Octoberfest Beer Tasting
Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 8:13 am
Three of us sat down and did a comparative tasting of six Octoberfest beers to see which we liked the best:
Shiner – Octoberfest
Flying Dog – Dogtoberfest
Bell’s – Octoberfest
Point – Octoberfest
Millstream – Octoberfest
Goose Island – Harvest Ale
The top 2 beers were unanimous between the 3 of us: Flying Dog and Millstream finished First and Second, respectively (I thought Millstream was better, but was out voted 2 to 1).
Bell’s and Shiner finished initially in 3rd and 4th, but as the Bell’s warmed up it developed an off flavor (band-aid) that no one liked. So it got moved down to next to last at the end of the day. The only thing that kept it off the bottom was the fact that none of us liked the Point at all. It was closer to being MGD 64 than to an Octoberfest - watery, weak, no significant flavor at all.
The Goose Island was a very good beer, but turned out to not be close to an Octoberfest style; but in their defense, they don’t claim that it is. In fact, I looked it up on their webpage and they consider it an American ESB. So we didn’t include it in the final vote tally.
Overall, it was a fun exercise, one that we’ll likely repeat with other seasonal beers in the near future.
Shiner – Octoberfest
Flying Dog – Dogtoberfest
Bell’s – Octoberfest
Point – Octoberfest
Millstream – Octoberfest
Goose Island – Harvest Ale
The top 2 beers were unanimous between the 3 of us: Flying Dog and Millstream finished First and Second, respectively (I thought Millstream was better, but was out voted 2 to 1).
Bell’s and Shiner finished initially in 3rd and 4th, but as the Bell’s warmed up it developed an off flavor (band-aid) that no one liked. So it got moved down to next to last at the end of the day. The only thing that kept it off the bottom was the fact that none of us liked the Point at all. It was closer to being MGD 64 than to an Octoberfest - watery, weak, no significant flavor at all.
The Goose Island was a very good beer, but turned out to not be close to an Octoberfest style; but in their defense, they don’t claim that it is. In fact, I looked it up on their webpage and they consider it an American ESB. So we didn’t include it in the final vote tally.
Overall, it was a fun exercise, one that we’ll likely repeat with other seasonal beers in the near future.