I usually assume when Europeans complain about American beers, they just are complaining about our “domestic” beers like Bud Light, Coors, PBR, etc. which makes sense, they are our bottom shelf beers.
I recently chatted with someone at a party who said “no, all American beers are bad” including microbrewery beers.
I’ve never been to Europe so I wouldn’t know, but I do like my Left Handed Milk Stout, NWPAs, and hell even the hipstered out IPAs.
Are these what y’all are referencing?
I’ve not tasted many American beers so I could not tell if they all taste like crap, and I also do not drink at all anymore. But being French, I can say that our Belgian neighbors have some exceptionally good beers, as well as Germans do. I loved a few of those, back then. But then they may also be a tad too… tasty for an uninitiated palate ;)
I’m pretty confident there must some local breweries in a few US places that can make quality beer too, the issue would then mostly be to find enough customers willing to drink it because it’s no use to make the best beer ever if most your customers prefer Budweiser or stuff like that.