Why do I hate beer?

August 31, 2005 4:06 PM

I hate beer. What's wrong with me?

I've never been a big drinker (didn't do much acclimation in high school) but beer is disgusting to me. I'm aware, of course, of the world's obsession with the beverage, but I just don't get it. It's bitter, there's too much of it per serving in a bar, and it just tastes bad. To me. Is there something wrong with my taste buds? Could I be overly-sensitive to bitter flavors?

I've tried several varieties of beer (pale, dark, canned, bottled, cheap, expensive, national brands, microbrews, seasonals), and they all have that same basically bad flavor. I understand there is something called the "IBU", which is a measure of how bitter a beer is, but even something very low on the scale is just terrible to me.

The thought of someone coming home after work and popping open a beer to drink is confounding.

It's not that I desire to drink more beer, though sometimes I feel a little awkward being the only one drinking soda, water (or even mixed drinks, which I also have a tendency to dislike intensely), but I figured the world must be in on something that I'm just not getting, or has everyone just learned to acquire the taste because it's generally the cheapest, most ubiquitous method of getting drunk?

posted by robbie01 to food & drink (51 comments total)

I have never managed to choke down an entire glass of beer, and I don't really feel like I'm missing anything. Don't worry about it.
posted by kindall at 4:09 PM on August 31, 2005

Nothing wrong with you. Beer is dreadful. I can barely stand the smell let alone the taste.
posted by dobbs at 4:14 PM on August 31, 2005

How about other types of alcohol? Wine (red, white, rose)? Cider? Sake?

Maybe it's the alcohol per se?
posted by AwkwardPause at 4:15 PM on August 31, 2005

I love beer, but it is an acquired taste. Why should it matter if it is a taste you don't care for?

I have friends who rave about the taste of different single malt scotches, but it all tastes like paint thinner to me...
posted by InfidelZombie at 4:15 PM on August 31, 2005

A lot of it has to do with acquired taste(witness a child's first sip of beer, generally the face made is the "scrunched up bitter face").

But really, you apparently just don't like beer.

I'm the same way for the most part, but I just drink something else at dinner(iced tea, usually).
posted by madajb at 4:17 PM on August 31, 2005

It's an acquired taste. Either you acquire it, or you don't. Your problem might be trying garbage like Busch Light or something.
posted by angry modem at 4:17 PM on August 31, 2005

You get used to it. The good thing about starting to drink it in high school would be that the peer pressure would force you to get past your initial dislike.

I started on watery house draught when I was young, then worked up to ales and so on. You say you don't like mixed drinks either? Is there any alcohol you like?

It really can be quite refreshing.
posted by maledictory at 4:17 PM on August 31, 2005

Nevermind on Busch Light, I didn't read that paragraph.
posted by angry modem at 4:18 PM on August 31, 2005

Did you get drunk? I remember the first time I ever tasted it I thought it was bad, but after getting older and drinking more I started to like it more.

Do you like wine or liquor (rum, vodka, whiskey, what?)

Granted all your cheap beer does taste like shit, maybe you should go out to a good beer and try some of the premiums. Get yourself a tall Hifewisen(sp?) with a few slices of lemon, it should be nice and sweet. I went to Germany a few years ago and NOTHING beets a good Pils over there. Most American beer (Bud, Miller et al) taste like piss unless they are ice cold. A lot of the better imports taste good at a warmer temperature.

There are a multitude of great beers out there, don't go by what you see in the grocery store, stop by a good wine store that lets you mix 6 packs and try a buch of different ones. Try some of your local microbrews if there are any.

What kind have you had and which did you like the most/worst? Then us beerophiles can point you in the right direction. There's a BIG difference in taste between Guiness and your Pale Ales, I'm sure we can find you one that you like.

And there's a big difference between a beer buzz a wine buzz and a liquor buzz. It hard to explain but it makes a differnence. Maybe you just need to get thru the first 6 or so, then they taste totally different.

I think the reason why you see so many people drinking beer at bars is because it's cheap.
posted by daHIFI at 4:18 PM on August 31, 2005

I hate beer myself, though I find bitter way more palatable than lager (which makes me want to puke). In my case it's because I'm a supertaster. I also find anything but the world's milkiest, weakest coffee similar vile and bitter.

