One at a time is plenty. I get incredibly stupid when I drink too much. This is the reason for the long hiatus.
Polydimethylsiloxane (anti foaming agent) and Polyvinylpyrrolidone (clarifying agent) may be organic compounds, and therefore “natural” somehow, but they’re not exactly the plain old corn, rice, wheat, barley, hops, and water that most people are expecting when brewers claim to only use “natural” ingredients . The only reason that macro breweries are able to deliver a consistent product to market is by the use of stabilizers and other chemical agents that make each and every bottle and can identical.
I’m not knocking the good ol’ American light lager (as a matter of fact I’m a huge PBR guy when it comes to a great ice cold summertime lawn mowing beer), I’m just saying that there’s a reason they don’t list ingredients.
PVP isn’t really an additive. It’s used to clarify and then removed entirely during filtration.
All my beer comes from Canada. I find a good variety and the prices are not ridiculous. I do not agree with warm or room temperatures. I drink beer after playing racketball or golf. A cold beer is correct then. A warm beer would be too gassy. Molsons, Carling and Labatts are some I drink.
You’re correct, I withdraw PVP, but the gist of the post is still the same. If an American macro had to put an FDA label on the side of the can there would be some mighty strange looks being exchanged down at the local bucket of blood tonight.
I do not believe anybody does. Cellar temp is about as cold as beer is supposed to get.
I love the pale ale, silver creek and honey brown
It’s still not too unusual to find beer served with ice in Thailand, although thankfully that seems to be falling by the wayside, at least in Bangkok. There remain some areas out in the boonies, though, where even though they have some sort of refrigeration, they’ll serve you a beer straight out of the case sitting over by the wall! And room temp in Thailand is slightly higher than room temp in many other places. Then you’ll get the beer with ice. Why they don’t stick a few bottles in the fridge is absolutely beyond me.
What you’ll see in Bangkok, if you do go to a place that still uses ice, is not ice cubes per se, but rather the glass is so frozen that there’s a large chunk of ice built up on the bottom of the glass. Dunno, maybe they do that on purpose, like putting a little water down there before freezing the glass. But even if the beer itself is already chilled, it’s warmer than the ice and so acts to melt it. Soon you get a little iceberg floating up to the top.
Hey, since we’re talking about cold/warm beer, and about megabrews, I want to bring up (again) my contention:
That it is true even of the megabrews that they are not best ice cold, but rather, simply chilled.
I have often heard that if you have to drink, say, a Budweiser, then you should drink it ice cold and fast, to hide the bad taste.
But I’ve now tried this experiment with three megabrews–Coors Lite, Budweiser, and MGD–and have found in each case the following. While starting out (while the beer was ice cold) the thing was literally not even tasting like beer to me, but rather, like some kind of sour water. But when I came back to it maybe fifteen or twenty minutes later, once it was down to just “cool” rather than ice cold, the thing was now recognizeably beer. It tasted like a beer–you know, like bread and flowers? 
And in no case did I particularly like the beer, but it was… better… than it had been before, and definitely potable.
I brought this up once before–when I made the discovery while trying my mother-in-law’s Coors Lite–but was roundly dismissed. I just want to reiterate that I’ve tried it with some more megabrews, and the principle really does seem to hold.
-FrL-
Heineken? F*&% Heineken!
Pabst Blue Ribbon!
Sorry. I like beer too, fancy beer, beers I can’t pronounce, but if I’m not in the mood to analyze the hoppiness of some particular brew (or I’m low on cash), PBR is a tasty, cheap beer. Yuengling is also a great domestic beer IMO, and it’s America’s oldest brewery.
As for skunkage, I’d err on the side of caution and ask them to grab a case out of the back. I’ve occasionally been sucessful with cold-warm-cold again beer, but with a beer you’ve never tried, that might be a fancy beer with delicate flavors, I wouldn’t want to take a chance. Actually, the first time I had Yuengling, it was skunked, and if someone else hadn’t told me it didn’t normally taste that way I would have never drank it again, which would be a shame.
Might I recommend a few brews? I tend to go for the darker ales and porters, but do enjoy a nice pilsener or pale ale too. Newcastle, Bass, Smythwick’s, Red Stripe, the aforementioned Yuengling, (really, PBR is not recommended if you want a strong flavor, it’s akin to the piss-water that everyone’s arguing about, just IMO, better) Amberbock, Blue Moon (I personally hate wheat beers, but a lot of people like them, and it’s the only commonly-available one I can think of. Throw an orange slice in it). These should be available at your run of the mill liquor store, and it’ll give you an idea of what types of beer you like. Then, if you’ve got a specialty beer store near you, you can go make a specialized 6-pack of whatever you fancy, whether it’s Old Speckled Hen, Entire Butt, Trois Pistoles, or Sing Ha (does anyone like Sing Ha, or just me?). Oh, and I’m sure the beer snobs will want to lynch me for saying so, but a lot of Sam Adams’ specialty brews are pretty good. I even like their Cherry Wheat, even though I generally hate wheat beer, but theirs doesn’t have the odor of moldy, singed socks like other wheat beers.
