Roundtable #30 | Retro Beer Challenge | Final Round and Champion

Here we are at the final round of the Retro Beer Challenge, with three contenders for the crown: Old Style, Budweiser, and Rolling Rock. Before we announce the winner, just a few notes.

The Worst: Jim thought Miller High Life was the worst of any of the beers we drank, but I'd have to go with PBR, which we eliminated in our preliminary round at the Melody Inn. It's kind of like choosing your least favorite dictator.

The Vomit: There was none. We drank four ounce samples, and because these beers average out at around 5.0 percent alcohol volume, we were easily able to handle them. I don't recall feeling drunk at all.

Added bonus for Utah, Minnesota, and Oklahoma drinkers: Budweiser in those states is 3.2% ABV due to state laws. So not only does it taste bad, but it won't get you very drunk.

The Winner: When it came down to picking a favorite, we each chose something different. Jim liked Rolling Rock, Kelly liked Old Style, Gina liked Budweiser. In choosing the sample labeled "B", I thought I was voting for Old Style - but as it turns out, I chose Budweiser as well. Which means our winner is Budweiser. King of Beers, indeed.

Jim calls this result "a rigged, St. Louis-ian conspiracy by two members of the Roundtable", but that's not the case at all - to be honest the differences between the three finalists were so small that it was really hard to choose one. On a different day I'd be just as likely to choose Rolling Rock or Old Style. They're really that close. So if you're somewhere away from good beer, but you're still looking to drink, any of the three are fair options.



The Post-Contest Challenge: After picking our winner, we opened up a bottle of Sam Adams Boston Lager to see if there was a noticeable difference between it and the Retro Beer contestants. Not only was there a difference, the difference was amazing. Sam Adams actually tastes like beer.

Roundtable #30 | Retro Beer Challenge | Semifinal Round

We really could drag this out forever...

Because we'd already taken notes and picked out the outstanding flavors of all the contenders, all we had to do now is line them up, taste them, and pick a favorite. We were still working blind, and surprisingly enough, it was pretty easy to forget which beer was which in the process of pouring and distributing samples. We kept notes near the pouring area just to make sure.

First up: Budweiser vs. Schlitz. I think we were all kind of hoping Schlitz was going to win this matchup, if only because Schlitz is by far the crudest sounds beer name of them all, ranking above both Arrogant Bastard and Old Leghumper. But this wasn't a name contest - and Budweiser's fruity, garbagey/white wine nose and well-balanced, crisp and agreeable flavor beat out Schlitz's slightly sulfury, "like someone threw an egg into the brewkettle" yet somehow "agreeable" taste.

Budweiser moves on to the finals.



Our second semifinal matchup featured heavy-hitters Rolling Rock and Old Style. You may recall from earlier reading that Old Style featured a "faint skunkiness, with notes of water and malt and a well balanced pissiness." Rolling Rock didn't have much nose, but the taste was reminiscent of a white wine; a little fruity, and a bit tart. When put head to head, the vote was split right up the middle, with two of us voting for Old Style, and two of us voting for Rolling Rock. As a result of our indecisiveness, both Rolling Rock and Old Style advanced to the final round.



What will happen in our three way final? Can pissiness beat out tart frutiness* or garbageyness*? Can you handle the excitement? Did any of us throw up? Place your bets, leave your comments, and tune in tomorrow for our next installment of.... THE HOOSIER BEER GEEK RETRO BEER CHALLENGE.

*these words are definitely not in the dictionary

*if you're wondering about PBR, we tossed it way back here

Roundtable # 30 - Retro Beer Challenge - Round 1 (Colo/Penn Region)

Knights Jim and Kelly were east bound and down to do the remaining rounds of the Retro Beer Showdown at our place on Saturday afternoon. The winner would be selected from a group of 12 divided into 4 geographical regions. Each of the 4 Knights present poured for a region while one of the others wrote about what everyone said.

Mike poured the beers and I took the notes for the first group which included beers from Pennsylvania and Colorado. The three competing for dominance in this bracket were (in no particular order) Coors, Iron City, and Rolling Rock. While all three were very similar in color, they offered a variety of smells and tastes.

