The new "old" Schlitz
Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2011 9:03 pm
Once upon a time Schlitz beer, "the beer that made Milwaukee famous" was a premium beer. It fought it out with Budweiser for champion in the American beer premium market and did a pretty good head to head job going back to sometime before I was born. Then in the mid 60's sometime it changed its formula. Turned into about as good an idea as the "new coke" was later. The new version had a distinctive after taste that wasn't....well premium. The brand fell into near nonexistence afterward after a steep downward march over a couple or three years. Then in the last decade or so it was seen on grocery shelves again as the basic cheap beer of no distinction or particular favor or memorable character.
In recent years some of the old brands have made a rebirth. Pabst is considered a popular beer among the young and in the know crowd in the last couple of years. But Pabst was always a working class beer to begin with....not premium. Miller, a shadow of its former self, that had been premium still makes Miller Lite which has a good market at the "premium" level, and even Miller High Life is doing some heavy hitting at the bottom of the beer market with a lot of advertisement, trinkets you can get for points on the cartons, and promotions to raise money for returning vets of the latest perpetual conflicts.
I noticed in the grocery today this back to the 60's Schlitz beer. The "Classic '60's Formula". It was priced like American premium...about like the Miller Lite and the Bud. I had to give it a taste.
I started the 60's in my young teen years and went through High School and College and into the military. I had some beer education along the way. I remember Schlitz changed its formula sometime in my passage and I remember the skunk after taste. It wasn't a favorite. But since half a century has gone by..... I had to try it.
Well....it is mostly flavorless...which most American premium beers are now days.....but it would go good with boiled shrimp or spicy boiled craw fish. It does seem better than the cheap version that preceded it for a dozen years or so. It didn't reproduce the skunk taste. Maybe it went back to the before the skunk formula. Not bad....but not anything I'm excited about either.
In recent years some of the old brands have made a rebirth. Pabst is considered a popular beer among the young and in the know crowd in the last couple of years. But Pabst was always a working class beer to begin with....not premium. Miller, a shadow of its former self, that had been premium still makes Miller Lite which has a good market at the "premium" level, and even Miller High Life is doing some heavy hitting at the bottom of the beer market with a lot of advertisement, trinkets you can get for points on the cartons, and promotions to raise money for returning vets of the latest perpetual conflicts.
I noticed in the grocery today this back to the 60's Schlitz beer. The "Classic '60's Formula". It was priced like American premium...about like the Miller Lite and the Bud. I had to give it a taste.
I started the 60's in my young teen years and went through High School and College and into the military. I had some beer education along the way. I remember Schlitz changed its formula sometime in my passage and I remember the skunk after taste. It wasn't a favorite. But since half a century has gone by..... I had to try it.
Well....it is mostly flavorless...which most American premium beers are now days.....but it would go good with boiled shrimp or spicy boiled craw fish. It does seem better than the cheap version that preceded it for a dozen years or so. It didn't reproduce the skunk taste. Maybe it went back to the before the skunk formula. Not bad....but not anything I'm excited about either.
