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Posted

So, the Dutch love their Heineken, not particularly good at all.

The Belgians while known for producing a lot of the best beers in the world drink the unremarkable Jupiler in large quantities.

How about the German Oettinger Pils? Is that any good?


No mention of Scotland in that map. They prefer a dram? :) Quite the alcoholics, the Scots.

Posted

How about the German Oettinger Pils? Is that any good?

no, but it's widely available and very cheap... was surprised to see it in the top position - but apparently it has a 7% market share. OTOH I would not interpret this as 7% of German beer drinkers drinking Oettinger, but rather as Oettinger being the beer of choice for a small group whose per capita consumption is far above the average...

Posted

So, the Dutch love their Heineken, not particularly good at all.

The Belgians while known for producing a lot of the best beers in the world drink the unremarkable Jupiler in large quantities.

How about the German Oettinger Pils? Is that any good?

No mention of Scotland in that map. They prefer a dram? :) Quite the alcoholics, the Scots.

I'm a little surprised to see Heineken at the top, it's my least favorite of all the big brands I think in the region where I live it's mostly Bavaria and Hertog Jan what people drink. I always have the feeling Heineken is mostly populair in the west of the Netherlands (Randstad region).

Posted

Fuckin' Iran is a light non-alcoholic beer. Maybe that explains some things.

No surprise to see Bud Light still leading the way in the U.S., not for me though.

I haven't had a Heineken in years and consider myself a better man for it. Same thing with Corona.

Posted

Sadly, not much reporting on Africa, and no Central Asia. Africans have a great variety of local/national beers...wait, not great variety...one national beer per country in a few different "flavors" (or absences thereof), but that's still 53 countries. SAB has bought up a few, and Guiness is still big business throughout much of the SubSaharan continent.

I wonder why the map doesn't have much reporting. Beer is surely big business in Africa, and growing, as opposed to parts of the world where it's shrinking, craft brew faddishness aside.

Posted

Probably putting my nuts on the chopping block here but genuine question: When did Heineken become so disliked? I always thought of it as a decent beer. Not a Rolls Royce but definitely not a Yugo, just something reasonably nice and dependable somewhere in the middle. Reasonable quality mainstream beer. Can't be bothered thinking or trying to decide what kind of beer i want? "just gimme a Heineken." Since discovering the internet i've encountered a lot of strongly negative opinions about Heineken. Has it always been regarded as a shit beer? I'm definitely not a beer connoisseur by any means.

Posted

Probably putting my nuts on the chopping block here but genuine question: When did Heineken become so disliked? I always thought of it as a decent beer. Not a Rolls Royce but definitely not a Yugo, just something reasonably nice and dependable somewhere in the middle. Reasonable quality mainstream beer. Can't be bothered thinking or trying to decide what kind of beer i want? "just gimme a Heineken." Since discovering the internet i've encountered a lot of strongly negative opinions about Heineken. Has it always been regarded as a shit beer? I'm definitely not a beer connoisseur by any means.

One thing abut Heineken is that they have slacked somewhat in the quality control of what is brewed outside of Holland. I have lived places in the world where the local Heineken tasted absolutely nothing like the mother country brew.

Posted

Probably putting my nuts on the chopping block here but genuine question: When did Heineken become so disliked? I always thought of it as a decent beer. Not a Rolls Royce but definitely not a Yugo, just something reasonably nice and dependable somewhere in the middle. Reasonable quality mainstream beer. Can't be bothered thinking or trying to decide what kind of beer i want? "just gimme a Heineken." Since discovering the internet i've encountered a lot of strongly negative opinions about Heineken. Has it always been regarded as a shit beer? I'm definitely not a beer connoisseur by any means.

One thing abut Heineken is that they have slacked somewhat in the quality control of what is brewed outside of Holland. I have lived places in the world where the local Heineken tasted absolutely nothing like the mother country brew.

I was wondering about that, whether the quality varies around the world.

Posted

Has it always been regarded as a shit beer?

We used to call it "skunk beer". The green bottles don’t block ultraviolet light. Reportedly, it only takes a few seconds of direct exposure to create a chemical reaction with the bitter hops.

Posted (edited)

If I'm reading this right, it says that the most popular beer in England is Carling. Can that be right?

http://vinepair.com/features/external/beer-world-map-3000-full-web.jpg

Not sure if Carling Black Label is still up there. Back in the 1970s I would have said 'yes', along with watney's Red Barrel.

