PBR GOES UPSCALE?

 Is PBR the new Champagne of beers? The popular beer, best known as an unpretentious, no-frills brand in the US is commanding a whopping $44 a bottle in China! Known as Blue Ribbon 1844 (the year Pabst Brewing Company was founded), it’s actually a significantly different brew than what we get here. Alan Kornhauser, who worked at Anchor Brewing Co., Portland Brewing Co., August Schell, and elsewhere, now works for Pabst in China six months of each year. According to him, Pabst China has started expanding its horizons beyond Blue Ribbon. “We just produced China’s first real specialty beer, an all-malt, reddish brown strong (15.7 plato) ale, dry hopped with Cascade (38 IBU) and aged in new uncharred American whiskey barrels,” he said to modern brewery age. “It’s being bottled in a nice looking 72Oml brown bottle with an enamel label.” Somehow it doesn’t seem likely that we’ll see a $44 bottle of Blue Ribbon 1844 here in the States!