Pilsners!

Gotta give love to Warstiener. 20 bucks a case and tastes great.

 

Victory's Prima Pils and Stoudts Pils are exactly the beers that were coming to mind while I read your original post. I also like Pilsner Urquell (regardless of the SABMiller acquisition, not to mention I probably never had the "original" anyway).

What about veering from style a little bit and going for a good Munich Lager? Spaten (delicious), Great Lakes Dortmunder, or Stoudts Gold (one of my favorite beers).

 

Drinking that now. Sounds like you get a decent price around you way. I bought a case of cans for $24 w/ tax a month and a half ago.

 

The cans were like 22ish after tax. I have seen the bottles from 24-35$. The other night the cashier rang me up for 35 and some change and I said " hey man, thats the bottles; I got cans." Ionno why such a variation in prices.

 

From my experience and observation, variation in price is the result of state taxes and the retailer's stock. For example, PA taxes are too much! For example, I work at a distributor where cans of Bud Light Lime (garbage I assume) are around a dollar more than bottles, and that's simply because my employer (not for much longer) carries 15x the amount of bottles that it does cans.

 

i have seen it for 16 bucks a case in WI

 

Steve and Jack - I homebrew a lot of German and Czech Pilsners. All German malts are not created the same. I like Durst for a dry beer like Jever. Weyermann for something in the south that is not so dry. BestMalz has a nice sweet finish. Or you can do a blend of Pils malt.

The Weyermann Bohemian malt for Czech beers is something that I like to get that certain flavor from the Bo-Pils style.

Then there is the process. How is it mashed? Infussed, step mashed, or decocted?

The yeast will also have an impact on the malty flavor. Had a beer made with one of the new lager strains that is available (Augusteiner?) and it was really malty/bready, and there was nothing special about the malt or process.

 

Lol that's ridiculous.

 

I was going to post something similar to your yeast comment. Yeast and fermentation are likely the issue of bready versus clean pilsner. We make ours with all weyermann pils malt and step mash it, and it's very clean because we use 34/70, which is a very clean lager strain. Bready malt is downplayed, and the hops are more prominent. Since most German brewers are mashing like we do (3-step with a 63C or so mash-in) and using similar malt, I would chalk up the variation to yeast and pasteurization/handling/age. You have to remember that pasteurization and age increase sweet, honey-like flavors from malt. Nearly every german import is pasteurized.

 

Smuttynose Vunderbar Pilsner...

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it isn't the most high quality or expensive beer ingredient-wise, they give it out like water on lufthansa flights.

 

Jeff,

As always, thanks for your input.

You stated: “The yeast will also have an impact on the malty flavor. Had a beer made with one of the new lager strains that is available (Augusteiner?) and it was really malty/bready, and there was nothing special about the malt or process.”

As you and I have corresponded in the past, yeast selection does indeed have an impact. I just drank a homebrewed CAP this evening brewed with White Labs 830 yeast. That beer had a substantial bready taste.

A difference of opinion between Steve and me is that there is a ‘requirement’ that there be a bready taste in a German Pilsner for it to be ‘authentic’. Steve has a strong opinion that a bready characteristic defines a “good European Pilsner”. I have a differing opinion. I believe that a German Pilsner can be ‘authentic’ and still not be bready. My examples would be Jever and well as Victory Prima Pils.

I believe that there is a wide range of flavors for German Pilsner. I drink German style Pilsners that have a bready characteristic (e.g., Troegs Sunshine Pils, Southampton Keller Pils) and I enjoy drinking them and I think of them as being ‘authentic’ German style Pilsners. I also drink German Pilsners that don’t have a bready characteristics (e.g., Victory Prima Pils, Jever) which don’t have a bready characteristic but I also think are ‘authentic’ German Pilsners.

Oh well, to each their own!?!

Cheers!

 

It is brewed with hop extracts. Still gets the job done for a sessionable Pils on a hot day and doesn't break the bank because it uses those ingredients.

 

yeah im not necessarily slighting it just saying that it probably is overpriced in most areas of the us.

 

Have to add my German favorites to the list...Erzquell, Herforder, and Veltins.

 

I was recently floored by Olde Hickorys' Southern Cross.

 

http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/412/17797

Got Kulmbacher Edelherb Premium Pils, and from what I gathered from the date, it was only about a month old. I've had EKU Pils on tap at the bars, and love it, this was also quite good.

Steve, not sure if either of these have that authentic bready characteristic you're looking for.

 

In case anybody was wondering, I thought that Terrapin's Sound Czech was freaking great.

 

I always wonder why Lagunitas Pils never gets mentioned in these threads. I put it right up there with Victory Prima Pils. In my old bar I had em both on, along with Avery Joes, and they did about the same business (Joes outsold 'em both though, but I was in Avery country)

I think I'll go look at cumulative scores, maybe my palate is just outside the consensus...

EDIT TO ADD: I thought this was just a one page thread! didn't read the intervening 11 pages...still haven't but got caught up in the steveh discussion and the hopfenmaltz & Jack horzempa discussion, but if somebody DID mention Lagunitas (which I checked, and it comes in here at 82 vs 92 for Victory, I guess my belief that they are of similar excellent quality is outside the mainstream here...not that 82 is a bad score, but it's clearly not loved in the collective wisdom as much as i love it.) I guess my point loses some lustre.

 

When fresh, EKU Pils is one of the best Pilsners I've ever tasted.