The Mild-less Month of May

The good folks of CAMRA have proclaimed May as Mild Month. That means thirty-one days to celebrate the malty sweetness of what can only be described as the ultimate session beer. What better of an excuse, than an official "month," to track down British beer's homage to the working man. A task like that should be a cake walk since Beer Advocate lists 364 different beers in their English Dark and English Pale Mild categories, right? I might even be able to simply pop down to the local grocery store and grab one—The Price Chopper I shop at, carries Full Sail stuff, and that Oregon-based brewery just released Allman's All Mild, a copper-colored Pale Mild, in their Brewer's Share series of beers. By the 31st I'll have had many bellies full of the sweet stuff and spent hours leaning on the bar, sharing stories and jokes, with friends and loved ones—or so I thought.

What has come to fruition is far less jovial. It is now the 21st of May—a mere ten days shy of the closing of  Mild Month—and I have not seen, let alone tasted, a single drop of Mild. No Moorehouse Black Cat, no Pretty Things Ale and Beer Project X Ale—1945 or 1838, not even a left over Goose Island Mild Winter.

Nothing—zip—zilch.

Maybe it's because May is the lead-up month to summer, and breweries are focused on lemon-scented wheat beers or zippy IPAs. Maybe pints of amber sweetness don't sell well on 80º days. I think it is more likely that American's don't have a taste of Mild—now or any time of year. For decades American beer has been classified as weak, bland, yellow piss-water, but the American craft-beer movement has embraced the hop. "American-style" has come to mean hoppy and usually strong-er. Those two ideas fly in the face of the humble little mild. Even the Mild's closest American relative the American Brown Ale has turned to the hop-side. There's nothing wrong with a sharp IPA or even the Mild's consort, the English Bitter, but for whatever reason, us Yanks haven't seemed to embrace the simplicity of the Mild.

So where does that leave me? Still Mild-less with ten days to go.