they sit at the export port,
then in some musty boat hold, then outside at the import port, then at
some train/truck depot before they finally get deposited at my local
liquor store. How could that beer ever be fresh once sitting upon the
shelves of my local store.


Say what you want about Bud, but their 'freshness matters' campaign
opened my eyes to the importance of freshness with beer. I think they
did a service to brewing in general. Now a lot of micro brews will
list a date when the beer was brewed. I won't buy old beer and I won't

buy a beer that won't list a brewing date or at least a 'drink by'
date.

Just wanted to share those thoughts. Thank you for your support.

Patrick

Buy something local. Goose Island IPA rocks, and it's brewed in Chicago.
Get some Three Floyd's--right in your area. You should be able to get all
sorts of incredible beer there as fresh as can be, and, if you aren't, it's
the fault of the retailer you're supporting. Go to a real beer store that
knows how to keep its shelves properly stocked, and things will improve.
--
************************************************** ***************
Dan Iwerks thinks that the beer you're drinking probably sucks.
The fundamental problem with Solipsism is it makes me
responsible for the fact that you're a complete idiot.
************************************************** ***************

> wrote in message
> Say what you want about Bud, but their 'freshness matters' campaign
> opened my eyes to the importance of freshness with beer. I think they
> did a service to brewing in general. Now a lot of micro brews will
> list a date when the beer was brewed. I won't buy old beer and I won't
>
> buy a beer that won't list a brewing date or at least a 'drink by'
> date.
>
> Just wanted to share those thoughts. Thank you for your support.

Not a problem, but Bud came late to the dance. Plenty of brewers were
putting a date on their beer before Bud came along and did it. And as Dan
said, this is MUCH more a retailer/wholesaler issue than it is a brewery
issue. I guarantee you that you will not find a micro in the U.S. letting
open cases of beer sit out in the sun. You see that happening, post
immediately, because I'm going to run out and find a priest: it'll be the
End Times.

--
Lew Bryson

Their clothes are weird, their music sucks and they drink
malternatives. And now you tell me they probably don't think Sierra
Nevada is cool? This is what the passage of years does to you: It
makes everyone around you more stupid. -- Michael Stewart 6/24/02

www.lewbryson.com

> wrote:
>Say what you want about Bud, but their 'freshness matters' campaign
>opened my eyes to the importance of freshness with beer. I think they
>did a service to brewing in general. Now a lot of micro brews will
>list a date when the beer was brewed. I won't buy old beer and I won't
>buy a beer that won't list a brewing date or at least a 'drink by'
>date.
>
>Just wanted to share those thoughts. Thank you for your support.

Lots of good points. I will add that freshness is not
only a matter of age but of storage condition and treatment,
as you tangentially mentioned. Even Vud can taste like crap
if the bottles are stored hot for a couple weeks. (What
A-B has that small breweries often don't is a vice-like grip
on their distributor network, so they can enforce good
storage policies.)
--
Joel Plutchak "The first thing to understand about the truly clueless
is this: they are incapable of comprehending that
they are clueless." - DS

You are probably right. I just did not start looking at 'born on date'
until after Bud starting using it as a promotion. But I have noticed
several microbrews in my area start using a 'born on' or 'best by' date
on their bottles after the Bud campaign. Maybe they would have done so
without Bud, I would guess that some were influenced by the attention
Bud directed toward the born on issue.

Beyond the retailer/wholesaler, I think there is a serious issue with
exporting Euro beer to the US. I have yet to have a Pilsner Urquell
that was not slightly skunky. Has anyone seen their brewery? Are
their bottles stored hot similar to the Slovenian brewers I saw? My
guess is most Eastern European beers, and probably some western brewers
too, just never paid much attention to quality control needed to keep
their bottles fresh during export.

By the way, never have been crazy about Goose Island. As far as
regional brews that I can get fairly fresh, I look for Capital brewery
beer (Middleton, WI) or Sprecher from Milwaukee. I have enjoyed those
brews. Have not tried Three Floyds but will look for it.

Patrick

> By the way, never have been crazy about Goose Island. As far as
> regional brews that I can get fairly fresh, I look for Capital brewery
> beer (Middleton, WI) or Sprecher from Milwaukee. I have enjoyed those
> brews. Have not tried Three Floyds but will look for it.
>
I'm wagering that if you don't care for Goose Island and their wonderful
stuff (especially that grapefruitty Honker's Ale), you'll like Three Floyds
even less. Three Floyds (at least what I've had of their stuff) strikes me
as Goose Island on steroids. As I recall, Capital is more a lager brewery,
as is Sprecher............ though I'm going from memory here..........

wrote:
> Hello. I only occasionally peruse this NG and have never posted. Hope
> I am not rehashing old topics.
>
> More often than not, when I buy a craft beer (micro US domestic or
> imported), it is totally skunky. There are a lot of great beers out
> there, but it is so hard to find them fresh. They just sit so long on
> the shelf that they are sometimes beyond drinkable.
>
>
> Case in point, Sierra Nevada ... in my neck of the world, it is almost
> always skunky (I live in the western burbs of Chicago). Same goes for
> a lot of great European beers like Pilsner Urquell. I
> have heard a lot of great things about PU, but every time I buy the
> stuff, it tastes skunky.
>

Age and/or heat do NOT make beer "skunky" - light does (that's why they
call it "light struck"). A beer, in a green bottle, exposed to light
will turn skunky in less than an hour, so "freshness" isn't really the
issue. I NEVER buy green bottled beer "off the shelf". If I'm buying
Pilsner Urquell, Jever or (in a nostalgic mood...) Ballantine XXX Ale or
Chesterfield Ale, it's by the case, sealed (preferably, on a cloudy day
and I'll throw a blanket over it when I get it into the car <g>). PU
also distributes closed 12 packs in some markets. Have NEVER had a
skunked bottle since I started doing that. (And if I only wanted a six
pack, I'd "steal" one out of a case on the floor.)

