Craft Beer Recommendations for Every Kind of Football Fan
Come fall, few things quicken our pulse quite like football. Our lives revolve around Saturday and Sunday afternoons when our favorite teams engage in gridiron combat, leading us to Mount Everest highs and Dead Sea lows. No matter if our teams win or lose, the sole constant is beer. We use it to toast victory and soothe defeat, equal parts celebratory pick-me-up and palliative medication. From tailgaters to fantasy-league moguls and folks just there for the food, we’ve created a beer-drinking guide for fans of every stripe.
1/8The Tailgater
Forget toast and coffee. This early-riser has his appetites trained on barbecuing and beer. Lightly charred burgers and steaks are a pinpoint match for roasty, chocolaty, and surprisingly light-bodied schwarzbiers such as Full Sail Session Black or Köstritzer Schwarzbier. Their crispness slices right through the fat. If your tastes lean toward bratwurst and sausages, look toward an aromatic German hefeweizen such as Paulaner Hefe-Weizen or Hacker-Pschorr Weisse.
2/8The Serious Fan
From pregame shows to the late-night highlight loop, you’re glued to the tube and a beer. You require a brew you can sip all day without dissolving into a slurring disaster. In lieu of a mass-produced light beer, look to a low-alcohol, full-flavored session beer (as in, you have several in a drinking session). We like 21st Amendment Bitter American, Founders All Day IPA, and Evil Twin Bikini Beer, which registers a rather dainty 2.7 percent ABV.
3/8“I’m Just Here for the Food”
For this fan, football is a mere sideline to the main event: food. From nachos to mozzarella sticks, fried pickles, pulled-pork sandwiches, potato chips and other delicious, yet nutritionally dubious delights, this culinary buff needs a beer that can bushwhack its way through grease and cleanse your palate. The carbonation and bitterness of a nicely hopped pilsner such as Victory Prima Pils, Pilsner Urquell, Trumer Pils, Sixpoint the Crisp, or Firestone Walker Pivo Hoppy Pils.
4/8The Suffering Fan
Yet another 2–14 season? You need a beer on the double—and by that I mean a double IPA. To blunt the bitterness of another botched game and wasted afternoon, seek out Lagunitas Hop Stoopid, Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA, Great Divide Hercules Double IPA, Smuttynose Big A IPA, and, above all, Stone Ruination.
5/8The Bandwagon Rider
When things are going gangbusters for a team, you’re their No. 1 fan. When losses stack up, you pull a Houdini and disappear. For the ultimate fair-weather fan, seeks out Sam Adams and Sierra Nevada. Like the Pittsburgh Steelers, Green Bay Packers, and Dallas Cowboys, the brewers are storied franchises that fickle drinkers love and leave. Whoa, this beer is excellent! Forget them—they’re too popular! They’re not as good as they used to be. For once, stay the course with a classic Sierra Nevada Pale Ale or brand-new Flipside Red IPA, as well as Sam Adams Boston Lager. They’ll stick with you through thick and thin.
6/8The Underdog
Your teams are always seven-point underdogs, rarely given a snowball’s chance in hell of winning. But you know what? You believe. This week will be different. This week, your team will come out on top. To drink, you need a beer from a scrappy, up-and-coming brewer. Look to beers from one of America’s fastest-growing breweries, such as Houston’s Karbach; Austin Beerworks; L.A.’s Golden Road; DC Brau Brewing; and Nashville’s Blackstone. Barring that, support your favorite local nanobrewery.
7/8The Fantasy-League Mogul
For you, the outcome of individual games matters less than your made-up team’s stats. You care about the individual trees, not the forest. That’s why you need a single-hop IPA, which focuses on the aroma, bitterness, and flavor of one choice hop. Look to the single-hop series of IPAs from Danish gypsy brewer Mikkeller, Maryland’s Flying Dog, and Oregon’s Hopworks and Ninkasi.
8/8“Uh, What Are They Doing With That Ball?”
Your significant other or perhaps a pack of friends has dragged you to the bar or a pal’s place. You care about camaraderie, not that stupid pigskin chased by big men in small tights. Instead of dwelling inside a dark cloud and playing on your iPhone, experiment with some of the most exciting new styles of beer. May we suggest a white stout, a salty-sour gose, or a smoky, wheat-driven grodziskie/grätzer?