You may also be a supertaster if you find some things like coffee, certain vegetables, and beer way too bitter or disgusting to deal with.
posted by wackybrit at 4:20 PM on August 31, 2005

I hate it too! Hurraaaaaaaaaaaaaaay we're soulmates!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 4:22 PM on August 31, 2005 [1 favorite has favorites]

It's an acquired taste. You have to drink it till you like it, if you really want to ... or, if you're in your early 20's, just wait a few years and try again.

I was never so shocked as the first day that I thought beer tasted good.
posted by SpecialK at 4:24 PM on August 31, 2005

Nothing *wrong* with you per se - your palet just doesn't find beer appealing.

My first sip of beer was a Labatt's Blue when I was a wee lad. Thought it tasted like roasted grain. Yummy! (although these days I stick mostly with liquor or darker & less carbonated beers because I hate the bloated feeling)

Have you tried, say, a Bushmills (my fav Irish whiskey) and soda (Club soda - I hated it when I was in rural Iowa asking for that; I'd get (cheap) whisk(e)y and coke instead)? Yummy stuff - the soda dilutes the harshness (what harshness?) but still allows you to enjoy the smokey goodness. Not sugary like a lot of mixed drinks are, either.

Do you like sour drinks? Whiskey sours can be nice. Or Gibsons. If you're into subtle-sweet, there's always mint Juleps.
posted by PurplePorpoise at 4:24 PM on August 31, 2005

Maybe try a few wheat beers. Things with "wheat," "weisen," "white," in the name/description. Try maybe some summer ales.

You might like some of the fruit-flavored beers like Lindeman's (real beers with fruit flavors, please, not Smirnoff Ice) but that would probably just make you a "fruit-flavored beer" drinker, not a beer drinker in general. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Specifically try sometime Hoegaarden, a widely available Belgian white. I once got a bottle of Allagash White for someone who didn't like beer and they said they liked it, but I personally didn't get a chance to taste it.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 4:35 PM on August 31, 2005

Well, you can always count on getting some humour out of an AA audience.
posted by buzzman at 4:35 PM on August 31, 2005

To answer your "what am I missing?" question: The thing I like best about beer is its complexity. In one sip I can taste apricot, jasmine, caramel, burnt toast, etc. It's a lot like wine in that sense, but more consistent year-to-year. I also dislike sweet drinks, and I find nothing more refreshing than a bitter or sour or even salty drink. Or hell, one that combines all three like a Michelada.
posted by cali at 4:41 PM on August 31, 2005

I'm with you Robbie. I'm a musician and work in bars a lot. People always want to buy me a beer. It's awkward.

I've pretty much narrowed it down to the alcohol. I don't really like anything with alcohol in it. I can enjoy a hard cider, the sweetness overpowers the alcohol. But I always think that it would be so much better if it were just plain, say, apple cider.
posted by nonmyopicdave at 4:42 PM on August 31, 2005

You don't like the taste. Nothing wrong with you. If you ask around, you'll discover that other people don't like certain things too.

For me there is:

Strawberries
Coconut
Sour Cream

And a variety of other things I'm not to fond of. Of those listed above, I get the strongest dismay with strawberries. Everyone loves strawberries! Apparently...

For beer, I like stouts and smoked beers. Not to many care for the smoked beers it seems.

Some more info here and here.
posted by juiceCake at 4:45 PM on August 31, 2005

Aquired taste? I loved beer as soon as I first tried it when I was a kid. It's the world's greatest beverage, and humans probably wouldn't even be here still if it weren't for beer.

But really, everyone has their own preferences; you shouldn't worry about it.
posted by cmonkey at 4:46 PM on August 31, 2005

I'm a supertaster too! Hooray!

I can tolerate woodchuck cider; it tastes like apple juice that has been left out in the sun. My favorite bar has it on tap and it looks like beer so I don't feel lame when I order something with an umbrella in it.
posted by Alison at 4:50 PM on August 31, 2005

Alcohol, regardless of where you're getting it from, is an acquired taste. Mostly you just drink a lot of it till you don't mind it too much. Then you drink a lot more till you like it.

Let's face it alcohol is a poison. That initial dislike that we are all familiar with is probably our bodies way of saying "Hey too much of this and we're dead, so back off."
posted by oddman at 4:50 PM on August 31, 2005

First of all, nothing says you have to actually like beer. You could probably go the rest of your life without having it and would be perfectly happy. But a life without beer . . .

