Thread: Beer In Thailand

You hear it here, you hear it there, "The beer in Thailand's shit." Mostly true. before i came to this country anybody put ice in my beer woulda got a face full of the shit. Now? The Thai beers are so shit and full of alcohol, addng ice is a way to keep from drinkin' 'em so fuckin fast you fall off the stool.
There are imports. Asked our resident beer expert and he gave me some decent information on importing beer. Mainly that it's a fuckin' pain in the ass. Could be profitable but the governemtn makes tough to profit from a decent beer. Gotta be careful what you bring in. Make sure it's got "name recognition."

Some of the best beers in the world got "name recognition" in their home country or maybe just locally, So What to do?

Today I hit the local farang market and they've got a selection of imported beers. Now at 88 - 200 baht for a bottle of beer a dude's gotta be selective and careful, unless, of course, he's one o' them rich bastards. So I selected ONE BOTTLE of ONE BEER that had an interesting name. Any of you other fellas got any secret brews in your neck of the woods think we'd all appreciate you sharing you thoughts on 'em.

Today i bought one bottle of Coopers Brewery original Pale Ale.


Now i'm a sucker for a good pale ale. Love 'em, crisp and clean, slighty bitter with a decent taste of hopp. This one said somewhere on the label "Bottle fermented" This means they fermented the beer then toss in a bit of malt of sugar before cappin' the bottle so it builds a natural head of steam. Pouring the beer in nice glass rendered a weak head but the beer had planty of fizz. Pale ale is not supposed to have that "creamy head" but this one looked like colored soda water.


I sat and admired the light golden-amber tint to the brew and savoured the aroma of the first "Pale Ale" I was to ingest in quite some time. I then tried a sip or two. The Ale has definite Pal ale flavor, albeit a tad light to my tastes. Wouldn't call it watery, just weak. It has good alcohol content and the taste was great, just not enough of it! To be prefectly honest I'd prefer a bit more weight to it.

The beer is sold by the bottle only and They Brewery is represented well at the RIm Ping Market on Chaang Pueak Rd. here in chiangmai, they have a "Sparkling Ale," sounded a bit fem to me, and a "Stout." I'll be tryin the stout later this week, and might slip on the pink tuu tuu just to give the "Sparkling Ale" a try. But at 88 baht a bottle I am not so sure I'll be buyin many of the Pal ales. A pale ale will usually gain some flavor as it is allowed to come up in in temperature and this one just failed to provide the satisfaction I expected. Nope folks looks like the Beer Chaang in the refer is gonna a bit more attention, till I can find that ne brew that makes me want to spend the premium price we ahve to pay for a decen beer in this country just cryin out for a decent bitter, or pale, ale.

The 'live' beers are often hit & miss. It sounds like the Coopers IPA was a bit young. I reckon if you bought some now and left them for a year or so, it would gain a bit of weight and be more to your liking. A bit like a reserve wine.

But who wants to wait a year for an average beer to get slightly better?