Stepping stone beer?

[MitchK]

What beer do you find is interesting enough for beer geeks but accessible enough for Budweiser types? I feel embarrassed when people who drink a lot of beer show up and all I have is belgians, double ipa, and stouts.

Do you find your average light beer drinker to like APAs or are they still too hoppy?

right now I'm thinking: german pilsner (maybe with a light "out of style" american hop late kettle addition for a flavorful but not too bitter twist), kolsch (crushable without being basically fizzy water), american wheat...

Basically I want to be able to have something crushable that I can hand my macro drinking co-workers or family but that I'll still actually want to drink myself as part of a regular rotation.

[Jimmy]

I find non-craft beer drinkers tend to like IPA's that focus on late/dry hopping additions. Keep the bitterness dialed back, but load it with citrusy late hops.

[GAM]

Sleamen's, Rickards, Grolsh, Pils Urquell and Barking Squirrel show up at my house a lot.

S

[jason.loxton]

I find that beers that doesn't taste like 'beer' (as people normally think about it) at all can actually bridge the chasm. For example, the most popular beer I ever made among non-beer drinking girls was a big bourbon vanilla porter. Same is true for things like sours or Belgians: people who like beer sometimes hate them, but they are so unlike traditional beers that people who don't like beer at all will sometimes love them *the wine and cooler drinking crowd).

As for a stepping stone beer for non-craft drinkers, anything without too much bitterness works.

[darciandjenn]

We had my Molson 67 drinking mother-in-law seriously digging a raspberry sour and a gose the other day, so I'd have to agree with Jason.

[McGruff]

I find that most people will drink anything at my house because it is free.

[jacinthebox]

a nice apa with mosaic...lots of late addition hops...around 25ibu...maybe use gelatin to clear it to commercial levels. This is what got my bud lite buddies to start leaving their cases of beer in my basement and start drinking mine.
Lots of people got cases of bud lite for their bdays for a while lol.

[MitchK]

yeah, my brother who mostly drinks white wine and cold brew coffee came over the other day and the only things I had on tap were an irish dry stout and an unfiltered-ish citra DIPA, and I was floored that he preferred the citra DIPA to the stout. I think hops might be more accessible to the general drinking public than I give them credit for as long as I steer more towards the citrus and less towards the pine.

[jacinthebox]

Fruity citrusy hops are always a winner. I find the bitterness is what scares off folks new to craft beers. Apa is great start...then they are drinking an ipa asking you to make a dipa lol