tried beer for the first time yesterday, thought it would be better than the smell. Nope. Struggled through 3 sips then gave it to someone else 😭
I don’t really get alcohol tbh. Ive only had like 3 or 4 drinks but no matter what it is they all taste bad :/
You learn to associate the flavor with the drug and from there you start to appreciate the intricacies of the flavor. A good bourbon is sweet in the same way bakers chocolate is with a vanillin and other flavors picked up from the wood. Meanwhile a light wheat beer is almost like a bitter bread. Wine is like grape juice but with a lot less sweetness and more depth. And if you really want to get drunk without dealing with bitterness or wine flavors you can always go to mead, which tastes like the honey it once was
Beers are very much an aquired taste. There’s your commodity beers and your piss beers from the big national brands like Pabst, Miller, Coors, etc. which largely are trying to sate a pallete that never liked the moonshine from the prohibition era (and all are crap in my personal opinion. It’s good for getting you buzzed and that’s about it), then there’s your microbrews which will vary wildly in style and flavor (if it’s on tap you can just tell the bartender you’ve not really had beer before and ask what they recommend and if you can try it before you commit to a full glass) and then there’s the stuff people don’t talk enough about: ciders (it tastes like apple juice but with a sharper, fuller flavor!) mixed drinks (again, ask the bartender if you’re unsure), and probably some other ones I’m not thinking of before you move onto the whiskeys and bourbons.
So basically it’s a wide world of alcoholic beverages and honestly people don’t encourage experimenting enough
Yeah for anyone interested in trying the more flavor focused hard liquors (I’m a bourbon and scotch lady myself) I recommend starting with just a few drops. The ethanol can overpower everything else until you learn to taste through it, and try to taste for the flavors mentioned. In whiskey you can often taste not sweetness but the reminisce of sweetness and a mild vanilla like flavor, these are from the corn heavy mash and the oak barreling respectively. Scotch should have a flavor reminiscent of a campfire, that’s the peat.
So, the first thing you need to know about alcohol is it’s an intoxicating drug. It is a depressant, its short-term effects include reduced inhibitions which in the moment can feel like increased confidence, and overall reduction in physical motor skills, plus a mild euphoria. Also makes your face feel slightly numb. That’s most of alcohol’s selling point.
Alcohol on its own is rather unpleasant to have in your face. A lot of cocktail culture sprung up around hiding alcohol with other flavorings so they’re in any way pleasant to swallow.
You might try something like whiskey and coke, I’d specifically go with American or Canadian whiskies here; scotch doesn’t really bring the right flavors for this. There’s a reason Jack Daniels or Crown Royal are stereotypes. Vodka can also be a way in; it doesn’t bring a lot of flavor of its own so adding it to fruit juices can get you used to booze within familiar flavor profiles. Don’t worry about sticking to posted recipes, drop a tablespoon of vodka into a tall glass of orange juice and see what it does, then start upping the ratio.
Get used to that, you may then start exploring cocktails, getting into wine or beer, or neat spirits.
…let me introduce you to single cask-strength malts: one drop, drawn delicately through your lips, let diffuse across your palate by capillary action, that’s how i learned to appreciate alcohol for the first time after four decades of not getting it…
…the great thing about cask-strength sipping whiskies is that one bottle can last years if kept properly sealed between pours…
There is soon a great winnowing of craft distilleries coming also. There is a glut of barrels growing in rick houses are we speak and production is dropping. MGP, (probably the largest producer of custom/aged spirits for “craft” whisk(e)y brands in the US), has announced large cut backs in their production. The market share for spirits is declining in the US as the younger customers are swinging away from spirits to other types of intoxicants.
Unless it’s an IPA, they’re gross and if someone drinks them then I assume they’re just suffering to be pretentious.
/s?
As for other booze, just make it like something you like to drink. Fruity vodka and sprite is banging. Rum and coke is a classic. I like creamy stuff so I put vanilla vodka, bailey’s, and milk together.
