Your first real craft beer experience?

In the late 70s, my wife worked as the feature writer for the Vacaville Reporter in California and she scored an interview with Jack McAuliffe at New Albion. I insisted on tagging along, and by 11 am I had heavily sampled three of his brews. As he gave us a tour of the place, we were interrupted by the arrival of a couple of guys in a pickup. McAuliffe excused himself saying "they're from Chico...they don't know what they're doing."

 

I probably fall in the 'how do you define craft beer' range, starting to buy beer in 1981.

Prior to that I was always my dad's assistant when he bought beer and wine for parties- he was cash and I was carry. As a result I did notice all the other kinds of beer in the store that looked so cool, and I'd try to push him in that direction to no avail. The first time I went to a bar with my friends (at 17 yo) I saw the Heineken Dark tap handle and jumped at the opportunity. It was love at first sip.

So if you are defining craft broadly as 'not an AAL', that's where it started for me.

 

Now it's coming back, it was the Special Reserve, not Pale Ale. It went from being my favorite beer to not being available suddenly. I know in 1982, 1983 I was still drinking it

 

Damn, replace the Corona with a Heineken and this is my story exactly! Totally agree that Magic Hat was instrumental to getting me into craft but I'll never reach for it these days

 

1976 in a bar on Fisherman Wharf in San Francisco Anchor Steam Beer.

 

It was in 1992 when I was serving in the military that I first tried Sam Adams' Boston Ale, my first "craft" beer. This was quickly followed by Anchor Steam. Can you believe that at the time, I thought Anchor Steam was a thick and heavy beer? Silly youth I guess.

 

Year was 2009. I just moved to Lafayette, La to live with my cousin to start my new offshore job. We went out and he took me to this local place called the “Tap Room”. He has me try a Xingu. From there I was hooked, couldn’t ever go back to a Bud Light after that. I later went to wheat beers then eventually IPAs and Porters/Stouts. I was 23 years old. Been a BA ever since.

 

It was the early 90's. There was only one bottle shop where I lived at the time. They had many "unusual" beers to try. My cousin and I would often go there to try new beers. It started my obsession with ticking. Although then the beers were not savored, they were chugged playing drinking games.

 

The first two beers that got me into exploration were Hoegaarden's original wheat beer, and Shiner's bock. I don't know if Hoegaarden counts, so I'd probably say it was one of St. Arnold's IPAs -- more than likely Art Car. I used to drink a sh!t ton of those.

 

I think I remember the Blue Boar Ale and Henry's Dark available earlier than the Heileman takeover of BlitzWeinhard. I do remember six packs of both Blitz Bavarian Dark and Henry's Dark on shelves at the same time in Portland. Henry's dark wasn't too great, but a lot better than Blitz Dark. Ortlieb then invented Boar's Head Stout. I think that was a stab at trying regain volume lost when East Coast production of Old English transferred to Pabst. Any connection between the two boars?

 

Can't find much info on the ale at all in the Pabst or even early Heileman period. Most ads in the mid-1980s call it just "Ale" , "Light Ale" or "Ireland-style Ale" - don't find much reference even to "Blue Boar" until the late '80s in M. Jackson Pocket Guides. In '86 ed., he wrote :

Well, Ortlieb's direct response was the creation a new malt liquor brand, Coqui 900 (musta been better, it was 100 more!) - some sources (inc. ex-Ortlieb brewmaster, William Mueller) imply it was the same recipe they used for OE 800. Joe Ortlieb, in that era before legal ABV labeling, said it was "about 9%".

Explaining that Coqui is Spanish for the sound a frog bellows, Ortlieb went on to say:

The timeline of Ortlieb's non-AAL beers in the brewery's final years looks like this:

McSorley's Ale - Summer '78 (acquired from Schmidt* Fall '77)
Boarhead Stout - Spring '79
Coqui 900 - June '79
Brands sold to Schmidt's end of 1980 (which did not brew the stout).

Both McSorley's and Boarhead were "about 6%" according to Ortlieb.

* C. Schmidt's & Sons bought all the Rheingold labels (inc. the Ruppert brands it owned) in 1977. They then sold McSorley's to Ortlieb and Esslinger to The Lion - the implication being they were too small for Schmidt's to brew and market.

