Devils Backbone Brewing Company Partners with Anheuser-Busch

That depends. Here in SE PA many begin with well made lagers and drink them regularly as part of their rotation. Indeed, of the 12 bottles/cans in my fridge right now 4 of them are lagers and I'll soon be ordering a case of Sunshine Pils.

In Germany lagers are much more often entry beers than anything else and many are well made.

 

I do have to admit that was an exaggeration

 

Goodbye, Skull Crushing Ape.

 

OH GOD, THE END IS NEAR!!! THE END IS NEAR!!! NOW ALL THE BEER THEY MAKE WILL BE CHEAP CRAP AS THE INBEV ACCOUNTANTS TAKE HOLD AND THEY'RE GOING TO TAKE ALL THE TAPS USING SOME MYSTICAL FORM OF ILLEGAL SALES PRACTICES NOBODY CAN DEFINE AND ALL THE REAL BREWERIES WILL BE PUSHED OUT OF BUSINESS!!!1!11!!!!

....oh wait....that hasn't happened with any of the other acquisitions? Oh...huh...silly me.

 

Would buy all the Vienna Lager

 

I heard AB-InBev bought simply because Carlo Britos didn't get this "strange American humor of craft beer names" and so wanted to take ownership of a brewery named after his spine...

 

Good for them. I like their beer, and still look forward to visiting the brewery in May.

 

for example, when flying into Dulles from Colorado to my parent's home in Fauquier County, late-ish enough at night that the detour to Whole Foods Fair Lake wouldn't work, as recently as last year I knew that I could stop in the Sheetz in Haymarket and get a six pack of (ice cold, 'cause that's how Sheetz rolls) Vienna Lager, or once in awhile maybe even 8 Point IPA, and I knew going in that there would be NO other craft brews in the [sarcasm] wonderful [/sarcasm] "Beer Cave" (TM), not a single one. But there WOULD always be a pretty damn good Vienna lager in there, to get me the rest of the way home.

 

this seems extremely likely to me. It's (IM highly subjective O) a lot better beer, and one they ought to be able to replicate in their giant facilities more faithfully than they did, say, the Goose Island IPA (which in the same highly subjective opinion has sort of flattened out, lost a little "soul" or something in their hands). Excellent prediction, Treyliff--we are seeing the beginning of the DBVL vs SABL battle for shelf space and "craft-y" market domination.

 

I've only had one beer from DB in my lifetime, and I think it was a Devil's Backbone that was fairly old. With that said, if this gives me access to more high-quality lagers, I'm all for it. One can only drink so many great IPAs/Stouts/Sours and i'm learning more and more how fantastic a great lager can be.

(SN Summerfest, one of the best readily available lagers going, is hitting shelves in KY and I'm PUMPED )

 

I know it's a pet peeve, but I hate it when people act like a well made lager is an "entry level beer". I'm a huge a craft beer fan and have run the gambit when it comes to my flavor-of-the-moment, but the more years I put in this hobby/passion, the more I discover that a great lager can hang with any beer out there, no matter how less "sexy" it is.

EDIT: Just saw @gopens44 respond to this same conecpt in another post on second page. I totally get what you are saying. No ill intentions meant in my response. Cheers!

Now back to your normal broadcasting

 

When it comes to the brewing process a lager can be one of the hardest styles to make well. There are no strong flavors for flaws to hide behind. Every now and then I get a craving for a lager but its not my favorite style by a long shot. I can appreciate a well made lager though.

 

Just to clear the record, Steve Crandall is businessman, not a brewer, the brewery was part of a larger plan of some sort of "village" that didn't take off. There was even the idea of a blacksmith shop there that would be open to the public to watch. This part I know, because I was one of the smiths he talked to about opening a shop.

 

LOL at medals being the barometer of good beer. I trust a high Beer Advocate rating more than i do a Beer Fest medal.

 

Their Vienna Lager is on my want list, so this is fine news for me. If they make good beer, I will buy it.

 

Honestly, I don't. I trust professionals and judges more than any random joe who signs up to give his favorite swill a 5. Especially with the recent explosion of hype-based ratings. Not saying BA rating don't mean much, but I'll favor a blind tasting by professionals over them nearly every time. Especially if there's a pattern. Anyone can win once. But 28 times in 7 years?

 

Actually, those aren't the flavor of the week. They are the flavor of the beer connoisseur. If that's not you, that's fine.

I fine their beers terribly mundane and boring. Why the hell would i want to drink a well made vienna lager when there are great DIPA's and Flanders Red Ale's to drink?

 

"MMMMM.... that hype tastes so much better than a beer judged to be brewed perfectly to style ".

I'm just giving you a hard time, for the most part.

 

Beers evaluated at beer events like the GABF have some differences:

• The beers are evaluated totally blind (the beer judges have no idea what the beers are that they are tasting)
• The beer judges are very experienced
• etc.

Not to berate the BA ratings but these are not blind tastings; lots of things can influence evaluations when the drinker knows what they are drinking.

Cheers!

 

Maybe, but medals are often times blind taste tests against beers of the same style, where as BA ratings are often biased by hype, scarcity, style, and low numbers of actual ratings.