Pabst Blue Ribbon might have been the ultimate hipster beer in the past, but now many people are wondering- Is Pabst Blue Ribbon gluten free? There is also feverish discussion as to why does Pabst Blue Ribbon have carbs? Fans of PBR will be more interested -how is Pabst Blue Ribbon a pilsner, and is Pabst Blue Ribbon good to drink these days. We want to let you know why is Pabst Blue Ribbon popular, so stick around and learn more.
Is Pabst Blue Ribbon gluten free?
The simple answer; No, due to the malted barley. As many sites will celebrate the news that Pabst Blue Ribbon is 100% gluten free and is shocking to find that these listings are on the first two pages of Google! One of these sites that is on the first page of Google search uses the keywords Pabst Blue Ribbon Gluten Free Beer and another specifies that no gluten was detected and contains no gluten. Not only is this a major shame for Google, but it’s also a shame that those with celiac disease are at high risk.
Taking any gluten test that you can buy nearly anywhere, will prove beyond a doubt that Pabst has gluten in it. Besides that, it would be very obvious upon reading the ingredient list that it contains gluten. Even this brain surgeon decided to list PBS as a gluten-free beer! Apparently, they forgot to delete the part of the ingredients that include malted barley which has gluten in it… Whoops!
The test for gluten will rank the gluten content somewhere between 20 to 100 ppm (parts per million) of gluten in each 12-ounce bottle. This will vary depending on where each production plant is making Pabst Blue Ribbon. Currently, they are saying that PBR is brewed in San Antonio but since the current owners include MillerCoors, it can be brewed in any other brewing facility all throughout the US.
Pabst Blue Ribbon beer is also brewed in China, Russia, and currently in Ukraine through an exclusive deal with a Russian Oligarch Eugene Kashper. Honestly, forget the gluten content, the business connection alone is enough to boycott a Russian product. Aside from that, this beer also uses GMO corn syrup, which is using genetically modified corn from China to make Pabst Blue Ribbon, making it a non-vegan product as a result.
Is Pabst Blue Ribbon a pilsner?
This is often called by most beer professionals a typical American Adjunct Lager which is brewed the same way as Budweiser beer. Don’t believe what they tell you about some classic and long-forgotten brewing process. This beer is cold-brewed through bottom fermentation rather than the traditional beer brewing methods. They don’t want to tell you they’re using rice to get that crisp taste and corn syrup to make yeast fermentation speed up.
This method is a fast and effective way to make beer, but calling it an American lager beer is really pushing the envelope. Perhaps it was normal in the mid-1800s that lager was more specific to brewing methods that delivered a lager made from traditional lager brewing rules. PBR is made using the adjunct lager recipe that uses rice to make it lighter and crisper.
Why does Pabst Blue Ribbon have carbs?
Wholly-Moley, Batman- the total number of carbs found in a typical 12-ounce bottle of Pabst Blue Ribbon is 112 carbohydrates and 142 calories. With this kind of carb content, most of the lucky ones who are sticking to the Keto diet are using PBS as a doorstop rather than drinking it. It’s certainly not healthy for anyone who is looking to lose weight due to the calories, but the carb content doesn’t help either.
Carbs in beer are unhealthy because this is never a good idea for raising your blood sugar level. Eventually, this will cause weight gain that is not processing all of these sugars fast enough for the body to burn. Unless you exercise continually, drinking PBS will pack on unwanted pounds in a very short amount of time.
Is Pabst Blue Ribbon good?
Much like all of the low-cost American adjunct lager beers, these are made popular through a lot of clever marketing and low prices for as much as $2 bucks per can. You can’t beat Red Stripe which is beating PBR for a tempting $1.50 per baby bottle-sized serving, yet PBR often sells their 12-ounce cans just as cheap. Is this beer any good aside from the marketing hype? Most people don’t care when it comes to price and that includes taste preference too.
If you’re in college it’s not so much the best-tasting beer but it can be chugged with little effort. The flavor by itself is clean and slightly fruity with a grainy flavor. The aftertaste is nice and clean which is what most non-beer drinkers fear having while drinking it. This is why those who are younger like drinking this beer because it lacks any real flavor.
Pabst Blue Ribbon ingredients
Pabst Blue Ribbon ingredients are:
- Water
- Barley
- Rice
- Hops
Pabst Blue Ribbon nutritional facts
Following the statistics section, the nutritional facts of several Pabst Blue Ribbon beers options are:
| Nutrition facts | Pabst Blue Ribbon Original Lager | Pabst Blue Ribbon Lime Stronger Seltzer | Pabst Blue Ribbon Wild Berry Stronger Seltzer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Units | 1 Serving (12 fl oz) | 1 Serving (12 fl oz) | 1 Serving (12 fl oz) |
| Calories | 153 | 220 | 220 |
| Total Fat | 0g | 0g | 0g |
| Sodium | 0mg | 5mg | 5mg |
| Carbohydrates | 12.1g | 2g | 2g |
| Protein | 0g | 0g | 0g |
| Sugars | 0g | 0g | 0g |
| Dietary Fiber | 0g | 0g | 0g |
| Alcohol | 13.4g (4.8% ABV) | 22.4g (8% ABV) | 22.4g (8% ABV) |
| Calcium | 14mg | 0mg | 0mg |
| Iron | 0mg | 0mg | 0mg |
| Potassium | 97mg | 0mg | 0mg |
Why is Pabst Blue Ribbon popular?
Pabst Blue Ribbon has undergone a wide berth for division over the years. It used to be called a white trash beer because it was cheap to buy. It doesn’t taste terrible, but it has a nice-looking label that makes it look as if it won some awards. In fact, it did way back when it was still sticking to traditional American lager recipes in the 1850s. There was very little that PBR could do aside from marketing their beer brand to a new demographic market.
In the 1960s and 1970s, PBR was certainly a hillbilly or redneck beer, yet this drove the Pabst Brewery nearly into bankruptcy over the next 20 years. By the mid-90s through the 2000s, PBR began a new marketing strategy to focus on colleges and universities which spilled over to local pubs and bars. This later exploded by 2010 in major retail sales because this demographic group had likely graduated and could afford to buy PBR regularly.
The marketing committee at Pabst has fine-tuned its marketing to make PBR a retro beer that is focusing on slick ads and nostalgia for old-timey Milwaukee beer. The youngest group to connect with this concept is among most of the younger Millennials and Gen Z. But if you’re among this group reading this article, you might have a different opinion now of your opinion of Pabst Blue Ribbon.