A Considered Reply To Beer Article Comments

Every time a beer story runs in “mainstream” media there are a raft of great comments from people who just love debating the worth of good beer.

Over the last few days I’ve spent a large amount of time cosidering the comments from this Good Food article about canned beer:

http://www.goodfood.com.au/good-food/drink/the-tinnie-taste-test-experts-put-21-cans-of-beer-to-the-test-20150312-141v2o.html

I want to make sure the authors get the recognition they deserve. I feel like sometimes we overlook the comments on these articles, when they are a fine and reasonable forum for discussing the world’s, and beer’s, major issues.

Let’s start with Andrew, who said:

Great. Now we have had a bunch of Ned Kelly bearded hipsters sample some beer…how about they go back to work and actually sample the beers we are finding and drinking in our pubs, clubs and bottle shop fridges. Out of those 20, maybe 5 are what most pub drinkers regularly tipple. No Fat Yak, No Cascades, No Little Creatures, No Holgate, No Beechworth Brewery, One Mountain Goat (and not even one of the more popular ones). Who made this list up

Mate, I agree. I can’t believe it either. Why aren’t these hipsters in the pubs sampling beers that don’t come in cans for their can taste-test?

James replied, agreeing:

A beer in a can test without the most important ingredient – hard work. Seriously authours I want you to get off your butts, go out in real world and do a days hard work or two. Try a range of samplings after a day in bush mustering cattle, working on a building site in Cairns in summer, chase tuna of SA, drive a truck in WA. Heck just do a days work in the garden in Sydney or Melbourne.

Now taste the beer.

Hear hear James. These fellas sound like a bunch of poofs. Trying to enjoy a beer without mustering cattle or chasing tuna. Maybe if they spent less time in hipster gay bars they’d be able to taste a proper beer. Seriously.

Frank alternatively, gives us his life story.

as a home brewer I’m satisfied that I’m saving like $2-8 per stubbie with my homebrew Coopers which tastes quite fine to me thank you very much and improves with age ‘mit hefe’ (bottle yeast) compared to most filtered-dead-when-bottled beers.

call my favourites – Schneider or Ayinger Weisse from Munich – I’ve enjoyed plenty of those – but when it comes to quaffing – I’m happy with all that money in my bank account – that I haven’t spent on such craft beers

Awesome story Frank. Keep us posted bro.

Fletch HATES hipsters:

First bearded hipsters ruined music, then they ruined inner-city venues, and now they’re ruining beer.

For the average bloke in the street, a good beer is a cold beer; even better if it’s cheap a beer.

Most of the beers rated in this article retail for over $60 a carton – which is great if you’re a single, childless, high income earning hipster. I may be old fashioned but when I have a beer I don’t just have one beer, I have twelve+ beers.

I’ll stick to cheap imported German lagers (such as Oettinger Pils, which the hipsters high and mightily poo-pooed), that are brewed without added sugar under the German Beer Purity Law (Reinheitsgebot). Having said that, I’m more than happy to enjoy a cold Carlton Draught, Melbourne Bitter, Fosters Lager, Tooheys or twelve if the weather’s good and the price is right.

I wish that hipsters would leave beer alone and go and join wine tasting clubs where their elitist snobbery would be greatly appreciated. Beer is the drink of the common man – hipsters aren’t common men; they’re pompous, highbrow, stuffed-shirt, smarty pants braggarts.

Ugh, tell me about it. Music was way better before people with beards came along. I am also completely over their stuffed shirts. I can’t believe hipsters have ruined stuffed shirts too.

Hey look, Fletch again:

Real beer contains no added sugar – only water, malted barley and hops.

Nice one Fletch. I don’t even want yeast in my beer either.

Bill says:

Maybe they should have real beer drinkers from pubs and clubs doing the taste test to get a real result from people who know beer.

To be fair, he’s right. This bunch of boutique hipsters probably love wine, and not mustering on tuna sites.

TS90 wonders why the beers they liked scored highly.

Looks like every beer that scored highly was a pale ale/ IPA. What a surprise. Seems like to me these taste testers have a preference for pale ales, making this a useless comparison. It’s like comparing red to white wine in taste tests.

I’m not saying this has anything to do with Tower 7 but… the dots are there mate. The dots are there.

Action directe, all action, no time to proof read, wonders why these nerds are even commenting here?

after you nerds finish moaning about the article, do you go back to your other hobbies, like pulling the wings off flies?

Too fucking right. Glad you took time out of your action packed day to give this pearler of a comment.

Redsaunas is over it too

I am well and truly over over-hopped, over-hyped US-style pale ales. Subtlety in reverse proportion to price.

More hops does not necessarily make for better beer.

Yeah, I counted 4 US style pales in this test. Fucking too many mate. OVER. IT.

Streeka said something no one gave a crap about. But his name is “Streeka” so he’s probably  super legend. Onya Streeks.

Scott1965 brings his years of experience to the table. Not sure why he isn’t given his own column in this paper.

One thing I have learned over the past 30 years is that, no matter what the newest trend is, people will keep going back to the affordable, easily drinkable stuff. You drink beer with your mates, you drink wine with your missus or at a dinner party. Love my VB – the only beer that does not give me a hangover. I could think of nothing worse than going to a barbeque and having to listen to a bunch of hipsters discussing the fruity aftertaste of their 3-times-the-cost-of-VB imported brew.

Totes agree Scott my mate. You don’t drink fancy beers with your mates. One of them will probably want a bit of a handjob after. No. Fucking. Way. Wine for the missus. That’s when the handjobs come in.

It’s all too much for Grumbles_McGee:

I have abstained from criticising any person on any forum for nearly ten years but your relegation of XXXX Gold to the bottom of your list is too much to bear. XXXX Gold is a Queensland lager: a beer that is the result of countless hours of pumping out shift after shift at the coal face. When served properly (as in it should be frightfully cold), XXXX Gold quenches any thirst with the added benefit of a warm buzz at the end.

That swill you recommend is completely unpalatable in any quantity beyond a pony. You small-L-liberal pontificators of all things abhorrent need to consider the fact that a full-breasted and poignant stout beer that has been brewed from ethically reared barley is completely undrinkable after a hard day’s slog. If I wanted fruity aromatics to whisk me away on a Friday afternoon, I would order a pina colada.

We should be celebrating a beer that well and truly accompanies our climate.

We should be celebrating XXXX Gold.

Stop destroying your culture by demonising our beers.

I can’t even add to this comment. It just sums up everything that I stand for. Ice cold beer, coal, and the word “pontificating”. It really puts these small-L-liberals in their big-P-place.

Finally, ibast

The comments on XXXX gold are interesting. I’ve got a theory that if you blind (with blindfold) tested it against mineral water drinkers wouldn’t be able tell the difference. People only know it’s beer because of the colour.

Too edgy for me mate.