Beer Snobbery

Today is the annual summer cookout for my office staff. The affair starts at 1 this afternoon and I may show up early to lend a hand with the various preparations. We're expecting 20 to 30 people and decided to make it as easy on everyone as possible. They don't need to bring anything; everything will be provided and all they need to do is show up. My employee who is hosting the event is providing all of the food and I'm providing all the drinks, alcoholic or otherwise.

I made the beer run after work yesterday and picked up an assortment that should suit any preference, though it turned out that I needed a little help with this. My preferences run towards the "high end," I suppose it could be called: imported Belgian ales and German beer, and assorted offerings from select domestic microbreweries. So I was envisioning an offering of assorted stouts, porters, IPAs, lagers, and so forth.

The one thing I didn't factor into all of this was that people tend to like just plain old beer.

So while loading the cart at the store yesterday, one of my employees admonished me for being a "beer snob" and recommended that I downgrade the list to things like Miller, Coors, and Michelob.

I was stunned. People actually drink that stuff???

Despite the fact that he also prefers higher quality beer, he had nonetheless taken an informal poll among prospective attendees, the result of which was the strong preference for the more pedestrian domestic beers. His logic made sense so I adjusted the acquisitions to suit the lowest common denominator, but included a limited number of things to suit the few with more refined tastes.

So it may be that I'm a beer snob. Never really thought of it this way, but I suppose it may be a valid point. But I make no apologies for this. One of my favourite hangouts here in Norfolk is a place called the Taphouse and their slogan "Life is too short to drink cheap beer" sums up nicely my perspective on such an inconsequential thing as beer.