Beer Styles

Quilmes Cristal is the city's flagship beer, a golden lager with white foam, easy-drinking and barely bitter. According to the BJCP style guidelines, this falls under International Pale Lager, the same category that many Mexican beers represent.

This lager is a beer for hot days and long evenings. It's lean, clear, and has little hop aroma, but a clean malt core. Anyone familiar with a German Pils will notice: it's less bitter and less spicy than a Pils from Germany.

Alongside it, a quite different type appears in Palermo. The American Pale Ale comes from the US, ranges from copper-gold to amber, and smells of citrus fruit and pine. It's top-fermented, noticeably more bitter than a lager, and somewhat fuller in body.

The difference between the two can be put simply: the lager is a thirst-quencher, the pale ale an aroma beer. With the lager, freshness takes center stage; with the pale ale, it's the hops. Antares and Cerveza Berlina show just how diverse the city's craft brewers have become.

The glass also shapes the impression. The lager comes in a slender glass that holds the cold and supports the foam. The pale ale gets a wider glass, in which the aromas gather and the nose can dive deep. This way the stylistic difference is visible even before the first sip.

Both styles have their place in the city. The lager belongs with asado, football, and heat; the pale ale with long evenings in Palermo, when you want to drink a beer slowly and talk it over. Neither style crowds out the other — they complement each other instead.