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We've been drinkers of good beer for quite a few years now, but it was not until 2005 that we started to fully realize our geekiness. That was the year a friend introduced us to Ratebeer.com, and we started exploring what is available and keeping track of what we drink and evaluating it. That website is essentially the reason we now write about beer and are such an advocate of turning other people on to drinking craft beer.
Along with Ratebeer.com (RB), Beeradvocate.com (BA) is a similar website and community of craft beer enthusiasts. We use both websites to find information, but we spend much more time on RB and that is where we keep our ratings. For many drinkers, the idea of rating beer may be overkill. But even if you choose not to rate, these websites are very useful.
The sites are a great place to find out just about anything you want to know about beer available in your area (and anywhere else). You can search the database of beers and look at what other people thought of them. You can look through the database of beer places (bars, breweries, bottle shops) located in the US, as well as many parts of Europe and the rest of the world. You can search their events calendar to see what is coming up in your area. You can search to see what the Top 50 rated beers are on the website and see which of these you can get yourself.
The great thing about these websites is that all ratings are from consumers. While some may be from brewers or professionals in the beer industry, the large majority are from regular beer drinkers. Once you are comfortable with the website, you can start entering beer ratings yourself. Here is a link to a great article that will get you started rating your first beer. Rating is a great way to keep track of what you have drunk in the past, and really helps you to develop what you like, and what you don't like, about certain beers. Before you know it, you'll be typing/writing out ratings at your local bar...We hope you have a tolerant girlfriend (This Seattlest certainly does!).
More info on rating beers and being a dork after the break.
Photo thanks to pdgibson in the Seattlest Flickr Pool.
Another great aspect of the websites are the Forums. People talk about anything and everything beer related on there. From homebrewing to industry talk to discussion about newly released beers, you can find people posting at all hours.
One of our favorite features of Ratebeer.com is the Trading Forum. Through this forum you can arrange trades with people all over the country/world to get your hands on goodies that you can't buy here in Seattle (or wherever you are). We have such a great selection of beer in the NW, that it is no problem finding people to trade with. If this is something you are interested in, please check out this intro to trading beer. We've done about ten trades in 2 years, and we have never had a problem getting what we received, and we've always kept more than our end of the bargain. In fact, beer traders are ridiculously generous. If you agree on a $20 value trade, chances are you'll find a few extra bottles thrown in your box. One piece of advice: Don't tell UPS/Fed Ex that you are sending beer in your box....We usually say "Collectible Glass."
95% of the people we have encountered on RB are wonderful. Then there are the 5% that think they know more than everyone else, especially anyone new. Ignore those people and feel free to ask question on the Forums, or email us with any questions.
Basic membership is free and gives you access to pretty much everything you need. After about 6 months of use, we decided it was worth the $13 annual fee to buy a premium membership, which gives you added features. More than anything though, we felt it necessary to support the site since we had gotten so much useful info from it.
We hope that a few of you can enjoy RB as much as we have. This Seattlest still remembers when he first moved to Seattle and because of RB found out about a special beer made by LaConner Brewery for Bottleworks. That IPA with the hop cone actually in the bottle was one of our best beer experiences ever. Thanks, Ratebeer.
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Sweet! I've gotta check those out--my beer snobbery is extremely limited currently, and I need to work on my knowledge for the benefit of others.
Just be careful, Jeremy...it's addicting!
For purely self-interested reasons, I'd like to respond to this post with a plug for cask-conditioned beer. Everyone into beer should try a cask ale—they taste smoother and have a much nicer texture than keg beers—and Seattle has a few places where you can get them. There's a handy list here:
http://www.cask-ale.co.uk/us/wa-cask-guide.html
and my self-interest is that we don't have enough cask outlets, but hopefully if more people start asking for cask ale it will spread.
Stumbling Monk carries cask selections. Also, Pike Brewery has one. Dee-lish.
I love cask beer:
http://seattlest.com/2007/10/31/cask_beer_not_f.php
I was at Pike Brewery last night and they had the a firkin of IPA that was mighty tasty.
jessejb is also correct about the stumbling monk. They do a cask on Thursday nights.
Ooh, thank you for those. I have emailed the maintainer of that cask ale list - he loves getting the chance to add to it.