Favorite non-homebrew to buy to use to bottle

Basically what commercial beer do you buy to reuse bottles? I prefer pry-off over twist for recapping personally but interested to hear what others normally (or have) gone with.

Sierra Nevada at Costco. Short, pry off, relatively heavy glass. My #1 choice.

Deschutes. They have a embedded strand of hops that go around the top of the glass. Very classy!

I've been grabbing whatever looks tasty from the package store. Home brewing gives me plenty of reason to buy lots of beer - FOR THE BOTTLES, duh! At least, that's what I tell the wife...

SN Torpedo for the 24 oz bottles, and Mac's Amber 22 oz. The labels on both of these just fall off.

Ninkasi 22 ouncers are great. The labels peel right off.

mcarb said:

Ninkasi 22 ouncers are great. The labels peel right off.

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Yeah, their sticker labels are great.

Michigan craft beer especially Founders and an occasional SN for the stubbies. I have friends that drink often but don't brew, so they bring me cases of Bells and such. They accumulate fast.

New Glarus from Wisconsin! Best microbrewery in the US IMO, bottles are the classic amber regular shape, unmarked, labels come off easily, and not criminally priced like others.

I'm also a fan of Deschutes. Cheap, delicious, and labels come right off.

Lot's of the smaller micro-breweries beers. Fun to try new beers and they usually have good bottles.

Sam Adams bottles are my favorite, but I like Grolsch bottles as well. Grolsch is great (beer sucks, though) because I like the flip tops.

Sam Adams!

Fuller's for me. Love the bottle design on the 12oz and the fact that it is mirrored on the 16.9oz bottles provides for a bit of uniformity. Labels come off really easily, as well.



Had been running a surplus, since my capper couldn't handle the bulged necks. Got a Colonna Capper last week, though, and must have gone through two dozen caps just bottling empties for the hell of it.

Indyking said:

New Glarus from Wisconsin! Best microbrewery in the US IMO, bottles are the classic amber regular shape, unmarked, labels come off easily, and not criminally priced like others.

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I practically grew up off of New Glarus' beer. LOVE IT! I get it every chance I get when I go home.

Smithwicks. Great beer, thick, dark bottles and the labels come right off.

Troegs Nugget Nectar. It's a seasonal (and one of my absolutely favorites), but between my buddy and I we buy enough that Nugger Nectar bottles are almost all we use year round.

Pliny and Blind pig. I dig the 16oz bottles and the shape.

I prefer just about any 22oz bottles - just because I would rather bottle 25 than 50. Other than that I like Flying Dog.... they are standard plain brown bottles without any embedded designs (like Sam Adams has), and the labels come off quite easily.

Since I've started entering competitions, I generally save mostly plain bottles. The Kirkland beer at costco is cheap (under a buck a bottle), the bottles are completely plain and the labels come right off with a short soak.

ChshreCat said:

The Kirkland beer at costco is cheap (under a buck a bottle), the bottles are completely plain and the labels come right off with a short soak.

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Haven't been to Costco in a while, since switching to Sam's. Are they twist-offs? Hell, if not, that can be one more factor to switch back to Costco come renewal time.

Coca cola. I don't need a capper, and if they blow up, I don't end up cleaning broken glass from all over the place.
And I really like to empty them...

Slanted bottles like Pliny, Monk's, Duchess. Also love small Coke bottles to use for sampling to see how my brew is coming along.

Indyking said:

New Glarus from Wisconsin! Best microbrewery in the US IMO, bottles are the classic amber regular shape, unmarked, labels come off easily, and not criminally priced like others.

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Same thing with Schell's in New Ulm, MN. Soak about ten minutes in hot water and the labels slide right off. They also make good beer!

For me Franziskaner, because it's been my favorite beer for so many years and I buy so many cases of them. Plus I find 500ml to be a perfect bottle size.

Only PITA is the gold foil!! But, I have a method for removing them and the usual Oxyclean for the labels. Still, if they didn't put the stupid gold foil on it would take a lot less time to strip the bottles. The gold foil part takes 40 minutes per batch - usually only 7 or so in the sink under hot water.


Rev.

I like bell's bottles. They got a great shape to them that's different than other brown bottles.

I FORCED myself to drink French Fischer 22oz flip tops - it wasnt the worst I've ever had, but I have enough of them to house a 5gal batch in all growlers if I want.

For 12oz Deschutes, New Belgium labels cleanup easily.

Deschutes must use the absolute cheapest glue on their labels. That's fine though, I like their beer and the easy to remove lables are a plus. I also like SN, and Samual Smith's. I like the bigger bottles from Sam Smith, less cleaning!

Trader Joe's around here has Mission St. beer that is $1.99 in 22oz (Brown and Hefe). The beer is nothing special, but worth it for the bombers.

Sierra Nevada at Costco because it's cheap but Green Flash has a similar style bottle and the labels are floating in the bucket the next morning - it doesn't get any easier than that

Bud American ale...alright beer but great bottles, Dark, thick, good looking, they work with a wing capper... That does it for me!

jmferris said:

Haven't been to Costco in a while, since switching to Sam's. Are they twist-offs? Hell, if not, that can be one more factor to switch back to Costco come renewal time.

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Nope. Pry off bottles. They come in a 24 pack with 6 each of Amber, APA, hefeweizen and "German lager". They're not the best beer I've ever had, but for just under a buck a bottle... they're good fridge fillers and certainly better than BMC.

I like variety packs... Sam Adams, Red Hook, Gordon Biersch, etc.

New Belgium or Sam Adams.

Sam Adams or whatever craft brew that looks tasty on a given day, as long as they aren't twist-offs.

Anything from Bells. Those labels practically fall off!

Duvel and Chimay, nice, solid, bottles with the labels held on by something water soluble. With the added bonus of containing great beer to start with...

richc said:

Duvel and Chimay, nice, solid, bottles with the labels held on by something water soluble. With the added bonus of containing great beer to start with...

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Can those be capped as well or only corked?

@ the Fischer beer comment - I had one Fischer beer a long time ago, tasted like grass, just plain out grass! It was disgusting. I never had another since.


Rev.

BillyBock said:

Same thing with Schell's in New Ulm, MN. Soak about ten minutes in hot water and the labels slide right off. They also make good beer!

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Agreed-they're my go-to beer for bottles. I love that they have no design- I hate when I can tell where the bottle was originally from. And I'm generally fine with drinking their offerings.

I like to stay away from Sam, Michelob, Sapporo, etc. - anything with identifiable marks on it. I'm OCD, so those bottles are the first to go when I'm giving away homebrew. Sam is the least offensive of those three.

For plain bottles, I like DFH. No neck label and the labels are among the easiest to remove.

Lately, I've been liking the shorties like Lagunitas and Sierra Nevada.