103. Red Stripe Jamaican Lager

Hooray beer!  I remember when I was younger, watching the Red Stripe commercials when I used to watch PTI religiously on ESPN.  Those were the good ol' days, when I was in college and I actually had time to be home at 5:30.  Class would be over by 3:30, I'd even have time to screw around and play videogames.  Nowadays, I'm lucky to be home by 5:30.  Red Stripe isn't exactly one of those beers that fits in my quest, but there come times where my selection is limited and I get one of the more prevalent brews that are out there.  In today's story, I was still at the beach for the weekend, but spent the night with some friends at the Emerald Club.  Sounds risque, but it's not.  Just your standard bar with a band playing..Heritage, which was actually pretty good.  Anyway, less about the night, more about the beer!

I got this baby in the stumpy brown bottle, no glass to pour it in.  Based on it's reputation, I figure this is the official beer of Jamaica, but I certainly could be wrong.  Couldn't get a whiff of the aroma..wasn't exactly in a place where I had the freedom or the capability to do so.  Color, lacing, anything of the sort?  Nope.  Nada.  I'm rating this baby purely on taste.

And how did it taste exactly?  Not bad at all.  You mean, you could taste something?  I could!  The lager taste is what you'd expect.  Mild taste of grains, but little to no hops or malt flavor to pull it in any one direction over the other..very neutral.  The key difference is the metallic taste that I get when drinking this.  I don't know what it is about that metallic taste, but it gets me in a good way.  It made the beer feel a little cleaner, gave it a little more character.  Light to moderate carbonation, light bodied.  A sessionable beer, definitely.  This actually isn't the first time I've had Red Stripe, but the first one came when this blog never existed, so I was glad to now add it to the list.  With little choice, I was glad to fork over the extra dough to get a Red Stripe over the likes of a Miller Lite.  Hooray beer!

Grade: C+

Price Paid: $4.00 (12 oz bottle)