The 2 "Boar" brands? Coincidence?

"Blue Boar Ale" had been a brand of California's Regal Amber Brewing Co. (in the '30s, they were the 10th largest in the state). Another coincidence or a little-known famed western ale?


Described as "Nut Brown" in '35 and "India Pale" by '38? They weren't so picky about beer styles back then, of course.

 

Aged about 15 a pint of Barnsley Bitter in the Wing Tavern, the last pub in Newark with handpumps. Lovely stuff.

 

While I was on a mission trip to Alaska in '98, I read a newspaper article about the upcoming release of a special beer brewed with alder-smoked malts. According to the article, the beer was produced in very limited quantities and could be cellared to age like wine. Even though I wasn't much of a beer drinker at the time, it sounded very interesting to me. When the missionary was planning a trip to the Lower 48 a few months later, I asked him if he could get a few bottles for me. He managed to score three bottles of the nectar we know as Alaskan Smoked Porter. I gifted two of them to some friends and enjoyed the third with some smoked salmon that had been gifted to me by one of the villagers in Ekuk.

If you need me, I'll be in the deep end of the pool.

 

Probably around ‘88 or so I remember Pete’s Wicked showing up. I was a poor college kid at The University of Akron, so I didn’t buy much of the good stuff. We drank mostly Wiedemann’s; six pack of stubbies for $1.89. I remember Sam Adams showing up around ‘89 or ‘90, but probably didn’t buy much of that either. Went to Great Lakes around ‘90 and had Elliot Ness for the first time. That’s the one that got the ball rolling.

 

Because the drivers were missing from the bag!?!

Cheers!

@ramseye4

 

I visited the Brickskeller in that timeframe (late 80’s or early 90’s) and I remember beinh handed a beer menu with a gazillion brands listed. I asked for one on the list and the bartender informed me they were out and I proceeded to ask for a number of others from the list and same response ("we are out") but I finally hit on one that was in stock. I found a few others later that were also in stock. It was a nice visit but the list was indeed larger than what they actually had available (that day).

Cheers!

P.S. I did re-visit the Brickskeller a few more times over many years. Besides the beers it also had a cool vibe to it.

 

Below is something I posted in a past thread:

"I have a soft spot in my heart for Stoudts Brewing for several reason. To the best of my recollection my first craft beer (we called them microbrews back then) was Stoudts Gold circa 1990. I didn’t know that beer was a Munich Helles (I didn’t even know there was a beer style Munich Helles back then) but I did know that I enjoyed drinking that beer since it was more-ish as compared to mainstream beers (AAL beers) of that timeframe."

Cheers!

 

Michael, as a kid I enjoyed going with my dad when he visited the Retail Beer Distributor to buy his case of Piels Real Draft beer (16 ounce returnable bottles) and I would wander around and look at the other beer brands. One brand that I thought looked real cool was Ballantine IPA since the cardboard case box had a wood look to it, something like this:



I was not of drinking age when this beer was available so I have no idea what it tasted like but I was fascinated by the wood look to the packaging.

Cheers!

P.S. I would not be at all surprised to learn that @jesskidden has a case box of Ballantine IPA from 'back in the day'.

 

From that era, just the one (pretty sure it's the case from the last Pabst/Milwaukee brewed BIPA I bought in the late 90s). I'd bet that the beginning of the date code 10306M = Oct. 30, 1996 Milwaukee. (1996 agrees with the 1996 date of manufacture of the box itself).

Not nearly as wood-grainy nice as that era Falstaff/Ft. Wayne label - but most brewers didn't spend a lot on the printing of the throw-away corrugated cases.

And, far right, actual wood grain - from wood!

 

This has been a fun thread to read. I started out drinking Hamm's because that's what my Dad drank. Like a lot of the older guys on here I discovered Henry Weinhard's beer. Found it at Longs drugstore which, oddly, had the best beer selection in town. It seems the local liquor stores weren't quick to try new beers at that time. Then Sierra Nevada Pale Ale came out in 1981 and changed everything. Easily one of the best beers then and still good. I've loved trying numerous new beers over the years.