What was your "Gateway Beer/Brewery" into the Craft World?

Hoegaarden.

 

Three Floyds & Bells

 

Revolution Brewing

 

Probably Sierra Nevada

 

Leiny's summer sampler, my first summer as a 21 year old. I didn't even like their summer seasonal offerings, but it got me hooked on variety packs (cases are much more common purchases in pa than 6'ers).

Family connections to the folks at victory brewing company made it inevitable though :-)

 

Sierra Nevada pale ale
Samuel Adams Boston Lager
Anchor Steam

 

I was into Blue Moon and Guinness for a time, then a friend at a bar bought me a Stone IPA and I was like, "What the hell? This tastes like flowers."

 

My "gateway" beer into U.S. craft beer was any of a number of Russian Imperial Barrel-Aged Stouts. Once I had these, I could imagine what it meant to craft a perfect beer without throwing everything but the kitchen sink into it.

 

Samuel Adams Boston Lager
Blue Moon
Various Bavarian Hefes and Lagers
Sierra Nevada

 

Blue Point and Brooklyn.

 

Great Dane brewery in Madison, WI. Loved the atmosphere and loved the wheat beer. We liked it so much we branched out to other things they brewed. It helped that we had a friend who worked at a pizza place that stocked their beer. We could get half barrels for $80 or $100 (back in '99) for our house parties. We figured that was better than Guinness (@ $110) and more people would like it.Then I went to Belgium in '00 and it was all over. I realized I could drink the best beers in the world for a fraction of the price of the mediocre wines I enjoyed.

 

Founders and Cascade.

I distinctly remember my first craft beer experience with Cascade's the Vine and Founders Curmudgeon Ale when visiting Portland several years ago.

 

gulden draak, have used it on many friends since.

 

Guinness.

Pliny the Elder opened my eyes to the wounderful world of IPAs.

 

Guinness and Bass. Plus Shiner Bock (I lived in Texas for a while) Then Sierra Nevada Pale Ale. At this point, I think I was still half doing it for show and not getting It.

Then, at a grocery store in Royal Oak MI, I bought a sixer of King's Pale Ale, brewed by Scott King at the (now defunct) King Brewing Company in Pontiac, Mi.

Simply put, it changed my life. I. Got. It. I can still taste it as I'm thinking and writing about it, now almost 15 years on. It was that powerful. Crisp, clean, intensely hoppy, with a good malt backbone but no sweetness, floral and very citrusy, and....fresh. In retrospect, it might have been the freshness that did it, but I'd prefer to not think too much into something that is, essentially, a spiritual memory. Like any spiritual epiphany, It Just Happened. Best not to think too much about it.

The bottles are gone - like most small brewers, he used cappable bottles and gum labels so they went to my eventual home brewing. But I still have the sixer box. I know it seems silly, but I think I will always keep it.

Oh, and Scott King is up and brewing again...and MillKing Productions has a Pale Ale...

 

I always find it amazing how BMC people will come to a Belgian, no matter how big. Belgians are one of my go to's for conversions.

 

BrewDog Zeigeist when I lived in Scotland just before turning 21.

 

Ballard Bitter - ya sure you betcha