UNTAMED BEER – a beer blog featuring beer reviews, news and discussion

Beer is a beautiful, complex and wondrous beverage. We all agree on this, right? Drinking a hand-crafted beer is more than an exercise to swallow yellow fizzy water. It’s an experience that should be savored.

I’m sure some of you are saying to yourselves, “Experience my beer? Dude, it’s a beer.” It’s also a delightful sensory experience. Drinking a beer involves more than taste. To derive the most out of your beer, you also need to account for your other senses, especially sight and smell.

Humans are visual creatures and are easily influenced by appearance. Much of what we taste actually comes from what we smell. (That’s why you can’t taste anything when you have a cold.) So if you want to get all you can out of that $5 (or more) bottle of beer you just bought, ask the waitress to bring you a glass to pour it into.

There are several factors that will allow you to experience everything that your beer has to offer, including the beer’s temperature, the environment you are in, and the vessel that delivers the beer to your mouth. This article is a guide to help you choose the right glass for the right beer.

There are a few things you should remember, no matter what type of glass you choose. First, be certain the glass is clean. If you notice any spots, oil, lipstick or dust, be sure to clean the glass with soap. If you’re at a bar or restaurant, don’t be ashamed to ask for a new beer if you notice the glass is dirty, or you see bubbles sticking to large spots on the side of the glass. That’s a sign your glass is probably dirty. You paid money for it, they shouldn’t bring it to you in a dirty glass.

The glass should not be chilled. When a beer is really cold, it numbs your taste buds. If you really want a cold beer, order a cheap one. Don’t waste the extra money on a good beer, as you won’t get the most out of it. Next, when you pour the beer, be sure to build a proper head. For instruction on proper pouring, see my Perfect Pour video.

Now it’s on to selecting the proper glass for that beer. Glasses come in all shapes and sizes, but the following guide should give you an idea of the general types of glasses and why they work well with different styles of beer.

Shaker Pint Glass

This is your typical, industry standard beer glass. If you order a beer at a bar, 98% of the time, this is what it will come in. This is also the least interesting and effective glass to drink a beer from. Figures…

This glass is popular with bars and restaurants because it is durable and stackable. It’s more space and cost effective to use them. However, there is very little about the design of the glass that enhances your drinking experience.

Advantages

• It’s better than drinking from the bottle.

Disadvantages

• It has a rather straight and uninspiring shape, so it doesn’t make for the best presentation.
• There is no inward taper to hold in aroma.

Appropriate For

• A general use beer vessel. If you’re slinging beers at a bar, no problem. If you want a better experience, there are better choices.

English Tulip Pint

This is a slight variation of the shaker pint. It starts narrow at the base and flares slightly out at the top.

Advantages

• The outward flare better supports the beer’s head, helping the head retention. It also helps you hold onto the glass.
• The small inward taper at the top is slightly advantageous for holding in the beer’s aroma.

Disadvantages

• Doesn’t stack well and the design doesn’t provide a significant upgrade over the shaker pint.

Appropriate For

• Irish and English stouts

Pilsner Glass

Tall and slender, this is a traditional glass for German Pilsners.

Advantages

• The slender body allows more light to pass through the beer. This is designed to highlight the golden color and clarity of a pilsner.
• The outward taper provides support for the head of the beer, allowing the foam to last longer.

Appropriate For

• Pilsner
• Golden lager

Brandy Snifter

This short, stout glass is wide at the bottom and tapers to a small opening.

Advantages

• The wide body exposes a large surface area to release a lot of aroma.
• The inward taper and small opening at the top holds the aroma very well.

Appropriate For

• Barley wine
• Imperial stout
• Strong ale
• Belgian trippel

Stemmed Tulip

This is the most ideal glass for getting the most out of your beer: taste, appearance and aroma. Great for beer tastings.

Advantages

• The stem keeps your palm off the bowl of the glass, which can cause the beer to warm prematurely.
• The inward taper holds in aroma, much like the snifter.
• As you drink the beer, the outward flare at the top will spread the beer out over a wider area of your tongue, which ensures you get the broadest array of flavor.
• The outward flare also supports the head of the beer.

Disadvantages

• You might look kind of girly while drinking a beer from a tulip glass.

Appropriate For

• Belgian ale
• Imperial IPA
• Beer tastings

White Wine Glass

Come again? Yes, you can use a wine glass to drink beer. In the absence of an ideal beer glass, when you want to get everything you can from a beer, whether it be for a tasting or your own pleasure, a white wine glass will do just nicely. It has many of the same characteristics that make the snifter and tulip glasses so good to use.

