Newbie requesting knowledge in beer.

Try some brown ales and porters.
Also look for some October fest beers (which should be hitting your shelves now)

 

Read all the forums, the longer the line and the more hype from threads = better tasting beer.

Look at what people are ISO (in search of) and have FT (for trade) on trading threads and seek those out, they are usually amazing.

Look at top 250 beers, and check them off the list. There is a reason why they are top ranked, status quo.

 

Cream or Blonde ales would be a good place to start. You could also go to a local brewery/brewpub and get a sampler flight of their beers. That's an inexpensive and great way to try several styles and talk to the brewery staff about the characteristics and ingredients associated with each of the different styles.

Cheers!

 

Go to local store and search out the "dark beer." 90% of those will fit the non-bitter bill. You also can't go wrong with most Belgian and German beers, and there's plenty of each distributed here. Welcome to the world of craft beer.

 

Also, getting flights at breweries and if you're lucky, at bars, is a great way to discover styles you might like.

 

So What flavors do you like? Then we can maybe give better suggestions here...

My advice: Soak in the site, taste the rainbow, and report back.

Cheers and happy drinking!

 

Milk stouts

 

In Iowa I'm sure you get Boulevard. Try their 80 Acre first if you want to get into IPAs. Then try pales, and finally IPAs wont be too bad. If you find Budweiser too bitter, I don't know what to say, hoping you meant the IPAs were too bitter.

 

You have come to the right place, good sir. Welcome!
I'd suggest starting by looking at the beer places noted here in your state and seeing if there are any breweries or craft beer distributors close to you. Check them out, ask questions, don't be afraid to try anything and everything.

...Or there's also the safer route of picking up a Sam Adams variety pack at your local grocery store. That's kinda how I started. Sam Adams Oktoberfest was my true entry point.

 

It will take a while for your palate to adjust to bitter beers like APAs & IPAs however it will get there (mine took a good 7 years to begin liking hops, however I didn't throw myself into beer much when I was young).

Some good recommendations above about dark beers, I would also suggest English Bitters (they actually aren't bitter at all) German Weizens (have more of a banana/clove flavour) and Belgian Dubbels/Tripels (which generally have more sugar to balance out the hops).

Unfortunately for you you just happen to be in the country that makes the hoppiest beers (which is where I would like to be).

Enjoy the world of craft beer!

 

I would say go to the store and buy a few different types of Belgian ales. Chimay, Gulden Draak, Delirium Nocturnum, St. Bernardus, and Rochefort would be a great place to start.

 

The best advice I can give you @Nooguy is not to listen to this guy. Special release's and such are fun to be able to get but not the most important thing. Find what your staples are the beers you like most that are readily available and then branch out.

My best suggestion for you is try to find some Milk Stouts http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/style/82/ and Oatmeal Stouts http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/style/69/ my personal favorite http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/113/571/ its fairly sweet too so would be an easy starting point and pretty easy to get.

Another suggestion is wheat beers as they usually have very little hop character there are many and fairly varied but if you use the style guide on this site I linked you to you can find yourself some Hefeweizen's, Dunkelweizen's, Belgian Wit's etc. tons of options in the realm of wheat beers.

Explore, enjoy, and above all respect beer.

Cheers!

Edit: Oh and before I forget since beers are sometimes only regionally available this website should help you find out whether or not the beers on those lists are available to you not 100% accurate but better than going in blind. http://www.seekabrew.com/distro/index.html

 

^ Sarcasm is hard!

 

Stick to Belgians (blondes, dubbels, tripels, quads, strong darks, maybe even saisons), German beers (hefeweizens, pilsners, Marzens, dunkels, bocks, etc.) browns, porters, stouts, Russian Imperial Stouts, non-BMC (Bud-Miller-Coors) lagers, and, if you liked Warheads as a kid, sours (American Wilds, Flanders Oud Bruin, Gueuze, Lambic, etc.).

Honestly, not to plug the homestate brewery, but New Glarus makes a lot of really delicious, excellent, and accessible beers. Their fruit stuff is fantastic, and even their "hoppy" beer Moon Man is not really bitter but quite bright and fruity. Depending on how close to WI (since they don't distribute outside the state), I'd say it's worth the trip there to try some stuff; I really don't think you'll have a problem drinking any of them as a result of bitterness, and almost everything they make stoops no lower than "good" on the rating scale ("great" is more apt in my mind, but I'll allow that I may be biased).

When (and trust me it's when) you begin to love hops, look no further than the brewery carrying Iowa's torch, Toppling Goliath. They are doing some of the best hoppy beer in the country (as well as some of the best stouts, and really beer in general, but the stouts are extremely hard to come by and very expensive for someone just starting into beer).

Lastly, maybe check out the "Beers of Fame" list here on the site. Unlike the "Top 250," many of these are pretty easy to find and are definitely there for a reason: their greatness has stood the test of time. Just make sure to stay away from anything reading "pale ale," "India pale ale," or "imperial India pale ale" (for now).

Welcome to the site, don't feed the trolls, don't pay heed to the arrogance of some BAs (most of us are very nice), ask if you have questions (doing good so far!), and don't get too caught up in the crazy chasing for hyped "whales" (meaning rare beers).

 

When a new member posts and is looking for advice there's no place for it. One it isn't even funny and two it isn't very obvious. If he where to make his comment over the top ridiculous it would have possibly been funny and obviously sarcasm, though still misplaced. Since the only parts that where clearly sarcastic where the first sentence and his addition of the phrase "status quo" to the last I thought I should warn OP.

 

If you are interested in learning about beer, i suggest you pick up Mosher's Tasting Beer.
It is THE text book for beer and it is easy reading.
You can order it on Amazon.

 

I absolutely hated beer when I was 21, thought it all was disgusting (and that it all tasted the same). A friend of mine wanted to home brew, and he was much bigger into beer than I, so I started getting into it through him. The style I found easiest to drink, initially, was amber ales. They're overall pretty balanced (not too bitter, not too sweet). I also hated bitter beer, even when I started getting into craft beers. IPAs were the last thing I wanted to be drinking, but I slowly started drinking those as well, and now I can say I love me a good IPA.

Honestly, there's just so much potential to be explored. As some have said, flights are a great way to introduce yourself to different styles. Find what you like and branch out from there.

 

Happy birthday, knowledge comes from experience, get busy.

 

Or just muscle through the bitterness, beat your taste buds into submission until you can actually taste past the bitter into th nuances beyond the hops.
Either that of try Wheat beers ( Belgian wit / German hefewizen) English styled beers ( milds /browns ), find some nice well made german styled lagers ( maibocks/ alts/ kolshes/ Helles).
Or do non of the above and just go to your bottle shop and pick up random bottles and drink, explore, enjoy. And if you don't like a beer at first try it again in a year or two you might be surprised.