Ummm... Beer ^_^ Part 1

Hi everybody, I decided to do a small series about beer. During my trip to Canada, I enjoyed many local beers which has inspired me to talk abit about one of my favorite alcoholic beverages: BEER.

So while I was in Montreal I drank alot of Boreale (http://www.boreale.qc.ca/joomla/index.php?lang=eng) which is a local beer. It is made and sold only in Montreal and is quite popular, you will find it at most bars. These kind of beers that are made in smaller quantities are called microbrews. They are usually craft beers made in more traditional ways than the big industrial beers like Sapporo, Asahi, Suntory, Heineken, Budweiser, Molson, etc.

I am gonna talk a little about the main types of beer:

a lager - this is the most common, Sapporo, Asahi and Suntory are all lagers as are most industrial beers, they are a soft golden (yellow) color.

an ale - this is the traditional beer of the UK and still very popular there, an old word for a bar is an alehouse (!) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ale they are a darker color than lagers.

a stout - this is a very dark beer, almost black. It is a little bitter with a chocolaty taste. The most famous stout is Guinness www.guinness.com

a white beer - also called a wiessbier(from the German) it is a white color, a bit cloudy and has a fruity taste. A famous white is Hoegaarden http://www.hoegaarden.com/

There are also lambics, pale ales, red beers, etc. The best microbrew I have had in Japan was in Kagoshima and is called Satsuma Purple(http://wscreen.blog19.fc2.com/blog-entry-443.html) it is made using sweet potatoes and is a purple color~!

When you go to a bar and want a "nama biiru" you should ask for a draft beer. They are usually served in a glass, a pint or a pitcher(4-6 glasses of beer). You might also hear half-pint, 3/4 pint and 1L. Draft beer is served from a tap on a keg (barrel of beer) so if you want to know what kinds of draft beer they have you should ask:

"What do you have on tap?"

The waiter or waitress will then tell you something like:

"Heineken, Guiness and, Asahi"

When I was in Montreal the waitress said:

"Boreale Rousse (red), blanche (white), noire (black) et blonde (lager)."

We were speaking French ^_- You should be careful when ordering white beer on tap in Japan, it is usually about 1000 yen for a pint and often the beer is FLAT. This means that there are no more bubbles in the beer...

Hmm, I guess that is it for now. The next lesson will be about beer idioms!

Phil