Do you like wine? Maybe you should steer toward that if beer and mixed drinks aren't your bag. Wine has enough variety and taste to keep your palette occupied indefinitely.

If you're adamant about wanting to like beer I suggest trying it with food. The flavor of beer can be a little difficult to ease into without an accompaniment. Personally, I don't enjoy beer without also enjoying a slice of pizza or a bratwurst.

If your looking for specific recommendations then I will recommend La Fin Du Monde. This a very sweet beer out of Canada. It has a high alcohol content so depending on your tolerance you may be "feeling the effects" after only one bottle.
posted by quadog at 4:53 PM on August 31, 2005

Nothing wrong with you. I've never acquired the taste for beer either. I try every new beer my husband tries and my response is always, "eh, it's beer." I'm also not a wine or alcohol drinker. I like a mixed drink on occasion (or bottled stuff such as Mudslides, Smirnoff Ice, etc.) as long as the taste of alcohol is thoroughly disguised. I attribute it to being a supertaster (supertasters unite!). Plus, there's a lot of alcoholism (and other isms in my family), so it's just as well.
posted by deborah at 5:07 PM on August 31, 2005

I consider you lucky - I wouldn't drink so damned much if I didn't love the taste of beer.
posted by tristeza at 5:09 PM on August 31, 2005

I looooved beer as a little kid. Then, someone got wise and decided that letting small children drink was a bad idea. Duh. When I tasted it again as an almost-adult, I hated it. Still do.

I guess it's a little awkward in social situations where everyone is drinking beer, but hey, who wants to be a sheep?? Be your own beer-hating person!

And, in spite of TheOnlyCoolTim's disdain, I love Smirnoff Ice and I feel fine drinking it alongside you beer-swillers. :)
posted by clh at 5:22 PM on August 31, 2005

I never did like beer either, and I always thought it was connected to my apathy toward bread. Besides bread, I'm a world-class carb eater. Potatoes, rice, pasta... I'd gladly eat nothing else if I could. But I've always sort of disliked bread, and very much disliked rolls. Beer always tasted foul to me, and eventually I decided that it was the yeast involved.

Finally I tried an oatmeal stout. It's very dark and rather thick, but something about it tasted rice-ish to me, don't know why. And I dooo love rice. For whatever reason, I was able to drink that for a while, and it turns out somehow I don't hate beer anymore. I can have it with a meal and finish it no problem. I still can't really tell the difference between different kinds, and I wouldn't drink it by itself, but I can happily drink one when the occasion calls for it.

I have to say, it's kind of nice. Used to hate coffee as well. Eventually I learned to tolerate it and I'm kind of glad I did.
posted by FortyT-wo at 5:25 PM on August 31, 2005

Funnily enough, I was talking to someone just the other day who acquired the taste for beer the same way I did.

I still don't like beer much, but I now know how it can taste better than anything else.

Basically, if you do hard manual labour all day in the hot sun; tiring, sweaty, hot work, and you have an ice-cold beer at the end of it, it's like nothing else.

"Sure" I hear you say "but an ice-cold anything-else would taste just as good and feel just as refreshing, surely?".

No.
I don't know why, but a beer after hot hard work has something that other drinks don't. I don't even like beer normally, but after an honest day's manual labour¹, it would be my top pick. And I'm not an isolated case - a taste for beer is very strongly linked to labour.

Anyway, it's one short step from acquiring a taste for beer in this situation, to feeling refreshed by a beer when you get home from work at the office, even though it doesn't taste as magical.

In a nutshell, you can't just drink beer, you have to earn it. Only then do the full properties emerge.

^{1. Admittedly, an honest day's manual labour is not something I do very often. I'm more the urban type :-)}
posted by -harlequin- at 5:27 PM on August 31, 2005

I hate it too. Think this way; you're saving tons of money and you're not missing out on anything.
posted by Sonic_Molson at 5:55 PM on August 31, 2005

There's nothing wrong with not liking beer. Just keep trying mixed drinks until you find something you like. More beer for the rest of us.

