I recently blogged my thoughts on Consumer Reports’ ratings of light beers and there was a sidebar comment they made in the article about cans that is more so true than I think they realized. Consumer Reports said,
Do not shun cans. They might not be trendy, but they protect beer from light and tend to keep it fresh longer.
I agree completely, do not shun cans, but actually they are trendy and are working their way to being commonly accepted as a better way to package beer. Cans do a great job of keeping out sunlight, a nemesis to beer where yeast and the alpha acids from hops reacts to sunlight creating off-flavors and in particular, the skunked taste. For more in-depth reading on skunked beer, refer to Al’s blog entry and my other entry.
But cans are doing even more than just keeping out sunlight. They are lighter, more compact, chill faster, and are cooler friendly. Others may add that cans are accepted in places like beaches because they don’t shatter like glass, but I’m still going to pour my beer into a glass if at all possible. Also, the special lining inside the can prevents the beer from coming in contact with the metal, though some argue the lining can have imperfections that are self defeating.
It seems to me, however, the biggest trend in cans is to use the Guinness invented nitrogen widget to nitrogenate your beer when opened, instead of carbonate. Nitrogen gives beer a different texture because of the smaller bubbles, making it smoother, creamier and thicker; which is something you could only previously get on draft. (The density also helps in pouring a black and tan.)
Guinness started the trend, but now there are many imported British beers that come in the nitrogen widget cans, including Ruddles County English Pub Ale, Old Speckled Hen, Young’s Double Chocolate Stout and many others, making for some very tasty pub style ales available from the store shelf.
Also check out Oskar Blues, they have a video story about their choice to use cans instead of bottles which is worth a watch. (Not to mention their mighty tasty beers)
So, yes… do not shun cans!
Last weekend I picked up a six-pack of Dale’s Pale Ale for a barbecue. It was quite tasty and fit very nicely in the cooler with the Bud Light that other people were drinking.
Canned beer is not necessarily a bad thing. Downsides: hard to reuse cans for homebrew; no can-conditioning; makes you look like you don’t care about your beer when you’re in the supermarket. Upsides: easier to transport, easier to store, make a cool noise when you open them.
Those “pub style” widget cans are actually nothing of the sort, because the beers listed would be served from the cask in a pub, and wouldn’t have an artificial “creamy” head. Old Speckled Hen has never been a beer I rate, but since GK watered it down it’s just terrible. Ruddles is another “brand” from a dead brewery now churned out by GK of course.
I don’t shun cans (although it happens that very few good beers are available in them) but I do shun nitrowidgets. The man or woman that invented them should be taken out in the street and shot, together with the person who came up with the idea of sticking loose advertising leaflets inside of magazines.
I’m pro widget
@Stonch:
Well, us poor Merkins don’t see too much hand-pulled cask ale. For that matter, most of us wouldn’t even know what you’re talking about, which probably contributes to its lack. (A chicken-and-egg problem, certainly.)
I believe you when you say widgetized beer is a pale shadow of its “real” incarnation. Compared, however, to a megabrewed American light lager, it’s nectar from the gods. It’s all relative.
Unfortunately, my one and only trip to England was my honeymoon twelve years ago and we…umm…didn’t make it to the pub.
“Compared, however, to a megabrewed American light lager, it’s nectar from the gods. It’s all relative.”
Yes, I suppose that’s right. But it’s a shame that so many in the US are judging British beer on the basis of dreadful Greene King products like Old Speckled Hen and Ruddles. They’re nearer the bottom end of the scale than the top. The same, of course, could be said of British people who judge American beer on the basis of BMC, but most who know their stuff wouldn’t do so these days.