The last few tasting notes I've posted here have all been on various Japanese brews. Continuing along this theme, I think it's time to delve into one of the deepest mysteries of the Orient. A conundrum that has puzzled the greatest thinkers of our time, namely: "What the hell could Japanese brewers possibly have been thinking when they came up with dry beer?"

We may eventually figure out what women really want, and how to buy a really good 50 cent cigar, but dry beer? I think that's one that makes even quantum physics seem like a kindergarten exercise.

Back in the late 1980s there was a mercifully brief period of about, oh, 5 months when American brewers briefly picked up on the Japanese dry beer fad that hit the island nation by storm after Asahi launched their pioneering dry beer process back in 1987. Anheuser-Busch had at least two of the suckers (Bud Dry and Michelob Dry), and one of the better U.S. brewed dry beers was done by Heileman (Old Style Special Dry). Hang on! This history lesson has a lesson, namely, you don't see these brews around your friendly local beer retailer any more. That's because in the U.S. at least, dry beer was very much a fad and in retrospect, was as significant in the annals of marketing as leisure suits and mood rings.

In Japan though, the nation that first inflicted dry beer on a wet planet, dry beer turned out (unfortunately) to be more than a passing fad. In fact, Asahi, which developed the dry beer process managed to parlay their technological wonder beer into a bona fide tsunami of sales, catapulting them into the front ranks of Japanese beer sales and knocking formerly untouchable Sapporo Lager for a loop as drinkers turned to the much lower quality, but "fashionable" dry beer. Today, Asahi Super Dry is usually regarded as the number one popular brand in Japan.

So anyway, what is a dry beer? Good question!


If It's Dry Beer, Then Why Does It Still Taste Wet?
Most of the world's great brewing inventions happened in Germany, Belgium, or England. The U.S. can lay dubious claims to promoting the huge use of cheap adjuncts, developing "light" beer, while Japan's singular "contribution" (if you can call it that) to the annals of brewing technology seems to be the development of "dry beer".

The crux of dry beer isn't much different from the crux of light beers or that recent ugly American fad, low-carb beers. The idea is simple: you reduce the sugars in the beer by doing a more efficient mash --- one that more thoroughly converts starches to fermentable sugars. In practice, this is done by adding enzymes to the mash and then using a very long low-temperature alpha amylase rest during the mash. Dry beers also undergo an extended lagering period to smooth the body as far as possible, and then they are all filtered at extremely fine levels --- unacceptably fine levels for any other style --- not only to remove yeast and proteins, but also to deliberately remove flavor contributors and to lighten the color.

The result is an unnaturally light colored beer with no body, light flavor, and little or no aftertaste. In short, it's not meant to be low in alcohol (and might sometimes actually be stronger than some light beers) nor to be low in calories (though it often is lighter than normal beers).

Originally, the beers were marketed as "beers for people who don't like beer". I don't think that says a lot for their product quality, and it tends to show, especially nowadays that most people "who don't like beer" have figured out that a good fruit beer or a well-made craft bock or Belgian style dubbel is MUCH further from the "beer flavor" that they didn't care for than the wimpy, watery, weak-kneed dry beer style ever could be.

So anyway, time to buck up and grit my teeth for the sake of science and brewing knowledge, so let's pop the top real quick before I come to senses and grab an imperial stout instead...


An Ice Cold Glass of Asahi Super Dry...
Serve Asahi Super Dry in any kind of glass you'd use for any other industrial lager, but the key to enjoying this one will be to serve it absolutely as icy cold as you can get it since that helps numb your taste buds so that you will experience as little flavor as possible --- believe it or not, exactly the way the brewers recommend it be served! ("Serve ice cold" is usually a sign of a badly brewed beer.)

Aroma:
There's very little to find in the nose beyond the faint tingle of carbon dioxide. Coming back on a second and third pass, and exercising as much fantasy as my mind can conjure, my thoughts drift to the subliminal suggestion of a hint of grassiness and maybe, perhaps, sort of a hint of green apple. Maybe. Maybe not. This is one seriously wimpy smelling beer!

Appearance:
The beer pours with a nicely thick head of foam that drops pretty quickly. True to style, the beer is as colorless and anemic as the worst American light beers. It's grossly unappetizing, like going into a restaurant and getting a brown-n-serve roll that nobody could be bothered to brown.

Flavor:
Now pay attention, kids, because the flash of lightning is only visible for a moment --- blink and you'll miss it. Just like the flavor of Asahi Super Dry. There is a lightning quick glimpse of soft malt sweetness that fades to nothingness in a New York nanosecond. "Dry"? Hmmm. Maybe, but only as opposed to being sweet, because there's certainly no real malt character on this beer --- no hops either. The overall impression is of softened water. The flavor is dull, short-lived, and as utterly uninteresting as the worst light beer you could imagine.

Overall Impression:
This is an expensive beer to buy in the U.S. Given its overall lack of flavor and poor quality relative to all of the excellent craft beers and European imports, I would never in my right mind recommend this stuff to even my worst enemy. It's bland, deliberately badly brewed, crummy tasting beer for people who don't know beer, don't care about beer, and who prefer bland, uninteresting, mass-market food products over anything that could possibly be termed "potable".

Asahi Super Dry is a plague on the beer drinking world that should be avoided at all cost ---- the only thing worse to be exported from the Far East is the SARS virus --- but a vial of SARS virus has more flavor and probably won't give you the runs as badly.



Recommended: No