Advantages

• Inward taper to hold in aroma.
• Thin body to show off the clarity and color of the beer.
• The long stem keeps your palm off the body of the glass to prevent premature warming.

Disadvantages

• People will likely think you’ve gone off your rocker when you pour a beer into a wine glass.

Appropriate For

• Beer tasting when you don’t have a better choice available.

Other Glass Styles

There are hundreds of other styles and variations beer glasses that have been created. In fact, in Belgium every brewer creates a glass specifically for each of their beers. Below are some other hybrid style glasses that combine different elements of the basic styles I described above.

Sam Adams designed a glass that is like a stemless tulip. It has a narrow bottom to reduce heat transfer, much the same as a stem. The top of the glass tapers in and then back out, like the top of a tulip glass. It’s a nice piece of glassware engineering.

Dogfish Head’s glass is an english tulip-snifter hybrid. Thin at the base, it flares out and tapers inward at the top.

The Tripel Karmeliet glass has a thick stem and wide bowl. It tapers slightly inward, going straight up with a wide opening so you can really get your face in there and smell the wonderful aroma of the beer.

When many of us think of canned beer, flashbacks to college parties or tailgates often come to mind. Coolers full of Natty Light, The Beast, PBR. And is there a better sound than cracking open a cold can of beer? The hiss of carbonation, the crinkling of aluminum. Fond memories, for sure.

It’s precisely because of those memories that most of us associate canned beer with cheap, bad-tasting light beer. And for the most part, it’s a valid association. Most beer that we see in cans is from the larger breweries and it is typically your run-of-the-mill Standard American lager. Over the years, canned beer has developed a very bad perception.

That perception has slowly begun to change over the past few years. A few craft breweries have begun canning their beer. Oskar Blues in Lyons, Colorado, championed the cause back in 2002 when they became the first microbrewery to can their beer. Since then, about 40 other microbreweries have started canning beer, including Surly in Minneapolis, Sly Fox in Pennsylvania and New Belgium in Fort Collins.

Given the perception surrounding canned beer, it is quite a risk for craft breweries to can their beer. After all, if it’s in a can, it can’t be good, can it? Good beer is only in bottles, right? Doesn’t the aluminum impart a metallic taste to beer? Yes it can, no it doesn’t and no.

Perhaps way back in the day, steel cans may have given the beer a metallic taste, but that is no longer a problem. Cans are now lined with a space-age polymer that prevents any such tainting of flavor. (Ok, I made up the space-age polymer part, but the cans are lined with a water-based epoxy to protect the flavor of the beer. The beer and aluminum don’t come into contact.)

Cans Are Better For Beer

As a matter of fact, cans are a much better container for beer for two primary reasons:

• Cans don’t allow in any light. Beer gets skunked when it is exposed to light. Even brown bottles, which block most of the light that damages beer (clear and green bottles are worthless), allow in some light. With enough exposure, beer in brown bottles can get skunked.
• Can don’t allow in any air. When beer comes into contact with oxygen, it can get oxidized. Oxidation results in beer tasting papery, cardboardy or stale. Bottles, for the most part, are sealed very well. However, over time, air can slowly seep in through the seal on the cap and result in an oxidized, stale beer.

For the most part, if you are drinking fresh beer that has been handled well, bottles will serve just fine. Cans do provide an extra measure of protection and help preserve the freshness of the beer.

Cans Are Better For the Environment

Not only are cans better for the beer itself, they also provide numerous benefits to the environment:

• Cans are more compact and weigh less than bottles, so they are more space efficient and cost less to ship.
• Aluminum is more easily recyclable than glass. Consumers are also more likely to recycle aluminum than glass.
• Cans don’t break, which make them ideal for outdoor activities such as camping, boating, tailgating and hiking.

Cans Are More Fun

• You can’t play Wizard Sticks with bottles.

Why don’t more craft breweries can their beers?

The primary reason is the initial cost to switch to cans. A small commercial canning line is much more expensive than a bottling line. Canning systems have become more affordable, thanks to Cask Brewing Canning Systems, which has engineered a relatively low-cost system designed for microbreweries. Still, Oskar Blues spent about $45,000 for their canning set-up, and many small breweries can’t afford that type of up front investment. Larger canning lines can cost over $200,000.

However, if a brewery can swing the initial investment, the savings over time can be significant. Shipping costs will be substantially lower due to lighter-weight aluminum. They can also save on labels and glue. In addition, breweries have seen substantially higher sales growth for their canned selections, as people have become more aware of the benefits of canned beer.

I’ll leave you with one final thought: Draft beer is served in a 1,984 ounce can, also known as a keg.