That's not to say that I don't ALSO check date codes (and I've been
doing that for many years BEFORE A-B started using it as an advertising
gimmick), since I don't like old/stale beer, either.

wrote in
oups.com:

> By the way, never have been crazy about Goose Island. As far as
> regional brews that I can get fairly fresh, I look for Capital brewery
> beer (Middleton, WI) or Sprecher from Milwaukee. I have enjoyed those
> brews. Have not tried Three Floyds but will look for it.

Eh, people have different tastes. As for Capital, I've typically found
them very impressive and, as I'm relocating back to the Midwest pretty
quick, I intend to drink a lot of Capital's lagers this summer. Same
with Sprecher--both their Vienna and Schwarzbier are teh r0x0r.

Agree with what another poster said, if you don't like Goose Island,
Three Floyds is probably not for you. Three Floyds is not a brewery that
exactly embraces the concept of subtlety with open arms. If you're in
the mood for honkin' big beers, go with 3F.
--
************************************************** ***************
Dan Iwerks thinks that the beer you're drinking probably sucks.
The fundamental problem with Solipsism is it makes me
responsible for the fact that you're a complete idiot.
************************************************** ***************

wrote in
oups.com:

> You are probably right. I just did not start looking at
> 'born on date' until after Bud starting using it as a
> promotion. But I have noticed several microbrews in my
> area start using a 'born on' or 'best by' date on their
> bottles after the Bud campaign. Maybe they would have done
> so without Bud, I would guess that some were influenced by
> the attention Bud directed toward the born on issue.

You have it backwards. Bud does not give a **** about you, the Bud-
drinking consumer/dupe. They care (as has been said previously)
about the idiot **** retailers who blow away shelf space for
goodbeear because they got paid by Augie.

The Born On date bullshit was in reaction to those who have been
doing it all along (Do you not remember the Bud "Pumpernickel
Stout" commercials?) Anchor has had a code all along, and the
ubergeeks among us can read it. Et al.

The hilarity, the hilarity...Bud doesn't *need* a Born On date. They
command so much shelf space and continuous distribution...

When was the last time you *didn't* see a Bud delivery truck?

If Born On clued you in...well, that's fine.


Scott

wrote:

> You are probably right. I just did not start looking at 'born on date'
> until after Bud starting using it as a promotion. [...]

The point is that A-B didn't start using this as a selling point until
well after many others had already done it. You just happened to see
if for the first time on Schludweiller packaging.

> Beyond the retailer/wholesaler, I think there is a serious issue with
> exporting Euro beer to the US. I have yet to have a Pilsner Urquell
> that was not slightly skunky.

You haven't had it from cans or on draught then?

> Has anyone seen their brewery?

Sure have. Goodbye, old-fashioned wood lagering vessels; hello, shiny
cylindroconical steel.

> Are
> their bottles stored hot similar to the Slovenian brewers I saw?

Some are, some aren't. PU has been putting a buncha money into
"upgrading" their brewing plant to more modern standards. Probably
doesn't hurt that they have SABMiller corporate cash to draw on, either.
The problem for a lot of those old Eastern European breweries, and not
a few Western European ones, is that there was never much investment
in expensive stuff like gigantic cold-storage facilities and all that,
'specially during the bad old days of the Communist governments.
And not only is the construction of cold-storage expensive, but it's
expensive to run, too, and a lot of those countries were rather cash-
strapped - and some still are.

> My
> guess is most Eastern European beers, and probably some western brewers
> too, just never paid much attention to quality control needed to keep
> their bottles fresh during export.

The problem is, they lose control of that product as soon as it
departs the brewery, after which it's sent to some port, loaded into
ships, sent abroad, unloaded, sits around, gets loaded on trucks,
sits around some more ... you see the problem here. Long distance
shipping is not the best friend of many beers.

Your best odds of getting a beer in decent shape are when you can find
it in a package that allows the least light in, since temperature
changes are pretty much out of anyone's control. That usually means
canned or kegged beer. Problem is, canned beer is looked on as
"downmarket" packaging in the USA, while bottles are considered
"upmarket," and thus appropriate for imported beer.

> By the way, never have been crazy about Goose Island. As far as
> regional brews that I can get fairly fresh, I look for Capital brewery
> beer (Middleton, WI) or Sprecher from Milwaukee. I have enjoyed those
> brews. Have not tried Three Floyds but will look for it.

I'll echo others' sentiments: if you're not fond of some of the more
assertive GI beers, the 3F range might not be enticing either.
--
dgs
"What, and join in your mad squid kettle games?" -- Lew Bryson

> Beyond the retailer/wholesaler, I think there is a serious issue with
> exporting Euro beer to the US. I have yet to have a Pilsner Urquell
> that was not slightly skunky. Has anyone seen their brewery? Are
> their bottles stored hot similar to the Slovenian brewers I saw? My
> guess is most Eastern European beers, and probably some western brewers
> too, just never paid much attention to quality control needed to keep
> their bottles fresh during export.
>
I live in Australia and suffer the same fate with PU. Luckily, one of the
mega liquor stores stocks PU and their turnover is high. I always buy it by
the un-opened case, from their cool room, and check that its well inside the
best by date - usually by 6 months. Thus so far, the beer has been fresh
without any off flavours or skunking.
Steve W.