Why I Started Enjoying Mass-Produced Beer Again

My story began with real ale and heading to the pubs around Manchester with my uni housemate, Dave. We’d sometimes spice things up with competitions on FIFA: loser buys a round of the most random beer we could find from around the World.

Not long after uni, craft beer started to becoming ‘cool’. Hoppy American-style IPAs from the West Coast. It all felt fresh and exciting. Beavertown with its funky cans that looked otherworldly. At Sheffield Tap, a pint of Thornbridge Jaipur became just as much a part of the train journey as the inevitable delay. Time for another one, though?

A classic pint of cask. Moonshine by Abbeydale Brewery, Sheffield.

This shifting beer landscape presented a perfect storm for someone who had recently entered the job market, had a bit of money in their pocket and was out every weekend socialising.

Untappd, an app for logging which beers you’d tried, became as much a part of my digital life as Snapchat and Instagram.

It felt like a game. The impossible task of trying every beer in an increasingly endless sea of IPAs, newly emerging DIPAs and Marmite-esque sours.

But an exciting dip began to feel like drowning. There was always another beer to try and I was increasingly paying more for beers I didn’t particularly enjoy. Choosing something unfamiliar increasingly felt like an expensive gamble.

Somehow, sitting on long, uncomfortable wooden benches in industrial estates and railway arches had become the normal way to consume a drink you’d paid £7.20 for.

I still had time for the breweries focused on the things that had drawn me in: quality, innovation and independence. But my enthusiasm for working my way through every new offering was fading.

In the post-pandemic world, my own tastes shifted. I still enjoy a cask ale when I’m in the UK, but I rarely purchase the types of IPAs I was obsessed with only a few years ago. Too many expensive pints had left me wishing I’d ordered something else.

Out on its own. Tyskie in the Beskidy Mountains, Poland.

Living in Poland, I now favour mass-produced Tyskie or Żywiec, and I’m fine with that. I know what I’m getting. The price is low. It’s a safe option, but it’s a good option. An enjoyable option.

Maybe it’s an age thing. Now in my mid-thirties, my drinking habits have changed and I no longer need the constant hit of trying something new every time I approach a bar. There was a time when choosing the familiar beer felt like admitting defeat.

Now I order a Tyskie, drink it without feeling the necessity to photograph the label or log it on an app. I enjoy it for what it is.

Beer is no longer a game I need to win.

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