Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Corporal]

So, I know we talk a lot about beer on this board (or at least it seems that way) but I have a serious question. What's the difference between good beer and bad beer? And you can't answer by saying bad beer tastes like horse piss.

[ChopChaeJoe]

Good beers don't have a chemical aftertaste. They are also not watery, though they can be light and easy to drink a lot of. There should be some kind of natural grain taste.

[JLarter]

Good beer is any beer that gets me drunk. Bad beer is any beer that gives me a hangover the next day!

[formerflautist]

I was actually wondering that, too. I dislike beers that I think are considered good beers. So what are some good beers and why are they good?

[pegpig]

Good beer is good. Bad beer tastes like dog piss.

[sid]

Good beer: UK, Japan

Bad beer: USA, Korea

[huffdaddy]

[dbee]

Good beer is generally brewed with barley malt, hops and fresh water. Alcohol production is basically centered around the chemical reaction that occurs spontaneously when yeast turns sugar into alcohol.

The best beers use barley as their 'malt'. Malt being the ingredient in beer that is used to provide the sugar. Pure barley is expensive to produce, so many beers which shalln't remain nameless (budweiser, cass, etc.... ) take a short cut in their beer production. And replace some of their barley with what is generally termed 'adjuncts'.

Adjuncts is the brewing term for low-quality sugar sources to replace barley, an example of which would be rice. Most Korean and large commercial American beers use adjuncts to speed up the fermentation process and to lower the costs of production. That's the very definition of low quality beer, and yes - that's also the reason some low-quality beers give you hangovers in the morning.

Hops are mostly used to give beer that fresh 'grassy' feel. Dutch beers are most notably for their hoppy grassy smell. Like when you open a bottle of heineken or especially a bottle of grolsch.

The world's best country for beer, all in all ?

Probably Germany. The Germans take their beer seriously, the Belgians treat their beers kinda like wine, and have 700 different fruit flavours of everything. Czech beer is amongst my favourite, as is Polish, but those countries also abound in low quality beers.

The reason I say Germany is because of Germany's 'rheinheitsgeboten' laws dating from 1516. Translating roughly as 'impurity forbidden'. Probably the oldest brewing laws on the planet. In Germany you can face hefty fines or even jail time (methinks) for brewing beer which has more than three ingredients.

Which ingredients ? ... you guessed it. Barley malt, hops and fresh water. That makes German beer in general, the world's best IMO. German beer (especially their Pils) are high on taste and low on hangovers.

Apart from that, in terms of just pure quality - you can't beat Warsteiner as a quaffing beer, becks as a hoppy, light, refreshing beer and anything you can pick up on a German supermarket shelf for $0.20 as an excellent budget beer.

[Pyongshin Sangja]

[dbee]