Looking to try something new

Jump in head first without floaties and try a trapist Belgian quad. It’s a $5 experiment at best, and if you like them then......

Rochefort or St. Betnardus are pretty easy to find, at least here in TX.

Good luck.

 

I like your questions. Weihenstephaner anything is a good start. Samuel Smith Nut Brown Ale or Oatmeal Stout, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, Ipswich Oatmeal Stout if in New England. Sam Adams Boston Lager is always a very good beer and I applaud your taste. Take your time and utilize your obvious curiosity. These are good times for beer and you are lucky. Cheers.

 

My honest recommendation is to head to the nearest craft your own six pack section of any given store that has it and just keep trying new beers and new styles. Find out what you like and what you don't, and figure why you like what you like and what you don't. Make sure your hoppy beers are fresh, but just have lots of fun trying new beers. Everything else will come in time.

No Deschutes in New York either, sadly, but I don't expect to ever see them here. Our market is simply too crowded. New York is an insane place for beer right now, but it's mostly NEIPAs and milkshakes and whatever is "hype". At least craft lagers are pretty accessible, which is great.

 

IMHO:

A: Fuck taster trays. Sure, ya can try 4-6 different beers but, also; what can ya tell from tasters? Sure, I'm about to get beat up by the "SuperTasters" ,who can bounce around between 6 styles, and not have palate confusion. Congrats to them. Most of us though, are better served by "fuller" pours, say 8-12 oz. If you're not yet sure what you're into samplers only confuse things.

B: Try everything. Don't think you'll like sours? Cool, but, try a few. Try every style there is, or at least what you see. It's OK to not like a style, as long as you've given that style a fair shot.

C: Didn't like a Beer or style? Cool, but go back later and revisit. I've had it go both ways; either I liked it at first, and hated it later, or the opposite.

D: THE MOST IMPORTANT THING, have fun! Try a couple new things, and then drink some Sammy's with your peeps. Just roll with it. There's so many beers, and so few friends.

Welcome aboard buddy!

 

as other have said sierra nevada, but also check out new belgium. they have solid beers in most styles for very reasonable prices. if youre on a college budget, you can try some decent Belgian styles like triple/double and sours for standard US craft prices instead of the import prices.

if you do mix sixes, be careful of buying expired beer.

cheers!

 

To follow upon beertunes recommendations, some places offer 1/2 pours too, so you’ll get an 8 oz glass. You might have to ask they don’t usually make grand announcements. To date I’ve never bought a flight anywhere.

 

As a "SuperTaster," I think most people have the ability to be "SuperTasters" and either don't stretch their palates enough or don't give their palates enough credit. Yes, historically, most beer has been consumed in what I would call very large quantities (10 oz. or more), but bear in mind that drinking beer serves multiple purposes, including, among other things, alcohol delivery, sustenance, refreshment, as a centerpiece for socializing, and general flavor enjoyment. All of those aspects are served by large serving quantities of a single beverage (although a flight works equally well, except arguably for the last factor I mentioned). Flavor recognition, palate honing, etc., however, simply don't require such large quantities, especially (but not exclusively) if the drinker is paying close attention, and there are rapidly diminishing returns in that arena to each additional ounce consumed. In other words, there are reasons to drink a lot of ounces in a row of the same beer, but learning about that beer, let alone beer in general, from a flavor perspective is not really one of them.

Anyway, I write this not simply because I disagree with this take on flights but because my best advice to anyone trying to get into or deeper into beer as a hobby is to go to a bunch of different breweries and order flights from a diverse array of styles. It's a quick and efficient way to gain a wide range of knowledge without taking in excessive alcohol and calories. I promise you that you will have a substantially better understanding of beer from drinking flights than you will from drinking a similar total number of ounces of beer via large pours after any given amount of time.

I'll also point out that I don't think we'd see such a practical consolidation of styles and rejection of beer-that-tastes-like-beer as we have in recent years if more people pushed themselves regularly to sample a wide array of styles, as flights enable. If you're going to get only one or two pints, instead of trying several small pours via a flight or two, you're likely to gravitate to the beers in styles you already trust the most (thus eschewing an opportunity to develop an appreciation of something else) or that stand out on the menu (perhaps due to gimmicky ingredients). On a similar note, I very often find that my favorite beer of the flight is the last one that I picked (i.e., the one of the four or five that initially grabbed me the least).