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Ever have Rolling Rock, Michelob, or AB Amber Bock

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yes i have, all three actually.

the rolling rock is nothing special.. smooth and simple, like icehouse or a lighter heineken. not bad, but not memorable at all. i like all the michelob products. bold, good taste(not like budweiser). and the amber bock is nothing like regular bud. it is the classic heavy, bold dark beer. very rich, strong aroma, slightly bitter at the end. living in texas, i grew up drinking shinerbocks and lone stars, so the amber bock is a little too thick and bitter.

i have never tried the world select, but am more than willing to try.. maybe that needs to go on my list.. but the peroni is next..

bigjohn

Ahhh. Rolling Rock brings back memories of underage drinking at a party in high school... at the valedictorian's house while his parents were on vacation.

And where were your parents that weekend, Peter

Try the Beer Judge Certification Program for the real descriptions of styles.

bigjohn, you might try Carlsberg, a nice beer from Denmark.

bigwill, I did not know that about the Japanese beers. So Kirin and such are now brewed by Molson or some other factory? Pity.

My understanding is that what we get here in the US as Kirin, Asahi, or Sapporo are all now brewed in Canada.

John, I wanted to mention that you should take some care in selecting beer from ratebeer based on it's rating alone. A lot of the people who contribute to that site (and others like beeradvocate.com) tend to give high marks to very hoppy beer or bold dark beers that don't quite fit the idea I've gotten of what you're looking for.

You might want to start looking through the bjcp style descriptions (great resource tom, had that bookmarked for a while now ) at some commercially available offerings in different styles that sound appealing to you. That way you can get a better feel for the styles you like. Then on the review websites you can check for reviews of particular styles and choose what you sample based on those.

spock, tom, and ringmir- thanks for the advice and web-sites.

as mentioned, i definitely need to take a trip out to the liquor stores, and see just what is avail to me, as far as selection. the grocery store stock is starting to get depleted. i havent been out there in a while, but i know they have a much better selection.

all this has got me thinking.. back in 95, i went to clearwater, florida for spring break. we went to a grocery store, and they had a mix & match special. for $6 bucks, you could get any beer from any six-pack, and make your own 'custom' six-pack. i dont know if it was just a spring break special, or if that was something they did all the time.. either way, i thought it was a great idea. it would sure help me out if i could do something like that now. that way, i could try 6 different beers at a time.

bigjohn

Now that you mention it, I do notice that people on ratebeer.com like a lot of hops. I'm curious if it's because many of them live in the Western US. It seems that many of the West breweries love to pile in the hops. Rogue Dead Guy Ale and especially their Santa Ale are two that come to mind. I was talking to the owner of our local wine and beer store and apparently bright tasting wines (like found in hoppy beers) are popular out West. To each their own I guess. On the other hand, I always love a fresh pint of Fuller's IPA.

I remember when I was a kid, my dad collected some beer cans. One that stuck in my mind was a brand called, "Old Frothen Slosh" from the Pittsburgh Brewery. It had pictures of heavy set women in a bikini with beauty pageant ribons drapped across them.



Another favorite of mine is Micky Finns, with green, wide mouth, glass mini keg bottles...

Gulp

I always thought it was more of a beer culture thing personally. Clearly the majority of people that review beers on these sites regularly are people who are passionate about beer. I think that a larger portion of those people have grown accustomed to more flavorful and complex beer, and prefer it themselves, and the bias shows in the rankings. There are accurate reviews of tons of beers on the sites, but I've just found that the actual rankings are always skewed. A killer lager just doesn't get ranked as highly as a killer IPA.

I've tried lots of beer and I'd chose another style ale or lager any day. There are some IPAs though (of course, its beer!).

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My understanding is that what we get here in the US as Kirin, Asahi, or Sapporo are all now brewed in Canada.

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That would explain why there was French on my bottle of Asahi i drank this past weekend! I couldn't for the life of me figure that one out.