It’s not that I hate IPAs, I don’t per se. I’ve home brewed IPAs for myself even though I prefer ales. The problem started with micro breweries trying to out do each other in seeing just how much hopps could be jackhammered into a beer. And it’s turned beer drinkers in pretentious snobs because they have no clue in what the reason is for IPAs to even exist in the first place or even how it’s supposed to originally taste.
Yeah I don’t actually hate IPAs either but as you said, finding one that does not contain an ungodly amount of hops is pretty rare nowadays. I like APAs more because they seem to have been spared by that trend so far
A lot of IPAs are gross. Some are quite good. Bitterness is the most maligned of all tastes. Tons and tons of bitter things that people love and every one of them is a love/hate acquired taste thing.
Grapefruit, bitter melon, bitter black coffee, any sort of bitter beer (IPAs aren’t the only one), heck even burnt sugar!
The biggest problem with IPAs is that crappy/inexperienced brewers use the bitterness of hops to cover up brewing defects. This leads to really gross aftertastes or overwhelming bitterness and only hipsters like drinking that crap.
For a hot minute there near the end of the Obama administration, craft beer was a thing in this country and we had some excellent beers. Then Trump got elected and I haven’t seen a craft beer that wasn’t an IPA or a token jet black “oatmeal stout” since.
The “craft” part got killed in the commercialization of the genre. So it’s become the modern version of Pabst. And there is a contraction of micro breweries at the moment as beer drinkers are slowly learning to pass on all the crap out there.
It’s a thing that happened and I’m not sure by what mechanism. 2018, lots of microbreweries and brewpubs most offering a wide variety, by 2021 you’ve got seven IPAs and one token stout on the menu.
We’ve moved on to sours or IPA/sour combos. I drink them because they are delicious to my palate. Always drank my coffee black even as a kid. I like bitter.
Honestly I fucking hate the term hipster. I’m not hip, I’m a laborer in my 40s. It’s just another way for people to divide each other.
I dislike the term hipster in large part because it’s a cultural movement that’s nearly a decade dead. It was people being kinda annoying about the realization that small scale products and culture tended to be better value propositions than mass produced versions. In 2025 everyone knows that. We all know that some no name restaurant in town is likely better than Applebee’s for example. Every gamer knows that a good indie game will likely give you more fun for your money than a aaa game (though the aaa one is more consistently likely to not be terrible).
Calling someone a hipster in 2025 is like calling someone a hippie peacenik for opposing the Iraq war
Good for you I guess, but why’d the variety have to disappear? I want my ESBs and barleywines back. I haven’t seen a locally made wheat beer since before the pandemic.
Because sweet beers are fucking disgusting? Really though you like what you like. I live in a tiny state population-wise in the US. I can drive five minutes to several shops that have 30 different sweet wheat options.
Oh I don’t disagree with you. I’ve looked for decent non-IPA microbrews and have been puzzled at the lack of selection! I just wasn’t aware of the timing.
Where i am every microbrewery has an ipa, and most have a stout, but from there you get all sorts. Rhinegeist famously does whatever they feel like, which makes them a nice safe bet. I love an Oktoberfest and I’m never hurting for choices in the fall. I also love me an American ale and we’ve got one brewery that’s got one that’s gained a fair bit of popularity for good reason.
