Blind Testing Light Beers (Coors, Bud, Keystone, + craft)

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There was no other conclusion after reassemblingour panel of brewers from last summer’s macro beer tasting to taste 15 light lagers blind. Five of the 15 could be considered craft beers; four of them finished in the top six.

The three brewers — Jim Cibak of Revolution Brewing, Matt Gallagher of Half Acre Beer Co. and Brian Pawola of Pollyanna Brewing — eagerly signed on for the tasting. Each declared a love for any beer that’s light, refreshing and well-made, no matter who makes it.

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The wrinkle to the tasting, they were told, was that the classic brands — like Bud, Miller and Coors — would be doing battle with similar beers from craft breweries.

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I assembled 15 beers that could reasonably be called “light lagers.” Some have “light” (or “lite”) right there in the name. Others are a brewery’s interpretation of a light, easy-drinking lager. They were served to the panel in random order, blindly

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We tasted the beers across more than two hours in a private room at Half Acre’s brewery on Balmoral Avenue. I grabbed them one by one from an ice chest and poured the (mostly) pale yellow liquids out of view of the panel into the same short clear plastic cups Half Acre uses for blind evaluations of its own beers.

Using a grading scale of 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest), our panel members spent a couple of hours in search of the lightest, cleanest and most refreshing beers on a recent warm summer afternoon.

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Beer No. 1 was a classic, and I wondered if it gained an unfair advantage by going first and dancing across clean palates? Perhaps. But our judges universally applauded it for doing the things a light beer should: It boasted just a touch of malt character while remaining, in their words, “clean” and “refreshing.”

Pawola said it was “dry and bubbly, with a touch of malt.” Cibak admired its “crisp bitterness.” Most important, Gallagher said, it wasn’t “flabby” — a crucial flaw among many light beers.

What makes for a flabby light beer?

“Lacking bitterness balance to the sweetness,” Gallagher said.

Coors Light, they said, was anything but flabby. They quite liked its combination of malt character, refreshment and balance.

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The first curveball came with beer No. 3. Of all of the craft entries into light beer, Founders Brewing’s Solid Gold has arguably had the most buzz, in part because it made the most forceful entry, landing in 15- and 24-packs (just like Big Beer) with aggressive pricing to match (just like Big Beer). It is the clearest example of craft beer trying to play Big Beer's game.

Though Founders doesn’t tout Solid Gold as “light,” that’s clearly a piece of the intent, with an alcohol volume (4.4 percent) closer to Bud Light (4.2 percent) than Budweiser (5 percent).

All three members of the panel examined Solid Gold in prolonged silence. Then all at once they keyed in on its vast difference from the first two beers: Solid Gold is darker and has a bit of haze. It was clearly a craft effort at “lightness.”

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Based on its color, beer No. 6 elicited even more raised eyebrows than Solid Gold — it was amber-colored, inching toward brown, and easily the darkest beer in our tasting.
Looks like Anti-Hero,” Cibak said of his brewery’s flagship IPA.

Was he bothered by a light beer — one that employs the word prominently on its label — that’s so dark in color?

“Doesn’t bother me at all,” he said.

It was Sam Adams Light, a beer that far predates the rest of craft brewing’s embrace of light beer; it was first released in 2001. In that way, Sam Adams Light seemed very much like a throwback, a craft version of light at a time that the classic light beers were still something to shun at every turn.

And so it was for Sam Adams Light, whose flavor backed up the appearance. Cibak described it as “toasty, caramel flavor.” Pretty impressive for 4 percent alcohol — even less than the evanescent Michelob Ultra (which is 4.2 percent).

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Because the first beer they tasted — Coors Light — appeared to be the favorite among the major brands, we decided to taste it again, to be sure that it didn’t have an advantage based on simply being the first beer sampled. However, another taste only reinforced their decision.

“Pretty good mouthfeel,” Cibak said.

“I like the malt character,” Pawola said.

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How the beers scored

Here are the average scores for the 15 beers tasted on a 5-point scale, with beers listed in order of finish, highest score to lowest.

TOP TIER

Coors Light: 3.5

Firestone Lager: 3.5

Totally Naked: 3.5

Solid Gold: 3.5

Spiteful Lager: 3.2

Corona Light: 3.2

MIDDLE OF THE PACK

Keystone Light: 2.8

Miller High Life Light: 2.8

Sam Adams Light: 2.7

Miller Lite: 2.7

BOTTOM RUNG

Busch Light: 2.3

Corona Premier: 2.3

Bud Light: 2.3

Trader Jose Light: 2.2

Michelob Ultra: 2

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