Welcome to People with Pints! We’re a small batch of beer lovers that just wants to share our stories with the world.
Now, Everything below me was written back in the old days of 2014. That wasn’t that long ago only… 7…years? Really, 7 huh? damn, that was a long time ago. Well, I’ll edit this once I get some time. I’ve certainly got more perspective.
Now, before we really get started, I do want to admit that it took me a while to really appreciate beer as much as I do now. I was disappointed by it. I had seen it glorified in TV and movies so much, and when I was finally allowed to drink, Coors Light and Labatt Blue were… less than demonstrative of the powers of great brew mastery
– How does something that tastes this bad also apparently excel at starting up parties and magically ripping the clothes off of heavy chested women?
Granted, I didn’t expect a party to start the moment my friends and I popped open a can of the stuff. No fear or need to bar the doors before foam machines and strobe lights entered our kitchen to invade our privacy.
I mean, I sorta hoped… but I wasn’t optimistic.
But overall I was just underwhelmed so much by the flavor, and how what little there was was so bad. And for a while I thought the problem was Me. Coors is one of the highest selling beers in North America, clearly some people actually liked the stuff. Maybe I just wasn’t a beer guy, and I should just retreated back to the basement with Dr Pepper and IBC Root Beer. So I passed on beer, a lot, til one Summer night out with some friends in downtown Montreal.
It would’ve been romantic, if the bar wasn’t such a cheesy shithole.
But it was my friends’ cheesy shithole. And that’s all that mattered….Well, that, and it had a rooftop patio.
It was on that patio that I sat back, enjoyed the night sky, and really thought that I should be enjoying it with a beer. But, straying away from the Bud Lights and Labatt Blues of the world, I was determined to try anything else that they had on tap. That’s when they gave it to me:
A Newcastle Brown Ale.
I know, it isn’t a cool little microbrew, it’s Heineken owned & operated boringness (to the more snobbish of my beer friends), but I’ll be damned if that soothing, nutty taste didn’t just go straight into my soul and change my life (and liver) forever. Cause I realized at that moment, that beer could be amazing, and that it wasn’t all just variations of a shitty Pale Ale with no flavor.
And let’s face it, for most of us… certainly those interested in a small Beer blog, agree that that Bud Light is shit. *2021 editor’s note, alright, they’re new flavored stuff, like Strawberry Lemonade or Mango, hit easy drinking notes that even I can’t argue, and frankly, I’ll champion it depending on what’s going on
I know this doesn’t seem like a big discovery…. And it probably shouldn’t have been for myself either, but I just hadn’t yet expanded my pallet. But that Newcastle was the push I needed. That that not only was I going to drink beer, but I was going to try every different beer I possibly could. And at least I admit that that doesn’t mean all the beer in the world, god knows you would need a large team, a lot of money and an updated Will to be able to try something so bold. But whatever I can get my hands on, whatever sounds new, different and exciting, I will give a shot.
Do I have preferences towards certain types? Of course. I can’t commit to 100% un-objectivism that a news journalist could strive for (*2021, man, I WISH that was still super common), but I can do the best I can to give you my opinion for what it is, and if I think the problem is myself more so than the beer, I’ll be sure to let you know as well. Because, as much as I want to review beers and tell you what is great and what I think may not deserve your attention and beer buying dollars, I know that it is really up to you and your opinions, your tastes, your loves that can really tell you what the best of the best is for you. My hope is only to introduce you to things you may not have heard of, or to at least share a cool story about a sandy bottle of Corona. We’re not very strict here.
Did you bring limes? Tell me someone remembered the limes!
And by that I also mean that it won’t just be beer reviews. We’ll be taking and rating Brewery Tours, taking Pub Crawls, pairing specific beers with specific Video Games, and let you in on our Epic journey to find the best possible Black & Tan combination.
Honestly, we just love beer. A lot. We had a 64 beer tournament based up on our love for it and it was barely enough to hold half the beers we find near and dear to our hearts. And if there’s something cool you think we should try, tell us! If you think we’re wrong, formulate a (preferably) semi-polite argument and tell us that too! You’ll never convince me that a Coors is better than a Guinness because you slept with my mother, but if you feel that the crispness of a Corona is balanced out perfectly when combined with BBQ wings slathered in Frank’s Red Hots, or that Switchback’s utter cheapness per Pint allows you to order the nachos with extra chicken on top, go right ahead and let us know!
Cause this blog is about all of us. We named it People with Pints for a reason. For we are many, and we all love beer, and together we can grow our beer tastes, experiences and knowledge. Maybe not like a communist All for Ale and one for Ale, but more like a well-meaning democracy with some speakers being more loud and verbose than others (I would, however, lover to see a fosters fueled filibuster). We are people. With Pints. ….of Beer, not Ice Cream. Well, usually. (Ben & Jerry’s White Russian not withstanding of course).
Also, It was that or “Tall Boys for Tall Boys”, and we quickly (okay, semi-quickly) realized that maybe we shouldn’t use that one.
Honestly though, we considered it. We’re sorry.
We hope you enjoy our musings, our stories, our feelings. We’ll give it to you the best way we know how, straight forward and not always a lot of forethought. And if it got you to try a Black & Tan, recommend a chocolate stout to somebody, or buy an 18 year old an Irish Car Bomb, then I feel like we’ve done our job.
And if our job is getting someone to buy an 18 year old an Irish Car Bomb, I’d say that’s a pretty awesome job.
So raise a glass, and take a nice long sip, ’cause it’s going to be a crazy ride. Thank you for coming along.