Help me out BAs

Assuming she's already drinking from a glass and not from a bottle/can, a harder pour will release more excess carbonation = less bloating.

 

Does she drink the beers with or after a meal usually? I generally feel very bloated and don’t even like to drink beer after a large meal. Recommend her try drinking a beer before dinner /several hours after lunch and see if she still feels bloated. Agree with @jesskidden as well, it’s most likely the carbonation and not the ingredients.

 

Also, is she drinking kraeüsened beers or those that are forced carbonated?

Was rummaging through my files on "brewing in Baltimore" for a reply over in the Breweriana forum and was reminded of this great ad for Bismarck Beer (which lasted only until 1940). Now, you can say I have an immature mind but what else are we to think of when you see that balloon illustration and the "BEER WITHOUT BACKFIRE" slogan?

(I'll leave it up to @ramseye4 to approach the topic with his wife the way he thinks best. I mean it is a solution - or maybe just a result of - bloating.).

 

Gonna echo some of the above posts. The issue is more likely to be beer in general rather than something specific to those beers. Don’t be one of those people who pours a beer slowly down the side of a tilted glass. That method keeps the carbonation in the beer. You want to do the opposite. Pour it right down the middle of the glass and get a big head. Let the glass of beer sit for a bit before she starts drinking it. Don’t drink the beer quickly.

One thing specific to those beers is that the Allagash beers are can/bottle conditioned. If an imported Marzen from Germany causes the same problems with her, then the yeast in the Allagash beers are not the primary issue, but I would still avoid drinking any settled yeast in those beers. Keep the beers standing upright in your fridge and don’t store them on their side. When you pour them down the middle of the glass, don’t do a big aggressive or dramatic pour in an attempt to release a lot of gas. Pour them carefully (but still as I described in the first paragraph to release some gas) and try to keep the bottom 2cm or so of beer in the bottle/can. The goal is to keep the yeast that settles to the bottom of the bottle out of your glass. This won’t be as possible, easy or clear-cut with Allagash White since it’s quite hazy rather than “bright” and clear. Bottles are better than cans in this regard if you can see the yeast as you pour.

 

That is contrary to Allasgash's own pouring instructions, of course. Flip, Swirl, Sip – How to pour a perfect Allagash White. I don't know, do people report a bloated feeling from the yeast? If so, after using your careful "yeast free" pouring method into an oversized glass, a couple swirls with a spoon would also remove some of the excess carbonation. Alternately, pour that into another glass with a hard pour.

(Wait, who's doin' the dishes? )

Many brewers, who long advocated a "straight down the middle" pour for their beers, used to blame Prohibition era yeasty homebrew for the tendency to pour slow with no head... as in this Genesee ad.

 

A 'beer sommelier' explains how pouring a beer the wrong way can give you a stomach ache:



Cheers!

 

Yeah, but my preferences rarely align with such things. I always wonder how much of these instructions are due to the actual preferences of the brewer vs a concern about the customer experience - getting inconsistent (ugly) pours or feeling ripped off if you don't drink the entire thing. Regardless, I know I have weird preferences with beer, so I'm not actually knocking anyone who prefers sediment to add body and subdue flavors. Regarding my earlier disclaimer about White, on my end I have no trouble keeping the sediment out of my first glass.

I recently had some Coopers Pale Ale - and damn there's a lot of sediment in that one. We're talking way beyond Sierra Nevada levels. Coopers instructs you to roll the bottle: "for our distinctive taste," "to enjoy the complete experience," "unlocking its full flavour." Nice adspeak. if I was going to rewrite the claims of such companies, I'd change it to "flip our bottle to muddy the flavor." Their US bottles changed from stating a "best after" date to a best before date. I don't know, maybe I should buy the older bottles around here that state "best after 2015." Those must be really good. Here's a radical thought for Coopers - How about you just keep the beer in a warehouse for 2 weeks before you release it? What do you mean it's not worth the logistics and overhead?

I was thinking along these lines: people don't always say exactly what they mean. I thought it was wise to cover more bases.

My advice could be seen as contradictory, but I think things can coexist. Don’t try to have the beer gently flow down the glass side. Do a careful and slow pour from a height and into the glass center. Then let the beer sit.

Lately, I’ve been in a bunch of social settings where some people were so anti-head. I encounter this a lot. They’re given a glass of beer with a thick head and they claim they can’t drink it or they get angry/embarrassed. A friend recently poured me a highly carbed Belgian import and everybody in the room (except me) relentlessly beat the guy up because the beer had a nice head. When I claimed I liked it like that, they all thought I was lying. These people probably like that careful pour down the side for the entire pour so there’s no head… and anything other than that is wrong.
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It's funny how I was just engaging with @Roguer on this topic.

 

Seek out cask ale - low ABV --- Low levels of CO2 -- flavors are amaze-balls. Hell u can even get NEIPA and Pastry stouts in cask w/little searching these days, Maybe move to the UK? Preferably near London or Edinburgh. Good luck!

 

My wife has a similar issue. It’s also present for her when drinking soft drinks, so we assume it’s the carbonation. She sticks to cask when out, and prefers English styles. She pours vigorously, and will sometimes leave an open can/bottle in the fridge to finish off the next day with no complaints.

 

I should elaborate for @ramseye4 to avoid confusion:
When someone just says "bloating" it's likely an issue with carbonation, but maybe there's more going on than just bloating. Some people think that yeast from bottle conditioning can cause gastrointestinal issues. With two out of three beers mentioned in the OP being bottle conditioned, I thought it was worth pointing out.

 

OTOH, some people think eating yeast can prevent drunkenness. So, since the product below apparently never got past the test market stage, drinking the yeast might be a good idea (especially for the lactose intolerant).

 

That's... um, interesting. It's a new one for me. Some of the stuff in these links were educational:
Snopes
NPR
Reading the NPR experiment, I'm let down that they didn't also include a yeast+water (instead of yogurt) test. That would have been an obvious thing to include to provide more interesting data. That would remove the yogurt sugar from the equation, and provide a single variable (the yeast) against having water on its own.

 

Straying away from beer and picking up Brown Water or wine is probably the best answer .

 

J.K. - A.I.

 

One thing i do when i drink out of BOTTLE ... i put my thumb over the mouth and shake the hell out of it after taking 3 or so sips.

Helps me slam them faster

 

If I’m in the mood, I tend to knock back a few quick shots of something sweet like Crown, Jäger, Apple Jack Daniel’s, or Fireball, and then chase those with a beer.

One guy I knew could slam a beer straight from the can in like 15 seconds. He could do it in 8-10 if someone poked a hole in the bottom of it.