Also, I commend you for actually trying different kinds of beer, instead of just loudly proclaiming that "I don't drink beeeer" after trying a sip of Milwaukee's Best. If somebody gives you any crap, just start listing off all the different types of brews that you've tried. Most people that would hassle you aren't very sophisticated in their drinking habits, and will probably shut up.
posted by MrZero at 6:02 PM on August 31, 2005

I didn't like beer initialy, and I tried to move on to harder liquers. Once you get used to drinking alchohol, drinking beer is easy.
posted by delmoi at 6:05 PM on August 31, 2005

try Mike's Hard Lemonade. I personally find light, carbonated beer disgusting. The flatter, thicker dark beers I love though.
posted by devilsbrigade at 6:06 PM on August 31, 2005

There are three things in beer that make it good: malted barley, hops, and alcohol.

If you don't like the taste of alcohol, well, you're sort of out of luck.

Otherwise, I'd suggest visiting a homebrew supply shop and just using your nose on some things, including the 2-row and 6-row barley whole grains, some cracked grain (if they have it), and definitely the hops. See if you can't get your nose into some fresh or just-dried hop flowers to smell them; they *do* go bad and stale hops are foul in the extreme. Fresh hops, on the other hand, such as Saaz or Willamette varieties, have a lovely flowery fragrance to them that is quite delightful. Hop oils provide the alpha-hydroxy compounds that confer beer's bitterness, too.

Once you have assessed the cereal and hop component, well, that's beer. A lot of things can go wrong during the manufacturing process, though. The best beer I ever had was some Munich-style lager I brewed myself, and I felt like I hadn't really understood beer until then.

I only point these things out because, well, you asked. It may be you do not like beer at all in any form, and I do not suppose that makes you a bad person.
posted by ikkyu2 at 6:09 PM on August 31, 2005

I'd always hated beer, as well. Then in Ireland I took a tour of the Guinness brewery and they kind of convinced me it was good for me. For the rest of the trip I started ordering glasses of it. I couldn't even finish those half pints.
Now I can drink a pint and I actually like the taste. Maybe I got used to it or just the memory of drinking it in Ireland makes it taste good. I still can't imagine sitting at home drinking one. I don't like it that much.

I totally understand how you feel -- I don't drink mixed drinks either and it can be odd being the only non-drinker. People often nod solemnly when you say you don't really drink, as if you're admitting some big problem to them.
posted by jdl at 6:13 PM on August 31, 2005

Have you tried drinking with food? A beer with a good steak can best thing in the world!
Beer or wine just makes certain food taste better.

I have to admit I didnt like it at first.. You can grow to love it, you just have to drink a lot of it first.
posted by phyle at 6:23 PM on August 31, 2005

-harlequin- is dead on about a cold beer after a hard days work. There is no finer beverage moment than that.
posted by cortex at 6:59 PM on August 31, 2005

TheOnlyCoolTim is right, Allagash White is a great starter beer. Witbeiers in general are perfect in the summer.

Also, if you're a fan of wine, you'll probably enjoy Flanders Red Ales, e.g., Duchesse de Bourgogne.

Now that I think about it, anything Belgian is good.

But if you don't like it, don't sweat it.
posted by Eamon at 7:05 PM on August 31, 2005

Witbiers. It was a typo, I swear.
posted by Eamon at 7:11 PM on August 31, 2005

If you read anything about heroin you'll find out about the love of the needle. Junkies get to love handling needles, as a wholly separate pleasure from actually shooting up. Kinda weird, huh?

Beer isn't so bad -- it's nasty, of course, but watery enough that one can choke some of it down without really needing to wash out one's mouth. Moreover, it doesn't smell all that foul, or at least, doesn't smell all that much. Coffee, now, that's a completely disgusting liquid.

(I like alcohol and caffeine just fine; I've just never trained my hindbrain to associate them to beer and coffee, and have no intention to!)
posted by Aknaton at 7:45 PM on August 31, 2005

Nothing's wrong with you... hate beer, it's all good. Lots of people the world over will agree with you, and while you may get razzed occasionally, it's not really worth offending your palate if you don't like it.

Now, if you want to like beer, to acquire the taste, I can offer some suggestions.

The first beer I ever had, and enjoyed, was Leffe. It's a Belgian blonde: light, sweet, and not terribly alcohol-tasting. Try it very cold until you come to like it, then try it a little warmer. It's still my favorite beer in the world.

