I enjoy beer, I love beer. But lager it seems is all I like. I bought some ale today just to see if it was as bad as I remembered and guess what? It is worse… It is like drinking perfume… Who really likes ale and why?
Well, ale has been popular for many centuries now. Either it’s simply not to your taste, or you got some bad ale.
Sierra Nevada India Pale Ale.
If you don’t like this, then I’d say you really don’t like ale. But, I call it nectar of the gods.
Define ‘ale’.
Seriously.
I drink beers other than lagers. I know the difference in taste between lager, bitter and stout; I know there are pale beers and dark beers that are produced differently. I read up on CAMRA. I’m a regular at the largest real ale festivals in the UK, and I’m not sure I really understand these classifications (at least, in terms of tasting the beers).
I’m a lager person as well (and a porter, and stout…) but nut brown ales can be pretty good. I find pale ales too watery and just generally lacking muscle.
Sooo… try a nut brown, you might like it.
I believe that the main difference between ale and lager is that ale is made using a top-fermenting yeast (meaning that the yeast floats on top of the wort during fermentation), while lager is bottom-fermented.
If you really want to find out if you can enjoy ale, you’ll have to pony up for a few bottles of Chimay. Sweet mother’s milk.
There are hundreds of ales out there, and they’re not all perfumy, so I suggest you experiment. And experiment. And experiment. Ask your bartender for recommendations (assuming he or she knows something about the subject, and is not some nineteen-year-old Miller drinker). Or go to a store that lets you mix-and-match to make your own six-pack, and see what you come up with.
Also, a lot of darker beers (like the aforementioned Sierra Nevada) are not at their best at fridge temperature, so sip slowly and let your drink warm up a little.
If you still don’t like ale after all this, just send the leftovers to me and I’ll take care of 'em.
This is weird thread greenteeth. I could be a smart alec and say “no, nobody likes ale, the British only produced 3.3 million barrels of it last year to paint the urinals with”, but the truth is that millions of people like ale, although maybe you’re never going to be one of them. As for why, well personally I prefer ale to lager because it is much richer and more varied of flavour.
There have been many threads on the subject, so a quick search on this forum should give you some more names and recommendations (especially for local brewers). Personally I like Marton’s Pedigree, Fuller’s London Pride, Courage Directors, the Young’s range, the Cain’s range and the Shepherd Neame range among others. Newcastle Brown Ale is also popular and is often mentioned here by Americans who claim to like English beer.
I certainly wouldn’t have compared Moorhouse Black Cat or London Pride to “perfume”.
Greenteeth, I’d advise you to find a brew pub and ask them if they do a nice ale. My favorite ales in the USA are Redhook Blackhook (which the label says is “Dark But Not Bitter”) and Sierra Nevada Porter. Both have a rich, full flavor that won’t wrestle you to the ground. Some folks like those burnt bitter ales that make you feel like you really accomplished something if you got to the bottom of the glass. I don’t.