Don't be Cruel to a Beer That's True

Go ahead. Pull the trigger.

Pittsburghers make me nuts. I went to grad school at Carnegie-Mellon in the early 80s and quickly learned to love Da Burgh. Even though it was falling apart at the time, steel mills crumbling and empty, streets barren and ugly, I loved this town. It had pride, and tradition, and it had its own brewery that it loved and supported as only Pennsylvania (okay, and Wisconsin and Minnesota) towns do. The city had real neighborhoods, with landmark bars in each one -- the Pleasure Bar, Chiodo's, Max's Allegheny, the Bloomfield Bridge Tavern -- and I tried to get to all of them.

And when I did, even in those days when I was newly awakened to the possibilities of great beer, I drank Iron City. Arn, the locals called it, "Glass of Arn!" they'd call from the bar. Why'd they drink it? What the hell kind of question is that? It was what they drank, what their dads and moms drank, it was the hometown beer, so you drank it. So I drank it.

What was it like? It was (and is) like any other mainstream American lager. It's pale yellow, like straw, or a girl's summer-light hair. It has a frothy white head, like waterfall foam in a mountain stream. It smells a little sweet, and the constant fizZzPppopsssZZzz of bubbles in the head will get your nose wet if you actually get down in there to smell it, and maybe sting a little. It tastes a little sweet, and pretty fizzy, and a bit bitter, though it's hard to tell if the bitterness is hops or carbonation (okay, it's probably carbonation). It's light in body, washes down a burger or a plate of spaghetti and meatballs real well, and goes away quickly, leaving only a trace of residual bitterness.

Now you all know why I don't write reviews of American mainstream beers; I just wrote it, and there's no point (to me, anyway), in writing another. With minuscule variations, Iron City tastes like every other mainstream beer. It's no better or worse than Bud, MGD, Coors, Yuengling Premium, Buck, Dixie, Busch, Pabst, Stroh, Keystone, Lone Star, Stegmaier, Straub, Stoney's, Point... And that is the point. Iron City's no better than these other beers, but it's damn sure no worse.

So why not drink it in Pittsburgh? Because you saw a really cool ad with bullfrogs and ferrets? Because Coors Light ads have babes in them? Because the nationals are avalanching Pittsburgh with beer ads and low-balling beer in the market because they want to kill one more regional brewery and hang its flickering neon on the trophy wall in their mahogany-panelled boardroom? Because you'd rather your money went to Colorado, or Wisconsin, or Missouri than into the pockets of people in your own hometown, people who might live down the street, people who run de-palletizers, or brewkettles, or forklifts, people who pay local taxes on those wages?

Pittsburghers make me nuts. Here they have a genuine treasure, one of the biggest remaining independent regional breweries in the country, and they are so insecure that they actually listen to the judgments of people who believe that advertising makes a drop of difference in how a beer tastes. "Iron City tastes awful, tastes salty/oily/rusty." Those are all actual comments I've heard. Rusty? Are you kidding me?

Look, if you're in Pittsburgh, and you like mainstream beer, hell, even if you don't, do me a favor. Go to a bar that has Iron City on tap (if you can find one: Yuengling is taking over here, too). Order up a glass, and get some food, too: get some fries, no city in America has better overall quality of french fries than Pittsburgh. (If you're up to it, go to Primanti Brothers and get a man's sandwich, eh?) Sip. Tastes okay, don't it? Not the best thing you've ever had, but what were you looking for? It's cold, it's good, it's yours.

I don't think advertising is a good reason to buy a beer, ever. But buying local, choosing a local, small product over a large national one when the taste is the same to within two decimal places? Yeah, I'll back that every time. Because if you don't buy your local beer, why should anyone else? And if no one does, you don't have a local beer. That's a loss, people. Local breweries, local bakeries, local butchers, they all make up the fabric that makes your area more than just a census map.

But hey. If all that means nothing to you, if you don't give a damn about where you live, about feeling good about the special things in your backyard that no one else has, by all means...

Go ahead. Pull the trigger.



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