Beer is a lot like cheese. While you may like Meunster, you may find Brie absolutely disgusting. While the process to make them, and the ingredients, may be similar, the end results are radically different.

I know that you say that you've tried a number of beers, but that's still a very small fraction of the number of beers out there. I'd estimate that there are at least 10,000-20,000 unique beers in the world--of which about a quarter might be worth drinking.

So, I suggest that you just keep trying beers until you find one that you like. Find someplace that'll let you mix-a-six, do your research, and stock it up with six different beers that you think might work for you. Then, go try them.

Pour each one into a glass (important!), and try a dozen sips of it. If you can't stomach it, dump it out, wait till the next day (or at least a couple of hours), and try the next one. If you find yourself fairly neutral to it, or find only one aspect of its taste unappealing, finish the beer and see if it doesn't grow on you. If not, don't worry. If you do like it, or like one from the beginning, for God's sake write down what it is and have one every now and again.

Once you have a beer or two that you enjoy, start branching out into other beers of a similar style from the same country (or closely-related cultures). Don't expect them to be the same, since you'll still find great variations even if the two beers are brewed literally across the street from one another.

Also, the suggestions of drinking it with food are very good. I especially suggest sweet beer with very spicy food: there is no more perfect contrast on the face of the planet than a bottle of Muadite and a plate of Cajun-style crawdads.

I just finished a big plate of fried rice and beans with lots of minced fresh habenero pepper. To accompany this, I drank a couple bottles of Yuengling Lager (the local optimized cost:quality:availability beer). While I drink Yuengling regularly, it tastes radically different when accompanied by that particular dish than it does by itself or with any other dish.

Anyway, if you find you dislike all of the beers you try, and have no interest in continuing, I'm sorry. You're still welcome at my parties, and I'll be glad to mix you one of my world-famous White Russians. Or, if you're watching your weight, a vodka-and-Vitamin-Water (I especially like the dragonfruit flavor).
posted by Netzapper at 7:57 PM on August 31, 2005

Heh. It could be worse.

I hate cheese. Most of it just tastes unbelievably sour to both me and my father. You can just imagine the odd looks we get when we mention this!

You have my sympathies, but i think it's not odd at all. We all just have different tastes.
posted by spinifex23 at 8:41 PM on August 31, 2005

it's beer! hooray beer!
posted by quadrinary at 10:50 PM on August 31, 2005

i hate beer too, i can hardly finish a glass, and when i do i regret it... i dont understand alcohol at all... it makes me feel like shit 30 mins later, let alone in the morning. listen to bob marley.
posted by Satapher at 12:59 AM on September 1, 2005

There's nothing wrong with not liking beer... but the idea that every beer tastes the same makes me think that you didn't have a very good guide in your experiment.

While you might not have enjoyed them... a raspberry lambic should taste nothing like an outmeal stout (it should taste a lot more like a fruit soda)... and both should taste quite different from a Hefeweizen.
posted by mosch at 1:11 AM on September 1, 2005

Like everyone says, it's nothing to feel unhappy about. For many people, it's an acquired taste [although as far as I can recall, I liked it pretty much as soon as I tried it.] There are certain kinds of alcohol which I've never been able to stomach - pretty much all brownish liquors [whisky, scotch, rum, etc] taste like paint thinner to me, and I'm not much of a fan of gin, either.

As other people have said, it may be worth checking out the stranger offerings of local microbreweries - you may yet find something that's palatable. Ask them for advice on matching beers and dinners - the contrast in flavors can be really great, and can make the beer taste quite different from the way it tastes alone. You don't mention wine in your question - have you tried it? White wines in particular may be worth checking out, since they're sweet. If you don't like any of those [and you don't like mixed drinks either], you may simply dislike the taste of alcohol... and yeah, that's OK too.
posted by ubersturm at 1:26 AM on September 1, 2005

Why bother trying to convert? If you don't like it, you don't like it. You can get along fine without it. I despise coffee with an unholy vengeance. I try it once a year to see if I've magically acquired a taste for it and to keep and open mind, but no luck¹. I never feel pressed into drinking coffee. You shouldn't feel pressed into drinking beer.

You're an adult. You can choose what you eat or drink. Make choices that strike the balance of wise, enjoyable, and healthy.