These days it's probably Carlsberg (brewed under licence).

Just bought some Old Speckled Hen. Way better than all of the above !

Edited by sidewinder
Posted

Has it always been regarded as a shit beer?

We used to call it "skunk beer". The green bottles don’t block ultraviolet light. Reportedly, it only takes a few seconds of direct exposure to create a chemical reaction with the bitter hops.

That's what it is for me and it seems to have worsened over time. Heineken was probably one of the first import beers I started to drink back in the day. I don't remember it being so bad in the beginning but something definitely changed for me and "skunk beer" sums it up.

Posted (edited)

I like Dark Heineken a lot, but it's really hard to find in these parts.

I've enjoyed a number of different beers as favorites including Carta Blanca, Foster's lager, Shiner Bock, Carlsburg (especially Elephant) and Sol. I'm not a big drinker, and not a Connoisseur.

Edited by jazzbo
Posted

In Holland, Heineken is good when it's from the tap and cold. When it warms up it gets really bitter. When I was a teenager, some colleagues drank uncooled Heineken from bottles after work. I tried one and nearly threw up. I don't like the excessive bitterness of Heineken. But I'm more of a red wine lover.

Posted (edited)

Heiniken owns other Dutch brands too like Amstel and Brand. A few years ago I accidentily ended up at a party of Brand for business relations and found out about that. I don't think everyone there in Limburg was too happy about this fact.There was good music at the party, though I was about the only one to notice since the people there were all drunk because drinks were for free. When I ever will drink beer btw.(I'm a red wine lover as well), it won't be Heineken.

Edited by page
Posted

Thanks all for the feedback on Heineken. I caught up with a friend last night; he used to tend bar and knows his stuff when it comes to alcohol. I asked him about Heineken, and yeah he brought up a lot of the points raised in this thread, and yeah he doesn't really like it either, although he'll drink it if it's there (he's a big drinker). I was like "how am i only finding this out now?" I asked him what he considered to be a good mass market beer, and he rattled off a massive list with a ton of caveats for each (only if it's on tap, only if it's brewed in such and such country, only if it's the version with the black label etc etc). I'm not a huge beer drinker but i do enjoy a couple of quiet ones every now and again; i've decided i'm going to do a bit of an experiment: drink various beers and keep a diary rating them and noting some impressions. I'm actually quite looking forward to drinking Heineken again just to see what i think of it from a more critical standpoint.

Posted (edited)

Heineken was imported into the US by Van Munching & Co. Van Munching & Co. was mentioned at the end of every radio and TV commercial.

Van Munching's contract expired in (I think) in '95.

My experience was that everyone thought that Heineken was a good European beer. I never heard anything bad about Heineken until after Van Munching lost its exclusive to import and distribute it.

http://www.nytimes.com/1990/04/04/obituaries/leo-van-munching-88-heineken-beer-trader.html

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1990-04-08/news/9001290347_1_heineken-beer-importer-munching

Edited by GA Russell
Posted

Heineken also offers a "DraughtKeg", which is a miniature 5-liter keg pressurized with its own self-contained CO2 system. When I've had beer from one of these, it always seems to taste better than the bottled stuff, which is likely due to the keg beer not getting skunked from exposure to sunlight. They claim that the beer will stay fresh for a while after the keg's tapped (not sure how long, but I think at least 2-3 days?), and some enterprising homebrewers have apparently even figured out how to reuse the kegs.

Forbes_1015_p072_f3.gif

heineken-5l-draughtkeg.jpg

Posted (edited)

Heineken also offers a "DraughtKeg", which is a miniature 5-liter keg pressurized with its own self-contained CO2 system. When I've had beer from one of these, it always seems to taste better than the bottled stuff, which is likely due to the keg beer not getting skunked from exposure to sunlight. They claim that the beer will stay fresh for a while after the keg's tapped (not sure how long, but I think at least 2-3 days?), and some enterprising homebrewers have apparently even figured out how to reuse the kegs.

Forbes_1015_p072_f3.gif

heineken-5l-draughtkeg.jpg

Heineken_Tapje.jpg

And it's successor: "Tapje".

the_sub.jpg

And now there's also the luxury item, "The Sub". The home tap 2.0.

Edited by erwbol

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