It's difficult to simultaneously know a whole lot and painfully little about beer. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing and all that. Sure I can name a lot of breweries, I've tried a lot of beers and beer styles, and I know what kinds of beers I generally like and dislike and can articulate why, generally. I still don't really understand the beermaking process though. On a very basic level I do, and I guess this could easily be remedied by a little homebrewing, but the process is, as I understand it, kind of like the board game Othello: "a minute to learn, a lifetime to master." I also am working on refining my palette. I get the big picture; i.e. I can taste the degree to which a beer is hopped, generally what flavors those hops elicit. I can taste whether a beer is particularly malty or not. Bitter or sweet or dry. Fine. But I have issues with the small stuff. Last night I had a Yakima Twilight from Victory Brewing last night at RFD in Chinatown. Tons of hops in that beer, but then I was able to detect anise on the back palette too. I was pretty proud that I was able to detect (and identify, which I guess is the hardest part for me) that even though anise is a very strong flavor. I guess it's small steps, and as I learn to identify flavors I'll hopefully be able to continually identify them.
This rambled a little bit. It's hard for me to articulate what I want to about beer. I guess it'll come in time.
Ideas for next time: the beer review process.
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