While wandering through my local bottleshop the other day trying to find something to refresh my dry and dulled tastebuds, I saw Millers Genuine Draught out of the corner of my eye and thought to myself “gee…haven’t tried that in a long time”. I don’t have a great memory, probably too many beers over the years, but when I got home and cracked open the first of the carton, the reasons why I haven’t had Millers for a while came flooding back to me.
The Miller Brewing Company has won a lot of awards over their last 150 years of brewing, and in fact has won the Champion Brewery award at the prestigious World Beer Cup. Miller Genuine Draft has even taken out a few awards in its own right too, such as silver in 1998 at the World Beer Cup and gold medals at the Great American Beer Festival. It is worth noting though that it was always entered into the American Style Lager section, and not competing against fuller flavoured European Style lagers.
Miller Genuine Draft was introduced to the American market in 1986 as a draft beer that would stand alongside the Miller “High Life”. Their web site explains how they use the finest of ingredients; in some cases hops from New Zealand are added to brews. They discuss the use of premium barley, and how Miller Genuine Draft was the first of the cold filtered beers, meaning that the beer is not heat pasteurised. The idea being that their exclusive four time cold filtering process won’t heat some of, what they refer to as, “taste” away. But this is just beer, not brain surgery.
So what does it taste like, well I think that someone may have lied to them.
I found the 4.7% beer to be watery, not carrying any of the hops or malt flavours, and also left a strange aftertaste, that, to use one of my mate’s wine terms, was a bit medicinal or “Band-Aid”. And quiet oddly I found that the “Band Aid” expression was the best way to explain the aroma too. It’s not a smell that made me think it was off, or past its best, but just bad. As though it was an inferior product.
The best way I could think to describe Miller Genuine Draft, would be to compare it to going on a date with Paris Hilton. Oh sure the packaging looks great, and I’ve seen enough TV to know that people like it, but a after a little while you’re left wanting something with a little more substance.