Beer #1 smelled like "the Mel in Daylight", but wasn't necessarily offensive in taste.
Beer #2 didn't have much nose, but the taste was reminiscent of a white wine; a little fruity, and a bit tart.
Beer #3 was odorless, watery and boring. It offered nothing and was unanimously dismissed.

We were also unanimous in order selection for this group:

Rolling Rock (Beer #2) was selected to move to the next round,
Iron City (Beer #1) came in second,
Coors (Beer #3) was last. If only the Bandit knew what he was going after...

Is anybody else confused? - KOTBRs #24, #25, #26

As has become tradition at Hoosier Beer Geek, we like to wrap up our roundtables with a summary review to make things easier to sort out later. We've been so busy recently that the roundtables have run into each other, but I'm about to tie them all together in a nice little bow in hope that the confusion is behind us.

Roundtable #24 - Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA - All six knights made it to Deano's Vino for our one year anniversary - we were all lucky to make it back out Deano's door alive. + Vomit.

Chris - 5 Mugs, Jason - 5 Mugs, Jim - 5 Mugs, Kelly - 5 Mugs, Mike - 5 Mugs, Gina - 5 Mugs. Our first ever perfect score. 5.00 Mugs average.

Roundtable #25 - The Good Beer Show - Chris, Gina, and Mike take a trip up to Muncie to visit the Good Beer Show folks at the Fickle Peach and the Heorot. Chris sits out the mug ratings, which probably explains why they're so low. + Vomit.

Two Brother's Hop Juice: Gina - 3 Mugs, Mike - Mugs. 3.00 Mugs average.
Stone Oaked Arrogant Bastard: Gina - 3 Mugs, Mike - 3.04 Mugs. 3.02 average.
Three Floyd's Fantabulous Resplendence: Gina - 2.5 Mugs, Mike - 1.0 Mugs. 1.75 average. Sorry Floyds. I'm going to try to make it up to you.

Roundtable #26 - The Retro Beer Challenge - Jim, Kelly, Mike, and Gina visit the Melody Inn to begin a series of beer tastings to find the best of the worst. Scores are then weighted in a method unlike anything we've done before because this is a tournament. Surprisingly enough, this review was minus vomit.

Budweiser: Jim - 2 points, Kelly - 2 points, Gina - 3 points, Mike - 3 points. 10 points total.
Rolling Rock: Jim - 3 points, Kelly - 3 points, Gina - 2 points, Mike - 2 points. 10 points total.
Pabst Blue Ribbon: Jim - 1 point, Kelly - 1 point, Gina - 1 point, Mike - 1 point. 4 points total.

Budweiser and Rolling Rock advance in the tournament.

There! I've done it. A complete summary of our last three roundtables. It's a miracle. Hopefully we'll never be this disorganized again.

KOTBR #26 - Retro Beer Challenge Round One - Final Tally and Results

First off, just in case you're new to this blog - I don't want to scare anyone away. Reviewing beers like Budweiser is not what we normally do. This is a one off project.

As I explained in an earlier post, the Retro Beer Challenge is a tasting of the common beer heavy hitters. Over the course of the next couple months we'll be reviewing all the "regular" beer we can get our hands on, in a tournament bracket sort of format to find out which readily available beer is the real king of common beer.

And now, on to the beer.

I'm sure you're dying to know what beers A, B, and C are. Here we go:

Beer A: Mike - 3, Jim - 2, Gina - 3, Kelly - 2, Total: 10 points - Budweiser
Beer B: Mike - 2, Jim - 3, Gina - 2, Kelly - 3, Total: 10 points - Rolling Rock
Beer C: Mike - 1, Jim - 1, Gina - 1, Kelly - 1, Total: 4 points - Pabst Blue Ribbon

By the rules of the competition, Budweiser and Rolling Rock move on to the next round, and PBR gets tossed. I don't know if the results were a surprise to us; I guess we thought that PBR, being the hipster cheap beer of choice, might have a better showing.

This is only round one of the challenge, and we've got a lot of bad beer to go - Do you have any early favorites? What do you think of the current results? Any surprises for Hoosier Beer Geek readers?