Im not usually a fan of alc but I do enjoy rice wine (korean flavored ones) and choya plum wine. Maybe you could try those? They’re moreso a sweet alcohol and doesnt have that weird earthy bitter taste imo
tried beer for the first time yesterday, thought it would be better than the smell. Nope. Struggled through 3 sips then gave it to someone else 😭 I don’t really get alcohol tbh. Ive only had like 3 or 4 drinks but no matter what it is they all taste bad :/
You learn to associate the flavor with the drug and from there you start to appreciate the intricacies of the flavor. A good bourbon is sweet in the same way bakers chocolate is with a vanillin and other flavors picked up from the wood. Meanwhile a light wheat beer is almost like a bitter bread. Wine is like grape juice but with a lot less sweetness and more depth. And if you really want to get drunk without dealing with bitterness or wine flavors you can always go to mead, which tastes like the honey it once was
Beers are very much an aquired taste. There’s your commodity beers and your piss beers from the big national brands like Pabst, Miller, Coors, etc. which largely are trying to sate a pallete that never liked the moonshine from the prohibition era (and all are crap in my personal opinion. It’s good for getting you buzzed and that’s about it), then there’s your microbrews which will vary wildly in style and flavor (if it’s on tap you can just tell the bartender you’ve not really had beer before and ask what they recommend and if you can try it before you commit to a full glass) and then there’s the stuff people don’t talk enough about: ciders (it tastes like apple juice but with a sharper, fuller flavor!) mixed drinks (again, ask the bartender if you’re unsure), and probably some other ones I’m not thinking of before you move onto the whiskeys and bourbons.
So basically it’s a wide world of alcoholic beverages and honestly people don’t encourage experimenting enough
Yeah for anyone interested in trying the more flavor focused hard liquors (I’m a bourbon and scotch lady myself) I recommend starting with just a few drops. The ethanol can overpower everything else until you learn to taste through it, and try to taste for the flavors mentioned. In whiskey you can often taste not sweetness but the reminisce of sweetness and a mild vanilla like flavor, these are from the corn heavy mash and the oak barreling respectively. Scotch should have a flavor reminiscent of a campfire, that’s the peat.
It’s a bit of am acquired taste but beers are by far not all created equal. There’s a stupid amount of diversity and large differences.
But if you don’t enjoy it don’t feel the need to force yourself.
So, the first thing you need to know about alcohol is it’s an intoxicating drug. It is a depressant, its short-term effects include reduced inhibitions which in the moment can feel like increased confidence, and overall reduction in physical motor skills, plus a mild euphoria. Also makes your face feel slightly numb. That’s most of alcohol’s selling point.
Alcohol on its own is rather unpleasant to have in your face. A lot of cocktail culture sprung up around hiding alcohol with other flavorings so they’re in any way pleasant to swallow.
You might try something like whiskey and coke, I’d specifically go with American or Canadian whiskies here; scotch doesn’t really bring the right flavors for this. There’s a reason Jack Daniels or Crown Royal are stereotypes. Vodka can also be a way in; it doesn’t bring a lot of flavor of its own so adding it to fruit juices can get you used to booze within familiar flavor profiles. Don’t worry about sticking to posted recipes, drop a tablespoon of vodka into a tall glass of orange juice and see what it does, then start upping the ratio.
Get used to that, you may then start exploring cocktails, getting into wine or beer, or neat spirits.
I fucking haaaaaaate hops, i hate the smell, i hate the taste, i also hate beer because i can literally smell the fermentation and it smells rotted.
Plenty of other ways to get turnt out there my friend
…let me introduce you to single cask-strength malts: one drop, drawn delicately through your lips, let diffuse across your palate by capillary action, that’s how i learned to appreciate alcohol for the first time after four decades of not getting it…
…the great thing about cask-strength sipping whiskies is that one bottle can last years if kept properly sealed between pours…
There is soon a great winnowing of craft distilleries coming also. There is a glut of barrels growing in rick houses are we speak and production is dropping. MGP, (probably the largest producer of custom/aged spirits for “craft” whisk(e)y brands in the US), has announced large cut backs in their production. The market share for spirits is declining in the US as the younger customers are swinging away from spirits to other types of intoxicants.
It’s an acquired taste.
Unless it’s an IPA, they’re gross and if someone drinks them then I assume they’re just suffering to be pretentious.
/s?
As for other booze, just make it like something you like to drink. Fruity vodka and sprite is banging. Rum and coke is a classic. I like creamy stuff so I put vanilla vodka, bailey’s, and milk together.
