BBC: "US craft beer: How it inspired British brewers"

“ …in the region of the intergalactic.” That reminds me of a Beastie Boys song!

Cheers!

 

I'd much rather drink a variety of American adjunct lagers than I would Carling lager. The major American adjunct lagers don't have any flaws as far as taste goes, they're just light, but Carling lager has a really unpleasant dankness to it that I don't enjoy. They started selling Carling lager in Sweden last fall I think and I'm waiting for the day when they will stop selling it, one of the worst lager brands I've tasted and I'm very much a fan of most pale lager brands.

 

The average strength of beer dropped from around 6% in 1914 to little more than half that through shortages and Government policy during WW1. After the War there was an enormous debt so beer tax was really ramped up with the result that strengths never recovered.
The point is that as a consequence beer remained of modest strength in the inter-war years and drinkers got used to it. They found that they could consume it in large quantities and did so; in effect the culture followed the product.Also, with the increase in road transport a weaker beer had advantages.You could drive to a pub, drink a few and drive home. But considering that pseudo-lagers came to dominate the world beer scene it isn't surprising that many if not most drinkers settled for less demanding beers.They do so today in both the UK and US for that matter.

 

This was basically my point. You said it much better.

The same is true for the US craft beer culture. The product was big, bold flavors, and the culture now expects that.

 

My response, slightly edited, posted on a primarily English forum*

That's pretty cool man. Although to be nit-picky on the BBC, I HATE the word "hipster." American craft beer is great stuff, and we Americans do take pride in the many small, independent craft breweries that have begun (admittedly mostly in the recent past) making fantastic, world class beer. Connoisseurs, yes, but hipsters? What the hell is a fucking hipster? It sounds like a tree huggin' hippie to me!! And "achingly fashionable?" Blech! I hate that descriptor too!!

The funny thing about the craft beer culture is that there's only one thing that really matters, and that's the beer. You could bottle it in a plain white labeled bottle that says "beer" and that would almost be enough, as long as the type and brand were labeled on the bottle somewhere (the style is often a major buying point, but I'll get to that). But us craft beer geeks care about the quality and deliciousness of our beer more than any other considerations. Good beer gets bought again. Crappy beer doesn't. We vote with our dollars, not the whims of some marketing major. An ad might get me to buy something once. But to buy it twice means the beer was good.

Style of beer does count. Craft beer lovers like me are actually aware of beer styles and know that they exist. Although stouts and IPAs are all the rage over here right now, craft beer lovers actually crave new and different styles and brands of beer. In the last 30 days I suspect I've had at least ten styles of beer, ranging from saisons to stouts to IPAs to pale ales to bocks and lagers.

And just to add, Rheinheitsgebot (sp?) is an antiquated German law, which has no place in the US (although to be fair, most beers do have only water, hops, barley and yeast, but limiting oneself to those ingredients isn't appropriate these days).

The pubs and brew houses are a secondary concern, as are the fancy bottles and notoriety of having their beers drank in England. To be honest, many craft breweries wouldn't allow their beer to be sold overseas because they wouldn't be able to control the quality and freshness of their beer so far away. Stone is like that, and I don't blame them. Who would think a 10 month old stone IPA was the same as a fresh one? Someone who hadn't tried a fresh one, that's who. Sitting on a boat in the heat and then going to a distributor and finally getting sold on a London store (where people will have their own brands, and might have a prejudice against American beer) doesn't make for a Stone IPA at its best. Keep that in mind when you drink American beers that are found in Europe. They might not be at their best. To be honest, I'm leery of buying English beers over here for the same reasons (unless they age well, but even then, was it shipped during july in a non-airconditioned boat?).

As for camra and casks... well cask beer is nice, but it's NOT the only kind of beer there is. Casks are expensive and hard to maintain, and the infrastructure for such products isn't something that's commonly found over here. The camra people are fine by me in that they don't want their traditional pubs to be drowned out by inbev, suddenly to find out that there's nothing but bud light available in their town. But it's not appropriate for the US. We're lucky to have anything decent to drink, no thanks to budweiser and inbev's (an 'nem's) despicable business practices over the past 5 or 6 decades. But just because cask beer isn't commonplace doesn't mean there's anything bad to say about American craft beer. Some pubs do have casks, but they're not the norm. Don't let the camra prejudice carry over to American beer.

