Anchor Steam Beer By Anchor Brewing Company | American Craft Beer Review

Great review! This is an excellent beer, a long time go-to beer for many Americans. Recently, however, Anchor Brewing announced that they were pulling back distribution to California only. Oh well, another good reason to go to California! Cheers!

As a San Francisco native I grew up with Anchor Steam Beer, Liberty Ale and sometimes their Porter. My friends wife worked at the brewery and they allowed the workers to take home what they called shorts, which were bottles of beer that were not quite full. He always had 2 or 3 cases of beer on hand (24 to 36 bottles) so we drank the free beer and enjoyed the fact that we were not drinking Bud or Miller. Anchor now makes some hoppy IPA's and I like their pilsner especially on a hot day. If you visit the brewery and go on the tour you can sample everything and I think you can also try the whiskey and gin (Old Potrero and Junipero).

Loved the Beer and the rewiew too!
Every beer (should)have a season,occasion to enjoy!This one not exception.
Refreshing, characteristic, more than I would expect from 4.6%
Keep up the good work Buddy 🍻🤘

For some reason I really hated this beer. Poured almost all of it down the drain. Just tasted soapy and stale to me.

I'm really surprised with peoples reviews of this Anchor Steam beer. I bought 6 bottles today and it is absolute trash.... I've been brewing beer for over a decade (full-grain, kegged). Anchor Steam reminds me of one of those crappy Coopers kits with some additional hop notes. I didn't get a spoiled batch, there are no ester flavors or anything, but it just sucks. It tastes exactly like my first attempts at brewing with the coopers extract kits. The best word to describe it is SOUR. Absolutely terrible beer. Gave me a headache too, I haven't had a headache in like 5 years. Trash beer.

Paul urquell beer a

Anchor beer need Less bitter

Anchor beer was -7

Anchor steam beer uses 2 hops in it and both are american in origin. They do use a lager yeast although from my understanding its a hybrid yeast meaning that its a true lager yeast just has half cerevisiae heritage.

They also use only 2 grains some 2 row and some crystal malt.

Not feeling the love for this one , a Sierra Nevada hits the spot for me

Anchor Brewery has been brewing that style since 1896 by owner /brewer Gottlieb Brekle , in San Fransisco Calif. They use Northern Blend hops- which is a blend of 4 American hops. Cheers my friend from America !

Anchor steam beer uses Nugget hops for bittering, and Northern Brewer towards the end of the boil.

Do a little homework, the hops are Northern Brewer American grown

Very smooth and very forgettable.

I've just had my first taste of this. review was spot on, loved it.

You nailed this, best review I have seen on this classic brew, enjoying this for the last 30 plus years, Cheers!!!

Yeah, this is a lager.

Just had it again, completely boring not really not enjoyable. A bit of peppery bitterness that is it. To call it more British ale, is crap it isn't malty where is not subtle dark fruit & it isn't earthy its boring American lager.

I'm sure it's lager yeast, which I believe is fermented at high temperatures. It's a peculiar brew, to me tastes like somewhere between a Vienna and a Bitter. It's not similar to an American Lager, but on the other hand it's not even a Bitter. That's why I believe it is an amazingly solid brew.

This is one of the first craft beers I ever tried and at the time I didn't know how iconic it was. Anchor really helped to open the door for craft beer as an art form in America.

I'm a big fan of this brewery and I'm slowly working my way through their range. Their Porter is great!

I'm not sure if it's a lager. Maybe lager yeasts, but it's definitely top fermented. In fact it's something between lager and ale. I had his beer long time ago, but i agree, that it's more similar to english bitter than to american ale, or lager.

I 100% agree with this review.

Posted my review of this just a few weeks back. They credit this beer as the foundation on which the American craft beer movement was built upon. I agree, it certainly got a British taste to it. Looking forwards to visiting the brewery next April.

It is not a bitter, it is a lager, though I believe it's fermented at high temperature. However, great solid classic brew, though most people drinking it now maybe expect something more "american style", with big hoppy notes, whereas this is more of a caramelly/malty beer, but to me it's just solid. Great stuff.

I think a lot of people are a bit disappointed with this when they first try it because you are expecting something more 'American' but, like you said its more of a British bitter. I also need to give it another go as I tried it in the middle of some hoppy beers and didn't really get to appreciate it properly.

I expected much more, I'm going to give it a go this week again & post my review sometime near the end of this month. Cheers!

Really glad you liked this, I love Anchor, all their beers are very good, and their steam beer is always a good go-to beer if you just want to sit and have a three or so beers that night. Cheers!

I had this a while ago, I thought it was very bland and boring. I bought it again to review so I can give it another go! Cheers Simon!