The Big Green House

Wednesday, May 28, 2003

 

Oh grow up

If you�re in the market for a good, hoppy beer (and who�s not?), you could do far worse than Flying Dog pale ale. You�ll have to look beyond their marketing scheme, though, which is pointed directly at the apparently limitless frat boy market � In Heat Wheat? Doggie-Style Pale Ale? Which, of course, must inevitably lead to the �I like it Doggie-Style� T-shirt, etc. C�mon. Any points awarded for somehow convincing Ralph Steadman to create the labels are immediately lost due to the Lowest Common Denominator nature of the trade names.

The beer itself is something else again. True, the body is decidedly on the thin side, but with hot weather coming on that�s not necessarily a bad thing. It�s very nicely hopped, anyway. Too hoppy for Miller Lite-guzzling, thick-necked puds, I�d wager, but the discerning adult palate (by which I mean �ones like mine�) will enjoy the refreshing bitterness. I�d like to see what these guys could do with an IPA.

That doesn�t make me cringe any less when I bring the six-pack up to the checker, though, since I might as well be wearing a fucking Dave Matthews band t-shirt. Shake yourselves, Flying Dog people! Put some body in the beer and pretend, just for a moment, that your customer might have a brain in his head along with the one in his pants.

bmarkey 5/28/2003 10:42:00 PM