How you should drink good beer - Serving Basics

The following are just some basic tips and things that I follow when drinking good beer. I say "when I'm drinking good beer" as there's little you can do to drastically effect the taste of a Bud Light or a Bud Select. Hell, something that inhibits the flavor of those beers might actually be a good thing. Also, I understand that not every situation allows you to do this stuff, so I'm not advocating you turn into a gigantic douche at a BBQ or a friend's Super Bowl party because you want a specific type of glass or whatnot. If you're in the right atmosphere and you actually want your more expensive beer to taste the way it is supposed to taste, here's a few easy things that I recommend to get the best out of your purchase. After all, why spend the money on something and not drink it correctly?

(I understand I didn't get to everything here, this was just stuff that I was thinking about last night while I was....yes...... drinking beer)


SERVING BASICS:

If possible, always, and I mean ALWAYS pour your beer into a glass. Your beer will absolutely not taste the way the brewer intended it to taste if you suck it out of the bottle. Find a freaking glass, and pour it into that glass.....not a plastic cup, but a glass. There's not one reputable brewer out there that would recommend their beer out of a bottle/can when a glass is available, which of course makes perfect sense. Why would a brewer not want their product to taste as good as it possibly can?

Secondly: By no means does your beer belong in a frosted glass/mug of any sort. I don't give a shit how many crappy beer commercials you see that get all boner-rific over the coldness of their beer, you are severely hurting the flavor of your beer by putting it into a frosted mug. Not only does your beer being that cold hurt the flavor, but it doesn't take Bill Nye the Science guy to understand that frost = ice = water = diluted beer = compromised taste. If you're looking to just go out and just get hammered on miller lites, then this is fine, but if you're dropping 10+ bucks on a six pack, or 5-6 bucks a bottle at a nicer beer bar then you are just wasting your time. For you St. Charles/St. Louis folks, this is why Trailhead "Brewery" sucks. (notice the quotes around the word "Brewery") Any place that claims they brew their own beer then proceed to serve it in a glass so that has ice floating on the top of their brown ale pretty much lets you know they suck and suck hard. A good brewer spent a hell of a lot of time figuring out a recipe and making that recipe just right, if they wanted more water to be in the beer they would have made it that way.

Thirdly: Be reasonable with your temperature. Not drinking your beer at sub-zero temperatures is just something you're going to have to get over. Put on your big kid pants, and realize that the reason you remember your beer tasting like shit when it was "warm" is because you were most likely drinking shitty beer to begin with. Similar to pouring your beer in a glass, no good brewer will recommend serving your beer as cold as humanly possible. Also, regardless of what people say, good beer in Europe is not, anywhere, served "warm". It's not served ice cold, but it's not served warm. There are a TON of good beers that recommend a serving temperature on their bottles, and the "warmest" I've seen is 55 degrees F, which is still below room temperature. A good rule of thumb that I follow is to get your beer as cold as your fridge will allow it. Pull it out, and let it sit 10-15 minutes before opening it. Pour it and drink it slowly, letting it warm up closer to room temperature as you drink it, and try to see how it changes as it 'warms'. Often times you'll find flavors that weren't there at first, or a bit of sweetness that didn't come through at all when you took your first sip of it at 40 or so degrees. With high ABV brews you will honestly miss a lot of the great aspects of the beer when you try to drink it too cold.

Glassware: This is great if you or the bar you are at have the proper glass for the style, but it's not the most important thing ever. In my opinion, a non-frosted glass, and a very CLEAN glass are just as important to get the proper flavor(s). Here's a good primer on glassware from: beeradvocate.com. If you don't have a bevy of different style glasses, a good alternative (which is also in the link) for a lot of the higher ABV beers is to just get a big/oversized wine glass. Air is a good thing for a lot of the "bigger" beers and it will only help open up all the intricate flavors and smells that the brewer intended. I guess you can be afraid of looking like a douche, but if you're just with a few folks hanging out at someone's place, they're probably aware of the fact that you're just trying to optimize the good chunk of change you just spent on whatever you're drinking.

The pour: Head, in any form, is not a bad thing (pun INTENDED). You are supposed to get a good layer of foam on your beer, and some brewers even make their own glassware to support a large amount of foam in their product. (Duvel being a great example) The reason some of you don't like foam in your shitty light beers is because you're more worried about getting more beer in your glass than you are the taste. If you ever start getting the glassware made for specific beers you'll even find that some of them have lines on them where they suggest the head of the beer to start. Most beers will give you the desired head without a super aggressive pour, but I like to do the typical 45 degree angle slow pour, then slowly get the glass upright and finish the last 1/3 or so of the pour a little more aggressively to see if I can get some foam. Don't worry if you don't get any, as there are some beers that simply won't give you a big fluffy head, or if they do, it will dissipate quickly. Also, a dirty glass will inhibit both the initial amount of head, and head retention while you're drinking.

Fruit?: No thanks. I don't go absolutely bonkers over someone trying to put a lemon, lime or orange in their beer, but I really don't want that. If the brewer wanted that stuff in their beer, they would have put it in there. The reason you put a lime in your Corona or other Mexican beers, is because those beers kind of suck. Putting a lemon or an orange in your draft beer just adds acid to it which is going to compromise the head you got with your pour, as well as the overall taste of the beer. Once again, I don't go completely apeshit over someone putting a lemon in their beer (although it makes less and less sense to me), but for god sakes, don't assume I want the same......ask me first.

I'll get to what I do to taste beer in the future (as you can be surprised at what you can find when you really pay attention to what you're drinking) , but these are just some small things I was thinking about that can have somewhat of an effect on the quality of your brew.