Beer A: Michelob Hefeweizen. $0.80 per pint. (On sale. List price was $0.95 per pint. Click here for a note on pricing from the first test.) Hefeweizen is an unfiltered, cloudy-looking, wheat-flavored beer recently popular with beer snobs. This was chosen to create a "flight" of "Hefs" in the test and also because it was the most plausible-seeming mass-brewery product to enter in the contest. Its price made it the low-ball entry in this competition and would have been comparable to Bud or Miller Genuine Draft in the first round.

Beer B: George Killian's Irish Red. $0.98 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.11 per pint.) Strong-flavored lager. Originally imported from Ireland. The U.S. supply is now brewed in Golden, Colo., by corporate parent Coors.

Beer C: Henry Weinhard Dark. $0.89 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.04 per pint.) Caramelly dark beer. Brewed lager-style. Produced in the Blitz-Weinhard brewery in Portland, Ore., which has several unusual traits. Over the last 20 years it's been passed, in a game of beer hot potato, among these corporate parents: Pabst, Heileman, Stroh, and most recently Miller. This brewery is where the Boston Brewing Co. makes a lot of its West Coast supply of Sam Adams. Chosen for the test as the one "dark" beer in the mix.

Beer D: Sam Adams Boston Lager. $1.04 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.56 per pint.) Old reliable. Included to calibrate results against those of Round 1. When bought for this round, was on dramatic discount sale, at one-third off list price.

Beer E: Redhook "Ballard Bitter" IPA. $1.33 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.55 per pint.) Like Killian's "Irish" Red, actually owned and brewed by Coors, Redhook illustrates what happens when the microbrew trend meets the conglomeration wave. Redhook started in the working-class Ballard district of Seattle, still has a loyal, local-fan following in the Northwest, and has tried to maintain a craft-brew image as it has expanded nationwide. It has also opened an additional brewery in New Hampshire--and sold a 25 percent ownership share to Anheuser-Busch. "Ballard Bitter" was included to create a "flight" of India pale ales in the test. IPAs are popular among the micro set for their hoppy flavor.

Beer F: Pyramid Hefeweizen. $1.33 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.66 per pint.) Popular Northwest microbrewery; chosen to complete the flight of Hefs.

Beer G: Bert Grant's Summer Ale. $1.33 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.66 per pint.) This is a truly micro microbrewery, verging on the oddball (the owner poses for advertisements wearing a kilt). It is based in Yakima, Wash., America's hop heaven, and the product line runs to ales with unbelievably strong hop flavoring and strong tastes in general. Included to see how the crowd would handle an unusual, powerfully flavored brew.

Beer H: Full Sail "Equinox" ESB (extra special bitter). $1.33 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.55 per pint.) From a small brewery in Oregon that advertises itself as "America's first and only employee owned microbrewery." Included for two reasons: to start a flight of ESBs (a kind of heavy-bodied ale that's ironically not very bitter), and because as of test day I had decided that this was my favorite beer of all. I never really liked Grolsch that well.

Beer I: Bass Ale. $1.78 per pint. (Not on sale. That's the list price.) Famous "pale ale" from England. Chosen for general snob appeal; also, nice-looking bottles and labels.

Beer J: Redhook ESB. $1.33 per pint. (Sale. List price $1.55 per pint.) Completes two "flights" at once--of ESBs, and of Redhook. Very popular in the home drinking area of testers; included to see the role familiarity plays.