After barely budging for several years, beer prices started to inch up in the second half of last year and are now rising at about a 4% annual rate, according to government statistics.

Try reading the first sentence of the quote.

C'mon Eric, you haven't noticed that the microbrews you used to be able to buy for $4.99 or $5.99 a six pack on sale a year ago are now on sale for $6.99 or $7.99? 

But, ok I'll "try hard to keep up." 

No biggie brother, I'm  just saying beer's gone up a lot more the last 2 years percentage wise than the 10 years before that.

Asahi

India Pelican Ale - Pelican Brew Pub - Pacific City, Oregon

Current house beer is Longhammer IPA by Redhook.

Nothing beats an ice cold Mirror Pond, or most any beer from Deschutes Brewery.

Agree that Deschutes is GREAT, but I'm a bit burned out on the Pond.  Bought a CASE of some Christmas Ale a few months ago at their factory sale for $11.  That was pretty dang good - wish I bought more.  I'm sure I'll be back to the Pond eventually...

Dignan:

Agree that Deschutes is GREAT, but I'm a bit burned out on the Pond.  Bought a CASE of some Christmas Ale a few months ago at their factory sale for $11.  That was pretty dang good - wish I bought more.  I'm sure I'll be back to the Pond eventually...

Yeah, the Jubilale is good stuff. I'm drinking a Widmer IPA right now that I've never tried before, called Broken Halo. Pretty tasty, although I could see it being too hoppy for some.

Dignan:

Current house beer is Longhammer IPA by Redhook.

GREAT.  It's the one IPA that seems to be available in the supermarkets around my house, so I've been drinking a bit of it.

I've been IPA crazy the last month, but there not as readily available out here as they were in Portland.

 I went to Costco today and I bought some sort of a Belgian variety pack with Stella, Hoegaard, and Leffe.  The only one I like is the Stella--didn't care for the Hoegaard (which one of the posters mentioned) and the Leffe at all.

Yah - it is easy to find, plus there's a gas station on my way home that's had it "on sale" at $6.99 for about the last five months.  No brainer.  Not the best IPA, but good enough.

^^^Would it be better on tap?  All the ones I had when I was visting the Pacific Northwest were tap.

Almost all beer tastes better from a nice, clean tap.

I'm sure it would be great on tap, but I don't get out much any more (two year old at home) and the places I do get to go to don't have it.  I'll make it my mission to try to find some on tap sometime over the next month though...

^^^I've not had it on tap either.  I have an 8 and 6 year old at home, so I don't get out much unless I'm out of town.  Need to find one of those 150 beers on tap places (though I'm not sure how clean those hoses are).

Ugh - nothing worse than a dirty tap!  Drank some dirty beer at a Roundtable Pizza (should rename to Ghetto-Ass Pizza) a few weeks back.

My wife is getting a week jumpstart on our vacation in the middle of this month, so I'll be cut loose to go out and find beer on my own.

Just had a Blue Moon Belgian Ale on tap.  Fvcking great........  I didn't care much for it outta the bottle, but my friend told me to try it out of the tap, and I did.  Although I didn't squeeze the orange....

 Blue Moon is good.

My issue with IPA's is they have become a macho hopfest and that was never the intent of the beer. It was designed to survive the long trip in barrels from the UK to India via ship, hence it would mellow over time. I have often wondered what a true IPA would taste like. 

Rastven:

 Blue Moon is good.

My issue with IPA's is they have become a macho hopfest and that was never the intent of the beer. It was designed to survive the long trip in barrels from the UK to India via ship, hence it would mellow over time. I have often wondered what a true IPA would taste like. 

Yer right.  All the IPA's I've had were quite hoppy.  That's ok by me.  I prefer the bitter hops flavor to the Euro Lager flavor.  Speaking of that, gawd, is Stella overrated.  It's become to the 2000s what Heineken was to the 90s.

Blue Moon

Newcastle

Modelo Negra

Sol

XX

p.s. Corona is a shitty beer.   

 Newcastle is becoming trendy for some reason too. It's an ok to average beer.

Newcastle is fucking GOOD!!!

I had something called Big Foot a couple weeks ago. It's a Sierra Nevada I think. I got blasted after drinking it but it didn't taste very good. I don't reco unless your mission is to get faded quickly.

Rastven:

 Newcastle is becoming trendy for some reason too. It's an ok to average beer.

The more I drink Newcastle (lately), the less I like it.  And I had it listed as one of my faves in a beer discussion from 3/4years back on HW.  It's an overrated beer.

Agree with Cucuy, Corona is terribly overrated.

I've been getting into coffe porters.  Mill Street makes a fantastic one. 

 I haven't been drinking much at all really. Dunno....just haven't had time to go out and get drunk anymore.