The reaction happens fast enough that a glass of beer can become noticeably lightstruck in seconds when exposed to direct sun.
Watch out where you set your brewski down at the next barbecue. Lightstruck beer is such a common occurrence that many folks just assume that Corona or Heineken is supposed to taste like that. The truth is that skunky beer is flawed, and no brewer wants their beer to taste like the back-end of a skunk.
You can now find cans of some of the most commonly affected beers like Heineken and Corona or Corona Familiar, which is the same beer as Corona Extra but packed in large, brown bottles , and these packages are a better representation of how the beer should taste. Miller Brewing still uses clear bottles for some of their brands High Life , and they skirt the lightstruck issue by using specially formulated hop extracts that do not react with UV light to create 3-MBT. Look, ma, no booze!
Fancy non-alcoholic drink pairings. Wes Avila to open a new Mexican restaurant in Hollywood next month. Some people believe that the slice of fruit will hide the skunk beer flavor that occurs when the beer is exposed to sunlight. Red glass is the best in preventing this phenomenon, but it is quite expensive, so many manufacturers choose green and brown bottles.
On the other hand, Corona and similar beers come in clear glass bottles. Therefore, citric flavor softens the bitter beer taste and makes it more enjoyable to drink. Most people associate citrus with beaches, the sun, the sea, and the chilling time, making Corona beer look exotic and more tempting. Psychologists have proven that most shopping decisions are made unconsciously and under the influence of emotions. Since citrus in a Corona bottle reminds you of summer and pleasure, you will probably buy a bottle to fulfill this feeling.
It is also possible that the bartender will serve you beer with a citrus wedge only because you have both seen it done that way in a beer commercial. There are many types of citrus fruits. What you call lime in most parts of the world is merely green lemon in Mexico. On the other hand, Mexicans refer to a similar type of citrus but with smaller fruit when they speak of lime. Typically, they drink light beers with a yellow or green lemon slice rather than using lime. You will get a Corona with a yellow lemon or lime slice in Australia and the US, depending on what the bartender currently uses.
In some cases, you can choose between those two. However, in Korea, lime is rarely available and expensive, so bartenders use lemon almost exclusively. If you visit a bar in the Philippines, you can get a beer with half a calamansi. Interestingly, this hybrid citrus is also grown in Florida, but most use it for cakes, jams, and lemonade. If you order Corona beer in Florida, you will still get a regular lemon wedge in the bottle.
There are many types of beer different in taste and serving. Typically, lemon or lime is put only in light beers, known for their mild taste and a low percentage of alcohol. It is also known for its bitter taste created by maturing hops and malts. While some manufacturers add citrus, cucumber, or herbs to soften its flavor, you can also ask the bartender for a lime wedge.
That roasted brown malt gives porter beers a specific, dark taste with admixtures of coffee, caramel, or chocolate, depending on the brand. You need to store and serve these beer types at room temperature. That smell. Ooooh, that smell. You know the one—musky and kinda sharp, it tickles the back of your nose and sets your head in motion looking for the source. On the street you're looking for who's just blazed up a jay; in the woods or the 'burbs you're on guard for one of those little black and white striped bastards.
That skunk musk is a potent odor that humans are extremely sensitive to, and it's also a funk that's common in beer. You've surely caught a whiff if you've ever sipped a Corona, Heineken, Tsing-Tao, Stella Artois, Rolling Rock, or any other beer that comes in a technicolored or clear bottle. It is such a prevalent character in these beers that many believe it's intentionally added by brewers.
It's an astoundingly widespread myth, even finding it's way into a respected homebrewing manual from the early 90s like Charlie Papazian's The Complete Joy of Homebrewing though later editions removed the erroneous claim. More recently, in Ashley Routson's The Beer Wench's Guide to Beer , the author says: "Heineken now purposefully exposes its wort to light during the brewing process, forcing it to become skunked prior to bottling.
Routson responded to me and said that it was "something that I learned from fellow brewers in the industry," and that "several brewers read my book before its release…and [reviewed] it for technical errors," so the idea that Heineken is intentionally letting light into their brewhouse is clearly common in the craft beer industry.
Before we refute the claims of intentionally skunking, let's clear up the common confusions of what causes beer to pick up the offending aroma in the first place. There's only one way that a beer gets skunky: exposure to specific wavelengths of light. The important thing to understand is that light is the number one enemy to beer; it literally cleaves molecules in your delicious brew into pieces, creating a new compound that is nearly identical to one of the substances produced in a skunk's asshole.
It isn't caused by a cold beer getting warm and then chilled back down again. It isn't caused by age. It's the result of a chemical reaction between light and the bitter compounds in beer. I'll spare you the science behind lightstruck beer, but if you enjoy reading about organic chemistry, then you'll love this explanation. Brown glass beer bottles block nearly all off the offending wavelengths of light, and cans and kegs, of course, block out all light.
The trouble comes when beer is packaged in green glass—or worse still, clear glass.
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