What beer set you free?

[SavageSteve]

Back in 1992-ish, the beers that changed my drinking life were New England Brewing Company's Atlantic Amber and Gold Stock Ale (not produced any more). They were also what made me want to start homebrewing.

I think I'm still pissing out all the BMC I drank in college.

 

[eschatz]

Achor Liberty, SNPA, Chimay, and the bastard

 

[niquejim]

I honestly think it was my first homebrew. I always used to drink either Sammy, or Heiney, or some Canadian Lager, or even (GASP!) Corona before I began to brew. I wasn't drinking cheap beer, but I wasn't really drinking GOOD beer (just stuff that cost a little more). I'd occassionally have something at the brew pub, but beer wasn't something that I really paid a lot of attention to until I started making it.

That's me almost exactly. I thought I was drinking good beer. I will forever be thankful for the Sam Adams Homebrew commercial which got me started.

 

[Poindexter]

It was this girl I dated for a while in 1988 that insisted on Saint Pauli Girl.

After we broke up I finished all the SPG that was left in the fridge. After that was gone I bought a sixer of Bud. I drank about half of one. I poured out the rest of the Bud sixer and never really looked back.

 

[uglygoat]

gennesse cream ale and miller high life... what? those set me free when i was knee high, and i still drink them...

 

[Moonshae]

+1 for Newcastle.

 

[Onescalerguy]

Pyramid Hefeweizen!I think it's crap now.

 

[kaptain_karma]

My first homebrew turned me on to the wonderful world of beers. It was a honey wheat, but the style had nothing to do with turning me on to beer. Through the process of brewing my first beer, I became so interested in brewing that trying new beers and styles became essential and delightful task.

 

[stever]

Mine was really two different beers, first was a pale ale from a local brewery called schlafly that I had at a wedding. It was really fresh and I remember thinking man this is freaking delcious. Then I tried the bottled version and it wasnt the same so I bought a six of Flying Dog Pale Ale and really loved that hop flavor. It was all over from there.

 

[Evan]

i was back home for new years during college one year and on the way back from the beer store where i had "splurged" and bought bud, he shut my hand in the car door...and to say he was sorry, he gave me one of his Big Daddy Brown Ales from Mad Anthony's (local to Fort Wayne, IN). i was hooked, i just couldn't afford it often. so after college i started buying more and more micro's. i still miss not living around Mad Anthony's, if you're ever in Fort wayne, i would stop by. since then i've fallen in love with their Old Woody Pale and their IPA. but once in a while they'll have their Big Daddy on tap, and i'll have to get one!

 

[talleymonster]

It would either be Fat Tire or Newcastle.

 

[Hopleaf]

Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout

 

[Junebug]

It was the locally brewed "Sprecher Amber" for me....these days, I'm drinking SNPA and SN ESB. Plus home brews.

 

[Professor Frink]

It was flying fish ESB for me. That was my gateway beer into SNPA then DFH. From there I found out that good beer did not have to be heavily hopped, or brewed on professional equipment.

It was Flying Fish for me too! I went home after college and started drinking Flying Fish ESB and Pale Ale and there was no going back.

 

[sdhucks7]

For me it wasnt so much a beer as a bar, there was a bar in OKC called Tapwerks (the original one on western for the OK people) where i learned what good beer was. Once i started going to this bar i found over 100 beers either on tap or in the bottle that really made me thing "hmmm there is better beer out there" then it was all up hill from there.

SD

 

[ohiobrewtus]

Hoegaarden.

 

[aekdbbop]

Hoegaarden.

more like ho bag...

bllllaaaahhhh:cross:

 

[PeteOz77]

First it was the Guniess.

Then a few of the seasonal brews From Schell's Especially the Firebrick. To think I lived 11 miles away from the brewery and drank Bud Light. Then I moved to the opposite side of the planet and discovered how fantastic the local brew was... and I can't get it here

 

[bs22619]

Lost Coast's- Great White Beer

 

[BrianTheBrewer]

There is a place in North Woodstock NH called "The Woodstock Inn".
My parents use to bring us there after a day of skiing. It is Ski town NH to me.
Quiet, small, very nice place to visit.

I must have been 16 years old when my Dad after all the years he finally let me try a great and wonderful brew called "Loon Golden Ale". I was hooked. I said to him how can people drink Bud Light when beers like this are made??!!

He told me to calm down and wait till I was 21 to try the rest of the brews made at the Woodstock Inn. Well I am now almost 27 years old, The Woodstock Inn bottles the beer now and everytime im in NH I usually buy 5-6 cases to bring home. I love the beer that much!!!

Thats how I got brought into good beer, from a great brewpub in NH.
If you are ever in NH try out the Woodstock Inn.

 

[MikeFlynn74]

My first decent beer was at a HOPs restraunt. The one near my house had a pale ale and it was awesome.

 

[Joker]

I wasn't a beer drinker of any kind before I tried a Black Butte Porter.

 

[MikeG]

Heh, I think mine was Heineken (no laughs please) to get me out of the really crappy stuff. It was a short lived gateway until I realized that the world was far more interesting.

 

[IrregularPulse]

Flying Dog Road Dog Porter got me started in college. I would drink 1-2 of those then as funds allowed then switch to the $2 32oz Icehouses for functionality.
http://www.flyingdogales.com/beer-road-dog.asp

 

[buckrogers71]

Victory HopDevil, then the other offerings from them and other local places

 

[david_42]

I can't really qualify this. I stopped drinking beer after college, switching to mixed drinks while I was in the Navy. After that, I got into wines for about 15 years. Drank beer occasionally, but not enough to remember. When I got bored with wines, there were dozens of craft beers available. Then I started homebrewing.

 

[bluedragoon85]

Being I live right on the Tecate border, I mostly started drinking tecate, dos equis, and Sol. I really didn't like any of them much in terms of flavor, but it was the norm; but then I started drinking other beers such as Bohemia, Negra Modelo, and Noche Buena. What really did it for me was the fact that there is so little variety in terms of beer in Mexico, that I was just completely disappointed (I wasn’t legal to get beer in the U.S.). The best I could get my hands on were Noche Buena (only during the Christmas season), Bohemia and negra modelo. I really liked negra modelo (Vienna style lager) but I wanted more variety and so I decided to brew. From there, I have been in complete shock as to how much variety there is to beer. Everyone around here thinks I'm the only person that homebrews in Tecate since no one has ever heard of such a thing before. The only other person I know that used to brew was a friends Grandpa. He is an immigrant from Germany (big time beer drinker), but he has left his brewing days behind him.

 

[blacklab]

Two:

Black Butte Porter
Mirror Pond Pale Ale

Deschutes Brewery.

 

[Brakeman_Brewing]

Newcastle in the bottle

 

[Judd]

The Propeller line-up, and Duvel.