It's all about the hop, 'bout the hop

jeffpn

jeffpn

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Am I the only one who hasn't heen sucked in by the hop craze? Why are so many brewers and beer drinkers infatuated by hops? When I go to the specialty or grocery beer store, it seems like half of the entire selection is either IPA, or something else with a lot of hops. I don't get it.
 
its the yuppy fad, I went a year perfecting my hoppy beers then got tired of them and went to milds, every now and then I have one and say man this is good so its great in moderation I guess
 
give me a doppelbock or a dubel over an ipa any day of the week.. i have been loving the new Belgian IPAs though, great mix of fruity yeast and fruity hops.
 
I think every commercial brewery in the US needs to have a few pale ales/IPAs to stay competitive in today's market and fit with general tastes. I don't think you could say that about most other styles, especially the more "restrained" beers like a brown or a bitter.
And let's face it, some beers are just not that marketable, despite how good they taste. You can hop rocket, randall, and blast all you want in an IPA and it sounds new and exciting. You can't really use any spiffy techniques on a brown (I'm not aware of any, but please let me know if I'm wrong)
 
That's exactly my point. Everyone is gaga over hoppy beers. Naturally, Brewers will make what the end user wants. I still don't get the hop craze. If you want a hoppy homebrew, try something everyone else makes. If you want a brew that's not overly hopped, you'll have to stop by my house. It's brew day!
 
That's why we brew our own... with occasional deference to the spouse.
 
I don't know... I sense a great disturbance in the Force, as if the Hoppy Side was beginning to yield to balance.... Balance is the key to me, too far off it and I don't want the beer. I can go hoppy or malty but balanced, dry beers are those I go back to and brew again. An IPA that reminds me of quinine, nein danke. Nor am I interested in a cloying malt bomb. Give me balance, good execution, good hop aroma in a malty backbone, I'm a happy sipper. But my lupulin shift is shifting back.
 
I'm not categorically against hoppy beers, I'm against hops for hops' sake. Ever higher IBUs leave me a bit cold - I prefer a balanced pale ale to an over-the-top IPA and I do love good hop flavor and aroma. But I want some beer in there, too: Hop tea is just boringly bitter.
 
I guess by definition it's an anti-hoppy discussion. Really, I'm just wondering why so many people today think that you can't have a good beer unless it's a hoppy beer. I prefer my beers not to be overly hopped. To each his own. If my wife like hoppy beers, I'd brew them. I don't have a problem with people liking what they like. I just don't get it.
 
i think part of it is in response to what is or is not on the market.
only bland, low alcohol beer? let's give them imperial hop bombs!
ok, now there's a lot of hop bombs out there? let's brew some session beers!
in the past few years, i've noticed a real spike in sours and other "odd" styles like gose becoming more and more prevalent. although, i have absolutely no empirical evidence to back that up :D
 
Where do saisons stand in the beer aisle? I'm thinking that saisons will be the next new in thing. Just a hunch.
 
I wish I could find more Pilsners and Lagers from craft brewers, there's plenty of varieties that could be produced. It seems that a lot of people find their way to craft beer and want to go big; hoppy, high ABV, imperial, etc. Exactly the opposite of the fizzy yellow macros they've left behind.
 
MrBIP, you should come over sometime. I have a Munich Helles that I made that is out of this world!!
 
Could it partially be that lagering just takes up too much space for too much time?
A lager takes what, 2-3 months? They could run several batches of ales in the time it would take 1 lager to be ready
These craft breweries are generally small, so they'd need to be pumping beer out all the time, can't afford to let it sit
 
I bet the bigger issue is refrigeration. I think you're hard pressed to find a brewpub that could lager if they wanted to.
 
And time is money - the faster they can turn around a fermentor, the less of them they have to have. A Pilsner ferments for about ten days, lagers for four weeks - the same fermentor can have produced three batches of ale in the same time. And the beers sell for the same amount per pint. It's economic. That said, they do have an excellent pilsner on tap at the Dry Dock....
 
Slightly off topic, sorry, but in a similar vein, what do they do with all those barrel aged beers? Keep them off site somewhere until they're ready?
 
Same thing Jack Daniels does with their barrels.

And to the point that ales are a faster turnaround than lagers for microbreweries (which is of course true) - the same is also true for Miller, Anheuser Busch, and Yuengling. Makes you scratch your head, doesn't it?
 
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