And, now I’m thirsty, so I think I’ll go to the beach with a 6 pack. Mmmm… beer.
I guess, I will never be a beer snob. I try what everyone else say is the best. Seems like everyone in the Caribbean and Africa thinks Stella Artois and Heineken is the best, Yet the Europeans and North Americans think of them as inferior. Guinness on the other hand, is liked by everyone, but I dislike it.
Except Stout. It is said to be a cultivated taste. I have drunk it a few times but 2 and I am through.
In Key West ,Kellys bar has a micro brewery. They make wheat and lager and a couple flavored beers. They are very nice. (Kelly is the blond instructor in Top Gun)
I love Guinness stout. It used to be godawful expensive in Bangkok at the few pub-style places that would carry it. Then it signed a new distributor, and the price dropped overnight, AND a lot more places started carrying it, not just pubs. Still not cheap, but now it’s easy to find for the equivalent of about US$5 a pint, whereas before you had to pay $12 or more!
China Guy: If you read this, I found a decent stout in Shanghai called Blue Diamond, I think it was. Seems to be available only in stores. I would pick up a couple of cans in a little mom-and-pop shop across from our hotel when returning at night. Not bad, and cheap. As for other beers, I’m not too fond of Tsingtao. When I was a young adult in West Texas, Tsingtao was sold in the liquor and beer stores outside of town, and I always thought I was being really cosmopolitan back then by drinking it. But I find it mediocre now. There IS a truly great beer in Beijing called Yanjing, but it was nowhere to be found in Shanghai.
Thailand has what I think is a fantastic beer: Singha. But it seems to be a love-it-or-hate-it thing. I love it. There’s a long-running local Urban Legend that says it’s packed with formaldehyde, and Boon Rawd Brewery, the maker, keeps coming out to deny it. People drink 50 bottles, wake up with a heckuva hangover and think, “Damn! It’s true! Must have formaldehyde in it!” I’ve watched the beer scene improve vastly over the years. Used to be just Singha and Kloster, both local brews, plus another hard-to-find beer called Amarit, which disappeared long ago. Now there’s all sorts of imports, but I still like my Singha.
I do remember, though, that Budweiser was one of the first beers imported into Thailand. This was in the mid-90s. I was never a Bud man myself back in the US, so I was not impressed with that development. But it caught on in fashionable circles. You’d have to pay outrageous prices for a Bud in a bar or restaurant, and the local high-society crowd would make it a point to be seen holding a can of Budweiser at functions. Sheesh!
Siam Sam: yay, another Singha fan! (is it one word? I thought it was two.) A question on pronunciation- most people pronounce it like it’s 2 words, with an equal emphasis on Sing and Ha. I wanna slur it together like sing-ah (like a Bostonian would pronounce ‘singer’). Which is correct? Or do we have it all wrong?
I’ve never had a Singha that was worth the effort to drink it. But then, I’ve never had it anywhere close to the brewery so I’m sure shipping and storage had quite a bit to do with the flavor profile.
longhair, if you’re still reading this, might I recommend Bohemia instead of that pisswater Corona. Even the Mexicans think Corona is swill. Any place that has Corona will likely have Bohemia, or Tecate (definitely a working-class beer in Mexico) or even Dos Equis, which is a not half-bad amber lager.
For stout fans, or those that just don’t like Guinness ( :eek: ) might I suggest Murphy’s Stout. Or my favorite session-ender, Mackesson’s.
It’s spelled Singha in English, but in Thai it’s actually pronounced “Sing.” One word, one syllable. It’s Thai for “lion” (the local variation of the “Sing” in Singapore, the Lion City). So, yes, I’m afraid you all have it wrong. In a bar in Thailand, you would ask for a “bia sing,” or Singha beer. But don’t feel bad, even farangs here in-country often say Singha as two syllablles; when they do, it seems to be the first syllable that takes the accent.
Well, like I said, it’s generally love it or hate it. I don’t think I’ve found anyone who’s felt so-so about Singha. I love the stuff. Drinking my first one after a long trip abroad, it really feels like I’m home again. Aaaahhhh.
But funny you should mention that. I was sure the Singha I bought in the store in Hawaii tasted different from the ones here in Thailand, but when I mentioned this in another thread, I was assured it was my imagination. I’d always heard that they lower the alcohol content for the US market and so assumed that was the reason for the different tatse, but others say it’s the same Singha. So dunno.
Friend silenus,
Yes, I am still reading this. I will look for those at my next stop. and from the OP, the ladies did buy the larger refrigerator for my den, and the original question is now moot. The old refrigerator was a 2.5 cubic feet. the new is 5 cubic foot better shelving. This means cold beer within reach of my desk chair.