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Journal jawtheshark's Journal: Ordering Beer in the United States 24

Journal by jawtheshark
I was reading one of those frontpage stories about advertsing. (Spare me the comments like "What is this frontpage thing you talk about?"... We all know some people still read the damned thing!)

Somewhere in the thread I find this comment. The part that struck me was: or the classic situation when a character enters a bar and orders a "Beer"...

How the fuck are you supposed to ask for beer in any other way. It doesn't matter if it's Miller or Bud, you just friggin want a beer. If I go into a pub here, I *do* ask for a beer and I get the beer they have on tap. No questions asked.
Do you guys really ask for a "Bud Light" in pubs? Man, all the bartenders/waiters I encountered didn't look at me as if I was from another planet when I asked for "a beer" while I was over in the US. Okay, mostly I asked for "a local beer", but that is another story all together...

Update 25/02/2005 12:18CET
Fixed the link

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Ordering Beer in the United States More

Ordering Beer in the United States

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  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Most beers in the US have anywhere from 4 to 24 beers on tap, and most of them are the same, bud, miller, who can tell the diff...

      Exactly ;-) So just give me the beer that's closest to you Mr Bartender... Saves you some work and my time. ;-)

    • The other difference is that pubs in Europe tend to have one "house beer", which quite often is sponsored by a brewery. Sometimes brewers will even buy pubs outright as a marketing tool (this is especially common in the UK). Such arrangements are AFAIK unusual in America for beers.

      What's odd is that arrangements tougher than that are quite common for soft drinks in America -- Coke and Pepsi vie with each other to get exclusive rights to serve restaurants, and sell their syrup and rent machines at a discou

      • They were quite common prior to 'prohibition' the alchohol industry in ameerica wasn't nearly as strong once prohibition was lifted, because the major breweries had been eating shrinking markgins for years, while illegal breweries had cropped up everywhere, and once prohibition eneded all those illegal operations became 'legitimate' breweries. plus there is a lot of effort to 'brand' beers (even though they all taste the same) and make people ask for the same beer, no matter where they go. Miller, old mill
    • Most beers in the US have anywhere from 4 to 24 beers on tap, and most of them are the same, bud, miller, who can tell the diff...

      I don't know what bars you have been going into, but one thing I like about the West Coast in general and the larger cities/towns in particular is most bars will generally have some form of decent microbrew or import on tap.

      As for the bitter beer thing ... it mostly has to do with the majority of microbreweries having as their 'main' beer an English IPA or ESB style beer. Also I
    • Dear lord. There is someone else who doesn't think "just add more hops" is a substitute for a beer recipe. Those west coasters know not one fucking thing about a balanced beer.
  • Once I went into a donut store, and said "I'd like some donuts" and the person behind the counter said "we don't have donuts." It was a while ago when that happened, but as I remember it, the reason I asked for "donuts" and not "an apple fritter, a maple frosted bar, and a chocolate frosted cake with sprinkles" or something like that was, I thought I'd give the counter person a "heads up" as to what I was going to order. Like "get the pink box ready" instead of "go get a 16 oz cup, because I'm about to or
  • Here in Upstate NY, and in the other places I've been as an adult, ordering a generic drink gets you a list of the brands they have on tap. Modern America is very picky, even if we're picky about different things than our snobbish European counterparts.

    Beer is not an exception to this rule. "I'll have a beer" is met with "Sam Adams, Killean, Bud, Bud Light...". "I'll have a coke" is either met with a Coca-Cola, or a "Is Pepsi fine?" -- and "I'll have a cola" is met with the same answer.
    • Modern America is very picky, even if we're picky about different things than our snobbish European counterparts.

      Well, we might be picky about many things but usually we're picky about the contents not about the brand. It's more important to know what is in something that to know what silly name some marketing department came up with.

      • Well, we might be picky about many things but usually we're picky about the contents not about the brand. It's more important to know what is in something that to know what silly name some marketing department came up with.

        It's not the name. It's the continuity of experience.

        Look at the uproar over "New Coke" vs. the complete lack of uproar over the adoption of HFCS. The difference in the first case was intentionally different, and was reviled. The difference in the second case was intended to be as slig
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Yes (Score:2)

    by rdewald ( 229443 ) *
    You ask "can I have a Bud Light?"

    Unless you don't like for your beer to taste like your ashtray, in which case you say "can I have a Stella?"

    There are a number of excellent local microbreweries in the US. There's lots of good beer here, but none of it is advertised during the Super Bowl.
    • I wish Coors Light tasted as good as an ashtray; might be an excuse to buy it then.
    • I personally think that's plain stupid. But, hell, that's not the first time American behaviour baffles me. I think you guys have been trained to know brands more than to know what kind of product it is. There is no difference between Bud and Miller: they both taste crap.

      As for Stella... Well, at least not everything is lost: you still can get good beer over there.

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