/sdefinitely not sarcasm.IPA haters rise up
It’s not that I hate IPAs, I don’t per se. I’ve home brewed IPAs for myself even though I prefer ales. The problem started with micro breweries trying to out do each other in seeing just how much hopps could be jackhammered into a beer. And it’s turned beer drinkers in pretentious snobs because they have no clue in what the reason is for IPAs to even exist in the first place or even how it’s supposed to originally taste.
Yeah I don’t actually hate IPAs either but as you said, finding one that does not contain an ungodly amount of hops is pretty rare nowadays. I like APAs more because they seem to have been spared by that trend so far
A lot of IPAs are gross. Some are quite good. Bitterness is the most maligned of all tastes. Tons and tons of bitter things that people love and every one of them is a love/hate acquired taste thing.
Grapefruit, bitter melon, bitter black coffee, any sort of bitter beer (IPAs aren’t the only one), heck even burnt sugar!
The biggest problem with IPAs is that crappy/inexperienced brewers use the bitterness of hops to cover up brewing defects. This leads to really gross aftertastes or overwhelming bitterness and only hipsters like drinking that crap.
For a hot minute there near the end of the Obama administration, craft beer was a thing in this country and we had some excellent beers. Then Trump got elected and I haven’t seen a craft beer that wasn’t an IPA or a token jet black “oatmeal stout” since.
The “craft” part got killed in the commercialization of the genre. So it’s become the modern version of Pabst. And there is a contraction of micro breweries at the moment as beer drinkers are slowly learning to pass on all the crap out there.
One of the weirdest takes I’ve ever seen. Bravo and well done for somehow working politics into this!
It’s a thing that happened and I’m not sure by what mechanism. 2018, lots of microbreweries and brewpubs most offering a wide variety, by 2021 you’ve got seven IPAs and one token stout on the menu.
Steel tariffs did hurt the craft beer industry actually
Mostly because they can’t be good at all of them. And there were/are a lot of bad brewers out there that don’t care about mastering the craft.
We’ve moved on to sours or IPA/sour combos. I drink them because they are delicious to my palate. Always drank my coffee black even as a kid. I like bitter.
Honestly I fucking hate the term hipster. I’m not hip, I’m a laborer in my 40s. It’s just another way for people to divide each other.
I dislike the term hipster in large part because it’s a cultural movement that’s nearly a decade dead. It was people being kinda annoying about the realization that small scale products and culture tended to be better value propositions than mass produced versions. In 2025 everyone knows that. We all know that some no name restaurant in town is likely better than Applebee’s for example. Every gamer knows that a good indie game will likely give you more fun for your money than a aaa game (though the aaa one is more consistently likely to not be terrible).
Calling someone a hipster in 2025 is like calling someone a hippie peacenik for opposing the Iraq war
Good for you I guess, but why’d the variety have to disappear? I want my ESBs and barleywines back. I haven’t seen a locally made wheat beer since before the pandemic.
Because sweet beers are fucking disgusting? Really though you like what you like. I live in a tiny state population-wise in the US. I can drive five minutes to several shops that have 30 different sweet wheat options.
Oh I don’t disagree with you. I’ve looked for decent non-IPA microbrews and have been puzzled at the lack of selection! I just wasn’t aware of the timing.
Where i am every microbrewery has an ipa, and most have a stout, but from there you get all sorts. Rhinegeist famously does whatever they feel like, which makes them a nice safe bet. I love an Oktoberfest and I’m never hurting for choices in the fall. I also love me an American ale and we’ve got one brewery that’s got one that’s gained a fair bit of popularity for good reason.
It’s been a minute since I’ve walked into a brewery or beer shop and found something I’d prefer over Yuengling, my go-to grocery store beer.
The double IPA, the “I’m not an alcoholic” drink of choice.
The Belgian tripel- I’m an alcoholic with good taste and I don’t care who knows.
Beer is definitely an acquired taste. Plus there is a big fad around IPAs lately which are stupidly bitter even by beer standards
Im not usually a fan of alc but I do enjoy rice wine (korean flavored ones) and choya plum wine. Maybe you could try those? They’re moreso a sweet alcohol and doesnt have that weird earthy bitter taste imo