Are all Pabst AAL's the same beer?

I don't think so. I mean Pabst definitely tastes different than Old Style. However, with them being AALs, I could see where people would think that because many of them are very similar. I wish I could post a picture because what I'm thinking @ZAP is thinking is similar to the Duff Brewery Tour in The Simpsons, where Duff, Duff Light, and Duff Dry were all coming out of the same pipe.

 

No, they’re not the same.

 

Well just a couple of months ago Pabst bought a brewery:

https://www.businesswire.com/news/h...son-Coors-Completes-Sale-of-Irwindale-Brewery

I suppose we will soon learn about the Pabst beers being brewed there?

Cheers!

 

I did notice a lot of these beers are regional. I love PBR. I had it easy and extra versions. Hamms is way different and I honestly like PBR better.

 

I have the same curiosity regarding A-B's stable of light beers. What's the difference?

 

Yes.

 

I can’t speak to all the brands listed. Hamm’s, Schlitz, Old Style, and PBR are not the same beer to my palate, and I prefer them in that order. PBR is much more similar to Miller High Life than than the beers I listed. Your mileage may vary.

 

Boy would that be the greatest stunt of all time brewing the same beer and just changing the cans.

There’s always slight differences imo, not enough to say one tastes so much better over another, just a bit different. Different locations, different brewers, different materials I’d suppose sourced depending on location.

No different than bourbon looking at at the family trees, Beam makes many different labeled as do all the others. Actually there’s many many different bourbons and very few distillers. None are quite the same within the same family unit. Taste varies, prices obviously vary, the difference is mostly barrels and warehouse locations, different mash bills, some warehouse locations produce better whiskey than others. Some have a different char.

 

You're welcome.

 

Thank you

 

Hamm's hasn't been a Pabst brand since 1999 In 1982-83 in a complicated 3-way deal, they merged with Olympia, which owned Lone Star & Hamms at the time, and at the same time Heileman bought Pabst, kept some brands and breweries and spun off a new "Pabst Brewing Co.", owning Pabst, Olympia and Hamm's and a few others.

Pabst would later sell the Hamm's brand, along with Olde English, to Miller when the two companies were dividing up the Heileman/Stroh portfolio in '99 - so it's a Molson Coors brand today.

A former Ft. Worth Miller employee who used to post on BA said that " Stag ...Old Milwaukee,Schmidt's or Black Label.... were all the same beer." I suspect the same is true of the other Pabst brands brewed at other MC's regional breweries, many (Old Milwaukee, Old Style, Rainier, Lone Star, Piels*) even have/had the ABV - 4.6/4.65% - but since MC "high gravity" brews them, tweaking them by adding slightly more or less carbonated water wouldn't be too difficult nor would adding post-fermentation hop extract of different variety or quantities for various IBUs, hops varieties, etc.

A former Pabst brewmaster told me some of their brands were blended to make other beers (their inferior version of Ballantine Ale was blended with another Pabst brand to make Stroh's, for instance - go figure).

* Piels is no longer a Pabst-brand. Info from several years ago.

Yeah, the current Pabst Brewing Co. website only lists 8 actual beer brands (along with a few FMBs, "partner" brands, etc) yet still claims to own "over 50" brands. A few years ago that "Brands" page used to look something like this:

Check AB's TAP INTO YOUR BEER website - they list ingredients, ABV, calories, etc., for each beer. Their "lights" all vary somewhat -rice in Bud Light, corn, corn syrup and rice in Busch Light and Natural Light, with the former slightly lower in alcohol by 0.1%, so close enough to be the same beer.

Back in the late 70s when it was first released, it was well-known that Michelob Light was merely high gravity-brewed Michelob, with extra water added and supposedly one of the reasons why it was higher in ABV than the typical "light beers" of the time. That was the first time I'd heard of high gravity brewing.

 

I was meaning if the bigger umbrella company was in fact brewing one beer with maybe regional product sourcing and then just changing the cans. Just enough difference to be well, just a bit different. With bourbon the rack location and warehouse might be the only difference between labeled product they go into the barrel essentially equal. Might be a false analogy , might be way off base, my mind was just working trying to be clear what I was thinking, but maybe it’s not even clear completely to me. But there are some similarities I think.

 

Other Half...

*yes I’m poking some fun here but serious I think the brew like 10 “different” ipas a week. Last I checked they had 38 hoppy beers to go.

 

Wow, no shit, seems a bit ridiculous and complete overkill. Resident Culture here does the same thing too with the one offs on NEIPAs. There’s a sameness even if they’re all imo very good, to a point it’s well pointless. I’d prefer a great core everyday lineup then supplement the one offs weekly, monthly etc.

 

Back in the day, most AALs tasted so similar, especially, it seems, when the original brewer went south..bought out.

I don't believe that has changed to date.

I tried a Hamms vs Rainier not too long ago but it was a failure because the Rainier that I was able to get was a lot older than the Hamms. Not a fair experiment.

 

As @jesskidden 's info points out, it wouldn't be at all surprising if different beers made at the same production facility were either the same beer or slightly tweaked. Things should be looked at on a case-by-case basis - particularly where they are trying to identify the beer with a specific market.

The current Lucky Lager (4.2% ABV) is brewed by 21st Amendment in California for Pabst. When I had that beer, it didn't strike me as the same beer as Pabst Blue Ribbon (4.8% ABV). Is 21st Amendment working from the same recipe as another beer in the portfolio or are they doing something unique? Even if the same recipe, does the "different chef, different kitchen" matter? I'm OK with the assumption that it's its own thing.

In the case of Stroh's, Brew Detroit in Michigan is brewing some of the beers (like Stroh's Bohemian-Style Pilsner - supposedly based off an 1850s Stroh's recipe), but the flagship is brewed somewhere else (Ohio?). I tried the flagship in a side-by-side with a Blue Ribbon. For me, those two seemed like different beers.

 

My 'vote' is they will indeed be different. Each breweries differing configuration (i.e., different kitchen) will yield differing results and each brewer has a preferred way of doing things (i.e., different chef) and that will change things as well.

One of the 'tricks of the trade' is how brewers deal with variations in ingredients (e.g., differing attributes of various hop lots) in order to meet a target (e.g., a consistent product) and some brewers are better at doing this than others.

Plus a myriad of other production considerations.

Cheers!

 

I take that on a case-by-case basis too. I'm not going to treat Budweiser from one US facility as a new tick compared to a different US facility (I'm being hypothetical though... if I was a ticker who focused on "collecting" Bud, it would be the opposite), but I'm inclined to think that a recipe in the hands of 21st Amendment will result in something a bit different from the same recipe at a "Miller" facility. There's not a right or wrong here.

BTW Jack, you should definitely watch that Bud documentary on the topic - Kings of Beer.