Beer

I think it is safe to say that I am no longer a beer snob.

I started to become one back in college. I think it was, in part, a reaction to all the stupendously terrible beer which college coeds found acceptable.  It was also fueled by a bit misguided herd mentality. I  spent a lot of time on the Internet back then, and I saw plenty of Europeans who mocked Americans for drinking Budweiser.  They were joined by "enlightened" Americans drinking imports and craft beer.  I decided that I wanted to be accepted by these people, and so my taste in beer had to be impeccable.

I don't regret my turn at being a wannabe beer snob. I learned a lot about the drink, including countless varieties I once never knew about. And if you sat me down with a very good craft beer today, I'd still enjoy it.  But some time within the last year, I decided that I just didn't care anymore.

Take, for instance, those Internet Europeans.  Once I got a lot more knowledgeable about my new favorite drink, I went back and looked at what superior brews they were fans of.  Turns out they enjoyed some fairly trashy imports. This was an important general purpose lesson, about how you shouldn't give even half a shit about anyone on the Internet, but I digress.  More important than unmasking the Eurotrash was the revelation that becoming a beer snob is a never ending battle.  Every so often, you find a beer which is completely new to you, and looks absolutely awesome.  You try it, and you think it is pretty good, so you head over to the reviews to see what others have to say.  Beeradvocate.com and the like are flooded with mediocre grades.  According to them, what you thought to be a hidden gem was just another average product that pales in comparison to *insert name of local craft brew which you cannot get a hold of here*.  Psychologically, this was always a downer.  I thought I had developed the eye, the taste, but apparently I still had a long way to go . According to these folks, almost nothing out there was worthwhile.

This leads me to my last point.  The success of craft breweries is, ultimately, a great thing, but some of them seem to exist for no other purpose other than to fuck with us.  Some of them are straightforward, brewing a couple of stable ales and lagers, with a seasonal or experimental drink every so often.  Others can't get enough of experimentation, to the point where it defines them.  Some use simple labeling and pledged to quality.  Others try much to hard to look cool and quirky, using art design reminiscent of an O.K. Soda can and using way too much playful ad copy for a drink which is illegal for minors.  Buying from craft brewers feels like a crapshoot at times.  You may end up with simple, well made beer, or you may end up with something that tastes weird for the sake of it.  I'm particularly frustrated with what I feel is an irresponsible usage of hops among craft brewers.  Hops can add all sorts of wonderful flavors to a beer, but in my experience they have to be handled with care.  If you just use a wreckless amount of them (which some beer labels have bragged about), you may end up with a drink that feels like a punch in the face more than anything.

There's a problem with saying anything like this.  Most beer snobs (and the brewers, if they responded) would quickly tell me, or anyone else with a similar complaint, that we don't actually appreciate the flavor of hops.  This isn't at true, of course, but it doesn't matter.  If you question whether a microbrew is doing the right thing, you can easily get scorned.

In writing this post, I actually remember when I decided to stop giving a fuck.  It was last summer, right before moving out of my old abode in Baltimore. I picked up a variety twelve pack of Magic Hat summer beers. They had a new IPA inside which was phenomenal.  It was very hoppy, but went down easily.  It felt such perfectly balanced.  My internal monologue went something like this:

You've wasted many a six pack on IPAs which taste like shit.  After finding something this good, why are you so desperate to experiment?  You know what you like these days, and who the hell cares what others think, when it is clear that they're talking out of their ass half the time?  Stick with what you like, and be happy with it.

And that's what I do these days.  I stick to what I like, and I don't care what anyone else thinks about my choice in suds.  So far it hasn't let me down.