Last Saturday we organised a blind tasting with 16 supermarket pilsners in the Netherlands (trying to stick to only Dutch brands). Most of the people on the panel are homebrewers or beer enthusiasts – so there was some anxiety over this tasting haha.
The image shows the outcomes of the tasting. The names have been removed for privacy reasons, and in some cases to prevent embarrassment 😉
We scored on a simplified BJCP score card system with a scale between 0 and 10 on 3 factors – taking the average as the final score:
1. Aroma + Appearance (every aspect before tasting)
2. Flavour
3. General impression (mouthfeel + preference)
The main take-away? Supermarket lagers are not great in general – the average scores were not high. Also they are really hard to tell apart when tasting blind. “Premium” brands did not always do better with our tasters. Amstel and Bavaria were the clear blind tasted winners – but the budget option Schultenbräu (Aldi) and Kordaat (Lidl) were not far behind. Another surprise is that ultra budget beer Pitt did surprisingly okay with our panel.
Unfortunately there was an issue with the Gulpener. It tasted of liquorice and fennel – as if the hops they used were severely oxidised. I personally drink Gulpener Urpils so this was a disappointment to me. Also Grolsch and De Klok (same brewery) scoring so low is interesting since large parts of The Netherlands have a very positive bias towards Grolsch.
The blind tasting format was really fun and our group will repeat this for sure. With better beers though.. Very unscientific and biased – but hopefully fun for people to read through (and most likely disagree).
Nou ben ik geen bier connoisseur, maar Amstel en Bavaria bovenaan?…
Ik ben het zelden zó oneens geweest met iets
My personal preference is from the bottom of the list to above. What that say about me?
Westerlingen waarschijnlijk hebben geen smaak …
Mijn instinctieve reactie is om het enorm oneens te zijn. Maar ben eigenlijk vooral heel erg benieuwd hoe ik alles zelf zou beoordelen in een blinde proeverij. Binnenkort maar eens doen.
6 comments
Last Saturday we organised a blind tasting with 16 supermarket pilsners in the Netherlands (trying to stick to only Dutch brands). Most of the people on the panel are homebrewers or beer enthusiasts – so there was some anxiety over this tasting haha.
The image shows the outcomes of the tasting. The names have been removed for privacy reasons, and in some cases to prevent embarrassment 😉
The weighted average results:
1 Amstel Pilsener
2 Bavaria Pilsener
3 Schultenbräu Premium Pilsner
4 Kordaat Pilsener Premium
5 Heineken Pils
6 Brand Pilsener
7 Pitt Bier
8 Hertog Jan Bier
9 AH brouwers Premium Bier
10 Schutters Premium Pilsener
11 Export Bier
12 Dors Premium Pilsner
13 Alfa Edel Pils
14 De Klok Bier
15 Grolsch Premium Pils
16 Gulpener Pilsner (bio)
We scored on a simplified BJCP score card system with a scale between 0 and 10 on 3 factors – taking the average as the final score:
1. Aroma + Appearance (every aspect before tasting)
2. Flavour
3. General impression (mouthfeel + preference)
The main take-away? Supermarket lagers are not great in general – the average scores were not high. Also they are really hard to tell apart when tasting blind. “Premium” brands did not always do better with our tasters. Amstel and Bavaria were the clear blind tasted winners – but the budget option Schultenbräu (Aldi) and Kordaat (Lidl) were not far behind. Another surprise is that ultra budget beer Pitt did surprisingly okay with our panel.
Unfortunately there was an issue with the Gulpener. It tasted of liquorice and fennel – as if the hops they used were severely oxidised. I personally drink Gulpener Urpils so this was a disappointment to me. Also Grolsch and De Klok (same brewery) scoring so low is interesting since large parts of The Netherlands have a very positive bias towards Grolsch.
The blind tasting format was really fun and our group will repeat this for sure. With better beers though.. Very unscientific and biased – but hopefully fun for people to read through (and most likely disagree).
Nou ben ik geen bier connoisseur, maar Amstel en Bavaria bovenaan?…
Ik ben het zelden zó oneens geweest met iets
My personal preference is from the bottom of the list to above. What that say about me?
Westerlingen waarschijnlijk hebben geen smaak …
Mijn instinctieve reactie is om het enorm oneens te zijn. Maar ben eigenlijk vooral heel erg benieuwd hoe ik alles zelf zou beoordelen in een blinde proeverij. Binnenkort maar eens doen.