How to find a beer you like? - Page 8

On May 14 2012 02:49 Cragus wrote:
This thread is full of a lot of terrible suggestions, people listing their favourite beers and general idiocy. I'm going to try to break things down to the basics a bit. You have five primary contributors to flavour in beer:
Hops: There are several varieties of hops some more flavourful, some more bitter. The bittering hops content is usually what contributes a bitterness to the beer (hence the name), but not all hops are equally bitter. Hops also give citrusy, pine, etc. notes. I would say these are all 'high notes' of flavour. It would appear that the OP doesnt like a strong bitter hops character.
Barley Malt: These are your earthy notes. Different malts give different flavours, but they all have that rich base. Some hops are smoked, some are more nutty, chocolatey, etc.
Yeast: This is usually a minor effect even in bottle conditioned beers. If you have ever made bread, you'll know what to expect out of yeast. The one thing this does do that is major is the beer type is largely determined by yeast. Lager yeasts make lagers (ususally lighter beers, but woe be the person that buys an eisbock expecting a light drinking beer), and ale yeasts make ales (usually heavier weight beers with more intense flavouring, but again, its up to the brewer, some ales can be quite light).
Alcohol: Drink a shot of vodka. You now know what alcohol tastes like. It usually contributes a slight spice to high abv beers, but is generally not a primary flavour contributor to most beers.
Adjuncts: This is kind of a catchall category for everything that isnt yeast, water, barley malt, or hops. In good beer adjuncts like (but definitely not limited to) wheat, oatmeal, chocolate, and coffee are pretty common to add flavour notes to the beer). In cheap shitty beer, adjuncts like corn and rice are used to add fermentable material at a minimum of cost. If you look at Corona, an example of a weak piss beer brewed cheaply, youll find it contains water, yeast, barley malt, corn, rice, hops, ascorbic acid, and propylene glycol alginate [yum antifreeze]. Basically with adjuncts, you should be able to guess how they affect flavour (if they added spruce or juniper, it probably tastes like spruce or juniper).

With that said, it sounds like the OP likes deep tones of malt without strong bitterness or hop character. The style list at beer advocate can help you find beers that fit the need, but I'll try to name some styles off the top of my head that fit well:
Doppelbock - strong german lagers that are malty without heavy hop character
Scotch ale/Wee Heavy - Scottish beers that are sweet and malty with no bitterness
Belgian dark ales - Very malty, not very hoppy, sweetish, very high abv
Milk stout - Contains milk [or at least milk sugars]. Sweet [too sweet for my taste], malty, little hop character
Belgian dubbels, tripels, and quads - very very malty, very very high abv, kind of sweet, low hop character
American/English porters/stouts - This is a mixed bag, some are bitter, some arent. All are very malty.

Strong antirecommendation:
Anything "Imperial" - these are usually very hoppy and/or very bitter (Imperial Russian Stout, Imperial IPA, etc.)
Anything "Pale Ale" - usually quite hoppy, enerally light malt character (NB: IPA = India Pale Ale and should be avoided, all true IPAs are quite bitter, although some of them are just using the name [like Alexander Keiths])
Anything macrobrewed (Stella, Heineken, Molsen, American Bud, Miller, etc.) - usually just bad or bland, very few exceptions
Anything "Light" - see above

Some specific beers I would recommend:
Southern Tier Creme Brulee Stout
Southern Tier Choklat
Chimay Blue
Traquair Jacobite
Innis & Gunn Rum Cask
Celebrator Doppelbock
Unibroue La Fin Du Monde (assuming you like nutmeg)
Young's Double Chocolate Stout (guess what adjunct this has )