What was your gateway craft beer?

I never really thought of Sam Adams as a craft beer company. So I think my first foray into the smaller brews would be the pumpkin varieties at parties in the fall. These would be Magic Hats and stuff like that in the late 90's. Beers that turned me into a craft exclusives were hoppy stouts and black IPAs. Storm King by Victory and Epitome by Carton.

 

Back in the 90s me and a good friend started drinking Pete's Wicked strawberry blonde and JW Dundees honey brown. Both beers were eye openers for me, so different from everything else we were drinking at the time

 

A lot of beer snobs disagree with me, but I totally think of Sam Adams as craft. To me, it’s the ultimate gateway craft brewery. Most people can’t go from Coors right to something hoppy. It’s too different. When friends want to drink something different, I start them off with a beer from Sam Adams. Then move from there

 

Right. "Craft" doesn't and has never meant artisanal. Not that the BA didn't choose that word to deliberately cause that kind of confusion or anything...

 

For me it was New Glarus' Spotted Cow! Following cow, I found I enjoyed many other of their beers, that's when I was shown the way!

 

Don't know if it was a single one, but from what I remember: Troegs Hopback, Sam Adams variety 12 packs, and 60/90 minute.

 

It's hard to remember that first American craft beer. I did drink European imports in college when the drinking age in NY was 18. My first job landed me in Beaverton OR for six months it's possible I had a OR craft beer in 1983. I have to say it was Newman's in Albany NY if I had to be certain. Documented by jesskidden below. They didn't bottle initially they used soft plastics gallon jugs that you purchased!

https://sites.google.com/site/jesskidden/newman's

 

My son introduced me to Lagunitas’s Little Sumpin Sumpin. I found it interesting enough to try many other craft beers. Today my favorites are Bells Two Hearted Ale and Cigar City’s Jai Alai. I am a big IPA fan, but I’m always looking at other genres.

 

It was Pete's Wicked Ale and Sam Adams Boston Ale (not the lager) in the early 90's that were the turning point for me in realizing that there was something so much better out there than the North American lagers I had been drinking up to that point.

 

Buddy gave me a Weyerbacher Double Simcoe IPA during our car ride to the beach about 15 years ago (give or take a few years). They don’t even make the beer anymore but it was so damn different than anything I had before then and I was hooked. I also remember hunting bombers of Sculpin 10+ years ago and thinking it was the greatest thing ever.

 

Blue Moon, Fat Tire and 1554, Yuengling, Sam Adams, SN Pale Ale

 

Despite drinking Sam Adam's when it was available back in the mid-90s (still funny to think that was the depth of craft back then) SNPA opened my eyes and palate to what craft beer could be. To this day it's one of those beers that you step away from, not purposefully mind you, for a period of time, and when you have one you pause and revel in how well made, well balanced and fantastic it still is.

 

When Killian’s Irish Red showed up, it completely changed the game for me. Yeah, I get that it’s not truly “craft” by subjective definition, but it was something at whole different level from what I was used to. Instead of spending my hard earned college $ on the Beast or Keystone, I’d buy a 6 or 12 of Killian’s. From there it went into Sam Adams, Fat Tire, Blue Moon, and Odell Levity. Arrogant Bastard was a game changer that sent me into the wild expanding world of craft

 

SNPA and Stone IPA. I still love both.

 

When I got to college in upstate NY in 1999 the only beers I had been exposed to were crappy AALs. But eventually some older guys introduced me to beers like Pete's Wicked, various Saranac beers, Sierra Nevada, Magic Hat, and imports like Bass, Harp, and Newcastle.

 

Was it pies & pints, by any chance?

 

Great Lakes Dortmunder and Sam Adams Boston Lager. My dad would buy these from time to time when I was a kid. When I was a teenager who'd sneak a beer every once in awhile, I'd always go for one of these when I could. Even from a very age, i knew there was better beer than Bud, Miller, Coors, etc. My parents rarely bought or drank the mass produced macro lagers.

Eric

 

Long Trail Ale, but yuengling was the first different beer that got me looking for more.

 

My first introduction to Good Beer was in the late 1960's when I was stationed in Bitburg, Germany, and enjoyed Bitburger Pils and Dortmunder Hansa lagers. Every visit to other towns and cities offered more options and my three trips to Munich for Oktoberfest were all fantastic.

When I returned to the U. S. A, it was several months before my taste buds were able to reacclimate to the extremely short on flavor and lacking any complexity brews.

In 1977, I had the discovery of discoveries when I found out about Anchor Steam beer - even though I was only able to buy any when I visited the West Coast.

Finally, by the 1980's, craft brews were really starting to become more and more available.

 

I'm a legit beer drinker, but a bad poster.