Rolling Rock Extra Pale

Brewed by Anheuser-Busch InBev
Style: Pale Lager
St. Louis, Missouri USA

Serve in Dimpled mug, Lager glass, Shaker

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Was not a fan of this, very light with a bitter astringent finish...almost no character.

Bottle. Pours a very clear, light straw with white head. Settles quickly with thin lacing. Aroma is bready, pale malt, dough, mild cereal. Flavor is sweet and bready, mild with a sweet, doughy chemical aftertaste. Soft to moderate carbonation, light body, and watery texture. Afforded by all, enjoyed by none.

Sweeter malts than most adjunct layers, which is fine by me. Extreme light yellow with no head. Goes down easy.

I’ve been rating beer for 12 years or so now. I’ve rated a lot of bad beer, just for the sake of putting another notch in my belt, but for some reason, I’ve put Rolling Rock on the back burner. It’s lurking in every grocery store and minit mart, so if I ever needed to add one more rating to push me over some magic number, it would just be a booty call to reach out to RR. Tall boy aluminum can, the color of the 6 ball, suitable for pumping full of BBs or .22 slugs out on the power lines. I’m always leery when there’s a horse on the label. Tall, dense white head when poured into the Snifter of Unworthiness. Clear, very (extra) pale, indeed. Distinct creamed corn aroma with a powdery carbonation. Sweet, straw/corn flavor, virtually no bittering. Thin body, light residual carbo, aftertaste reminds me of Chex cereal. Absolutely pointless. New Leaf Market, if the hipsters haven’t bought it out while stocking up on kimchi.

12 oz can. Very pale, yellow and clear with a white head and no lacing. The aroma is corn, light sweet malts and grassy. Similar flavor, pretty bland and lightly sweet. Light body with a clean crisp feel. Easy to drink and slightly better than other domestic pale lagers.

Bottle. Faint candy aroma. Lower than average carbonation. Disappointing lack of flavors of any kind, even with lowered expectations. Faint hop taste. Clean finish. Very unsatisfying. Regrets from the first sip, with eye on other bottles in the cooler. Will not drink again.

My least favorite ale that most consider a "starter." Extremely watered down (this makes Miller Light taste like an actual beer). Color is a sickly pale with little to no aroma. Feel free to drink plenty of it, because it’s essentially just a few grains dissolved in water.

Fairly blahh beer. Sight: Very pale yellow, white foamy head Smell: light doughy notes. Taste: slightly sweet taste but not much flavor throughout. Aftertaste: Short without much flavor. Not much else to say about this one except maybe it’s boring.

Though it has a low alcohol content, Rolling Rock is a common beer and has a smooth, clean taste.

Might be the last American beer with a painted label on it’s bottles (I use the term American loosely here, I’m aware that they are owned by an international conglomerate these days). The horse head, the white fence, the quality pledge, and the mysterious number "33" on every bottle are all iconic for a certain group of drinkers. The use of both rice and corn rather one or the other lends it a certain distinction from major adjunct lagers, which generally use one or the other (Maybe a good compromise in a group that can’t decide between Bud and Miller or something). It also used to have a very distinctive aftertaste to it, a bit of sweet bitterness (Do those two adjectives cancel each other out? :) ), which I think it’s gradually lost to a some degree, unfortunately, since it went from being an independent company with it’s own brewery in Pennsylvania to being just another beer off the line at an AB-Inbev plant in New Jersey. And, yet, it’s still Rolling Rock. "Not Bud, Rock", as I remember reading that the t-shirts servers at one famous bar that had Rolling Rock on tap and wouldn’t serve Budweiser in any format used to wear back when they were made by separate companies. It’s clean, refreshing, basically a good adjunct lager, but you can’t call it craft or elevate it too much. A lot of it’s appeal is admittedly packaging and branding, but when trying to save a little money, there’s something about holding a bottle on an old friend in your hands. Sort of like Pennsylvania’s version of Natty Boh. A lot of people remember their fathers drinking this beer when they were younger, or they themselves remember it being the beer of choice at their college dorm or in their early working years, and there’s a lot of nostalgia attached to it. You can’t fake history and tradition, though some brands try. This brand has it.