good american beer off the top of my head:
Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, Torpedo, and Bigfoot Barley Wine
Great Lakes Nosferatu, Burning River, Commodore Perry, and Blackout Stout
Anything made by Dog Fish Head specifically their 90 min IPA
Hoppin Frog Double IPA
Victory Hop Devil
Goose Island IPA
This is really just the tip of the iceberg, America has the most micro breweries in the world and there is no denying that there is damn good beer here in the states. I've had a ton of imports in my day (used to be all that I drank) and they are good but real american micro brew wins by a landslide. When people hear "american beer" they think of bud, miller, and coors. but those companies aren't even american owned anymore. Good riddance, their beer really is piss water for people who don't like the taste of beer. Real american beer is damn good and its fun as hell discovering all the hidden gems out there.
The only thing more fun is making your own beer. I got into it as a way to get beer when I was to young to buy it.
Now I have a blast creating my own unique beer tailored to my own tastes. It doesn't get any better or fresh than that. Plus it's cheaper
btw, on the high powered beers, I wouldn't buy anything over 12-14% unless it says Ice Brewed or Ice Distilled on it. When fermenting beer, the yeast eats the sugars from your mash and poops out alcohol. Each yeast stain can only withstand a certain concentration of it's own alcohol-poop before it dies. Most for beer are around 10-12%. There are some that go as high as 20% but those tend to have a bad aftertaste. You know that dirt cheap 20% vodka they sell at the supermarket that tastes like ass? They use a similar strain of yeast, it produces high alcohol but at the cost of the taste. This is why you can buy up to 20% at any store in Ohio, to get higher you have to distill which is Government Controlled. However, the government doesn't consider Freeze Distilling illegal (yet), so a good brewery will freeze distill beer (ice brewing) to raise up the alcohol content. Yes this is exactly what Bud Ice is, just a ice distilled Budwiser (aka butt wiper) but the problem they have is that they started with shit and end up with shit. If you make a really good stout and you age it in a bourbon barrel and then freeze distill it up to like 20-30%, thats some damn good shit. I tasted one at a beer festival once, I killed to many brain cells to remember the name of it now. Beers like that are hard to find and expensive to make and buy (you have to get the beer really cold to get those kind of alcohol levels and you loose a lot of volume). Check out Sam Adams Utopias to see what I mean. Granted thats on the high end but if I had the money I'd buy one
Barley wines are strong too (9-14%) and very good. Seek ye out the Bigfoot
