Blind taste testing skill

[billvon]

The BMC switcheroo thread got me thinking about this:

My wife and I have this routine going. I'll get home first and get a bottle of something out, pour it and be drinking it when she gets home.

"What's that?" she asks
"Guess," I'll say.

(And of course she does the same to me.)

I seem to be right about 50% of the time, but part of that is that I know what _she_ likes and thus can narrow it down. I can tell most of my own beers from each other, with the exception of that long string of SMaSHes I did that all sort of taste the same. I can tell a Duchess de Bourgogne, or an Abt 12, or an Angel's Share, or a Coconut Porter, or a 90 Minute IPA, or a Festina de Peche, or a Saison de Buff from anything else; there are some beers that are so distinctive that they stand out.

But the difference between Goose Island Bourbon County and Port barrel-aged Santa's? Can't tell. Red Barn vs. Hennepin? Not really. Witch's Wit vs. White Rascal? Well, I can tell by the color, but not so much by taste. I'm not sure if it's my memory or taste that fails me here - when they are put side by side I can definitely tell a difference. But I can't use that difference to identify the beer uniquely next time.

Which makes me wonder about that situation with the guy who can't tell Coors from Miller. If I ordered a beer somewhere with a lot of beers but with perhaps less skilled bartenders (say, a Yardhouse somewhere) and they mixed up my Nautical Nut Brown with a Downtown Brown, would I notice? Probably not, unless I had had it very recently.

So I can understand that guy who can't tell the two beers apart, especially given that the light US lagers are probably closer in taste than those two browns. But even if I miss the change, I still hope that bartender gets it right.

 

[tagz]

If you do a blind series you can really pick up on the nuances. I did a session for my family recently. We blind tasted some hefes, belgian wits, and ipas. It's interesting; I used to love Blanche de Chambly, but next to Ommegang and White Rascal it really didn't hold up. It was an interesting exercise for me, and my family (who religiously stick to Southern Tier IPA) got to expand their palates a bit.

 

[bsdx]

This reminds me of ordering flights of beers, sometimes the labeling or receipt is hard to piece together and its harder to put all the tastes into your expectations. Also if some of the samples are ho-hum at a quick taste, I find I am more concerned about sorting out which is which than I am about deciding if I like each and every beer enough to order on its own.