Good (but not expensive) Beer Wanted

Not just "still around" but Matt's flagship brand these days.

Their former flagship, the budget "Utica Club" brand apparently now having a very reduced local NYS distribution area (I think I've heard of it making it across the border into Northern PA) accounts for about 1% (!) of their barrelage according to an article I read recently. The line being reduced to the regular and a "light" version, Utica Club Cream Ale (which I always preferred over the more popular local competition, Genesee Cream Ale) is apparently gone.

I'd heard that their old "premium" brand, Matt's Premium, was "retired" but I've seen mention of it recently on the 'net (Untapped, I think). No word on Maximus Super.

Needless to say, the Saranac line (one of the earliest "craft" brands from an old line brewery - circa mid-1980s - Hudepohl's Christian Moerlein predating it by a few years) is much reviled by many of the modern beer geeksters . Just not XXXTreme!!! enough, ya know.

 

Hudepohl was going to be another of my selection. For a budget beer, the Burger Classic is a good pale lager...with a sort of "German Tingle" Once again, @jesskidden always chimes in with something good.

 

Prices on beer are very much related to your location, a fact many on BA seem to ignore or not understand whenever the subject of "inexpensive" craft beer comes up.

 

The Wild Pils and Black Forest are definitely worth trying, but probably won't be that much cheaper than Sam Adams.

 

Below is a list of US craft brewed Pilsners that I posted previously. None of these beers are available to me for the low price mark of $7-8 per six-pack. I can purchase Sly Fox Pikeland Pils for $9 per six-pack.

“Some of my favorite craft brewed Pilsner by brewery:

Victory: Braumeister series of Pilsners (Hallertau Mittelfruh, Saaz, Tettnanger, Sladek, etc.), Hip Czech Lager (Bo-Pils), Prima Pils (German Pilsner)…

Troegs: Sunshine Pils (German Pilsner)

Sly Fox: Charles Bridges Pilsner (Bo-Pils), Standard Pils (unfiltered German Pilsner with Spalt hops), Pikeland Pils (Northern German style Pilsner), Keller Pils (unfiltered Pikeland Pils)

Stoudts: Stoudts Pils

Neshaminy Creek: Trauger Pils

Firestone Walker: Pivo Pils

Trumer: Trumer Pils

Sixpoint: Crisp

Neshaminy Creek: Trauger Pils

Cheers!

 

JackHorzempa covered a good list above but I will add that I love many of the beers you mentioned in your original post but end up choosing their American clones more often simply due to the fact that it is much easier finding them fresh.

 

I would go with some Great lakes beers:

Elliot Ness - Vienna lager (one of my favorite lagers)
Dortmunder gold (everyone loves this beer)
Oktoberfest (porb hard to find but another great example)
Wright Pils (prob gone but another great example)

Price wise they are not bad about 9 bucks a six pack at 16 a 12 pack.

 

To re-enforce what @paulys55 posted concerning freshness. The Pilsner beer style is a delicate style which falls off pretty quickly. The benefit of the US craft brewed Pilsners is that they are fresher (they are indeed fresher for my purchasing experiences).

Cheers!

 

I stand corrected. I just checked my local Total Wine website and here are some Saranac prices:
Wild Hop Pils- $7.99
Adirondak Lager- $6.99
12 Beers of Summer- $11.99 (that one is probably old, but at least is a clue to what a 12 pack goes for)

These may indeed be just what @Silverstroke is looking for.

 

I've never seen their Josephsbrau Brewing Co. beers. In CT the only Trader Joe's brand I've seen is Kennebunkport.

 

Prima or Pivo Pils

 

Yeah, that is why one can't talk generally about "Trader Joe's" private label beer brands - they've have so many of them, brewed by so many different breweries (sometimes using the same 'dba' name for more than one brewer), and with varying availability from state to state.

 

victory is good and can be found at 8.49-8.99 but is usually 9.99/six pack

Saranac lager $6.99/six
Genesee or cream ale 99cents 24oz or $15.99 30pack
Heineken $13/12pack
St Pauli Girl $14.99/12pack
Warsteiner $12.99/12pack
Kona island lager can be found for $7.49/6pack

 

It sounds like you already have something you like in that sweet spot. For what reason do you want to find American brews?

 

Right you are. I had also considered adding a mention of the (retired?) Brewery Hill nee, Pocono line from The Lion out of Wilkes-Barre, which was even more budget-oriented than Matt's Saranac line, here in flyoverland, Minnesota from the late 1990s and into the early Oughts. Fact is, both of these "Crafty" lines were priced even lower than simuilar six and 12-pack (often variety pack) pallet drops from our regional, old-line upper midwestern breweries ("Berghoff", Stevens Point), back then. Very solid, all-malt lagers and British-style ales. I'm not really so sure what The Lion is doing now, but there reach is much more focused on the Northeast than it is the Craft Beer-obsessed Midwest.

 

I haven't seen the Pocono line in a very long while, but I also think they were on to something there. A couple of times a year they would even offer price breaks, and it could be had for $3.99 a sixer- a good value for a nice pale ale with enough hops to know that they were there. I'd definitely hit it up on those occasions.

 

Every time I search up a brew I see his Avatar, he is a beer monster.

 

Anchor Steam.

 

Damn, has no one mentioned New Glarus yet? You might have to trade for them, but Hometown Blond (just finishing it's season), Naked, Two Women, and Back 40 Bock are all excellent and might be up your alley (especially the Blond pils-style).

If you're going to trade for Wisconsin beers, might as well throw Lazy Monk from Eau Claire on the ISO. He cans both Czech-style golden and black lagers. Good stuff.

Lakefront Eastside Dark and Riverwest Stein are both awesome, too.

 

If you like the Geman lagers, find them available, and fairly priced, why look for something that mimics them?