¹I have applied this same technique to bittersweet chocolate broccoli, cauliflower, and black olives and had success. Coffee still hasn't made it.
posted by plinth at 3:48 AM on September 1, 2005

heh, plinth, you're the same as me. I'm more tolerant of coffee now in that I can go into a Starbucks without wanting to vomit, but even full of sugar coffee is foul to me. It's funny because bitter is the only extreme of flavour I like - I won't eat anything too sweet, spicy, salty etc, but I'll happily suck on a lemon or eat a cooking apple.

My other half doesn't like beer either, or wine, but he'll happily drink the fruity girl drinks.
posted by corvine at 5:24 AM on September 1, 2005

i hated it until i was 22, one hot day i ordered some random-ass beer and it was so cold that it tasted like springwater from jesus christ's garden. my life has never been the same since.
posted by yeahyeahyeahwhoo at 6:39 AM on September 1, 2005

Interesting question - I could never drink beer when I was younger (didn't touch anything until I was 18; didn't drink heavily until Uni shortly thereafter)... I learned my lesson by drinking vodka+coke during some drinking games, in lieu of a pint of something... oops.

Anyway, over time I have come to the point where I know that I like *some* light lagers, and I can tolerate some dark ales, and maybe a stout (but only Guinness, and only if it's cold!) - there's loads of drinks out there in these categories which make me shudder wretchedly when I so much as smell them...

One salutory lesson I learned was due to the pint-downing contests we used to hold (yeah, stupid... but fun!) where I'd turn up with a pint of lager or cider - very difficult as they're fizzy.
One holiday between terms, myself and a friend frequented a local bar, and forced ourselves to have a pint or two of John Smith's bitter (a reasonable, well-known Brit beer) - the first few were *horrible*, but over the course of a week or two, we found that we could drink it without flinching... end evetually got to the point where we were able to down the whole pint really quickly, which was the whole object of the exercise.

As others have said, there's no need to feel bad if you really can't face beer or similar drinks - I can't imagine that anyone who's grown out of their mid/late teens will even pass comment... but if you want/need to get into it, then the only way is to keep trying until you find something you can palate.

@plinth: bittersweet chocolate broccoli?? Sounds intriguing! :-)
posted by Chunder at 6:39 AM on September 1, 2005

You might also do well to try some of the other Belgian brews. I don't like the Triples and Dubles, because they're too sweet, but you might dig a Chimay or another one of the fruit-based beers. They're sour and a bit puckerish.
posted by klangklangston at 6:58 AM on September 1, 2005

I've liked beer ever since I was a wee lad and my grandpa would let me have sips of his glass. When I was in my mid teens my buddies and I would go down to the pub (yes, we were in our early to mid teens and they'd sell us beer at the pub!) and get sloshed on one pint of beer. The bad part was invariably throwing up on the train ride back to boarding school. So after a while I stopped drinking beer because it wasn't worth feeling like crap for the rest of the day. I started drinking and enjoying it again in my late teens, this time without getting sick, which led to me probably drinking too much.

I really enjoy beer but I don't drink that much of it anymore...probably just five or six a month. This way I get to savor and enjoy it without getting sick of it and getting a beer gut. Plus, although I dig the initial alcohol buzz, I really don't like the bloated bleary-eyed lethargic feeling that lasts long after the high is gone. A couple times a year I do get blind drunk, but I have to be in the company of good friends who are similarly inebriated. Otherwise, I'd much rather light up a doob than pour a drink. I prefer pretty much any drug high (except for meth which I hate) over an alcohol buzz.

So robbie, don't feel bad about not liking beer or alcohol in general, as long as there are other acquired tastes you do enjoy (oysters, sushi, caviar, dark chocolate etc. etc.). I don't trust people who are stuck in the "yummy phase" of life. It's like their palate hasn't changed since infancy. They don't like coffee, they don't like anything mildly spicy or exotic, they've never tried a cigar or a cigarette because it's all so icky.
posted by Devils Slide at 8:23 AM on September 1, 2005

My favourite beverage moment was when we used to play Irish music in a pub every Saturday afternoon. After a late night and a couple of beers, there's nothing better than a big pub breakfast (eggs & bacon etc.) with a nice pint of Guinness for dessert. Possibly not to everyone's taste...
posted by sneebler at 6:26 PM on September 1, 2005