Carlton And United Breweries Victoria Bitter

Definately a contender for 'World's Worst Beer', it barely tastes like beer. Considering the quality of product from many smaller brewers who genuinely make great beer this is an abomination.

As a teenage I drank VB more than any other beer, but since then changed to other beers.  When I tried VB recently the taste had definitely changed.  Sure, maybe my palette did too, but not that much!

The appearance is still good, with a nice yellow/brown colour and good head with regular bubbles.  The aroma seems somewhat burnt and metallic with no detectable "natural" ingredient smells.  But the taste.  Alas, the taste is very watery and screams of mass production.  I don't want to sound like a snob, but this is no longer a high quality beer.  No complexity or subtlety, no detectable traditional ingredients tasted.  In short, spend another $10 or so on a better offering.

Ok, I REALLY wanted to like this beer, being it's I believe the biggest selling beer in Australia. I had a midi at Yamba and it smelled like burnt vegetables. It looked like a typical yellow lager in the glass, and had a decent white head, but it smelled awful. The first taste while it was at near-freezing temp was surprisingly alright, and so thought it must smell that way due to the cheap hops and mass production. Second sip was ok, and the third was passable. But I noted as it warmed the stench of burnt vegetables came to the taste along with a somewhat metallic finish. I only managed to drink half of it before leaving it at the table.

I didn't want to put it down due to what was likely a stale keg, so later I had a pot at the pub by  local 1st Choice. It looked nice in the glass with its white head and yellow colour, but this time it had a sort of burnt grass aroma. The taste after a few sips and a slight bit of warming (to maybe 4C) it had that off-putting, burnt vegetable taste with the metallic aftertaste. It didn't to seem as extreme as the first one I had and I did manage to finish it. Two different pubs at two different times in two different states, and virtually the same outcome. I asked the bartender at the second pub if the beer was old and/or if they had cleaned their lines recently, and he assured me the lines were clean and that it was their top-selling beer and they change kegs regularly, and gave me a free pot of XXXX Bitter. I decided that I wasn't going to give it any more tries at a pub, but did get a 'grenade' at Dan Murphy's to try at home. Ya know what? pretty much the same result.

I gave it a half point for aroma for having some. I gave it 2.5 for looking like a good macro-lager in the glass. I gave it a point for flavour because it tasted ok the first, frozen sip. I gave it a point for drinkability because it was cheap. I now understand that VB stands for Vile Bile.

A great refreshing beer.

Is it me or has this beer changed it flavour from 10 years ago its not very good these days.

A few years ago i would give it 6/10 now 3/10