Tomorrow I'm going to Real Ale Brewing Company (aka Blanco Brewery) for their 14th anniversary party. We have a driver, BTW, as we plan to get pretty happy. But why would I go 60+ miles each way to go to an American brewery? Simple. Their beer kicks ass!



And the fact that Obama's got homebrew going in the fucking white house KICKS TOTAL ASS.

*not a beer forum, but we do discuss beer there frequently. Keep in mind this response is in response to what I perceive to frequently be European stereotypes of Americans and their beer

 

I am not comfortable with you representing all Americans on "a primarily English forum". Not only is your language atrocious, but you have succeeded in perpetuating some of the exact stereotypes that I think you were trying to elucidate. It is a lengthy response, which I think is probably why you are proud enough to copy it here, but I'm not sure what you have said really has much to do with the OP's article. Carry on however.

 

And judging by the most popular threads on BA -- namely Latest Haul and What Are You Drinking Now -- the U.S. craft beer "culture" followed these big beers from the exclusive release party to the FedEx dropoff point to someones kitchen counter to flickr and Facebook. Indeed the lack of a more pervasive, more public drinking culture around U.S. craft is one of my biggest complaints, and a big reason I am against holding up the "biggest and boldest" as the best U.S. craft culture has to offer.

 

Yeah, but Heady Topper sure tastes GREAT!

Cheers!

 

Less filling...

 

eh.

Im a regular at two craft beer bars, one which definitely specializes in the "bigger, bolder" beers (the other is much more of an across the board craft beer bar, with lots of lower ABV offerings -- I like them both). I argued with ding about this before he was banninated. You are just wrong about the lack of a public drinking culture.

Georgia, South Carolina. Hmmmm....maybe the problem is with location?

 

Used to watch my neighbors pour Carling Black Label from a 40oz into a cold mug straight from the freezer. They then added a pinch of salt to kill the head.

I imagine that made it taste...less dank?

 

Whatever happened to "drink what you like"?

Who cares if someone else loves the hoppier, bolder stuff?

Is it supposed to make you look "cooler" to not like those kinds of beers?

 

Although I love drinking beers from all over the world, America definitely has the market on variety.

We also aren't as limited by brewing tradition as other countries, so we go to town. One of the few (very few) perks of being one of the youngest countries.

 

I don't see why casks should be more expensive, or even as expensive, as kegs.It's in fact the simplicity and minimal equipment needed to produce cask ale that has allowed an explosion of small breweries here-over 1000 in a country of 60 million. The infrastructure is already in place though many pubs have replaced cellars with above ground temperature controlled beer storage rooms (still called cellars though!)
But as in my previous post , the beer culture had developed round the beer available. Except in city centres it's relatively difficult to sell beer over around 5% ABV in pubs and taking macro lagers out of the reckoning seven pints of draught beer is sold for every pint of bottled or canned beer.
As for CAMRA and American beer, you will find nothing but praise and admiration in their publications. CAMRA is well aware that cask is not a universal option for such a vast continent but it is an organisation with a single purpose which is to encourage this form of dispense for beer.

 

I care. Just this week a bill here in SC designed to expand the amount of beer allowed to be consumed in brewery taprooms got gutted by the State Legislature because it included -- front and center -- a stipulation that beers be allowed to contain up to 14% ABV. The legislators argued that the alcohol content contained in 64 oz. of 14% ABV beer is equivalent to a 12-pack of "typical" beer. As a direct result, they imposed all sorts of crazy liability requirements on brewery owners. Now the likelihood that people wanting to open breweries that serve primarily lower ABV beers will have a chance to do so is severely impacted. Why? In part because U.S. "craft" beer has come to be associated with ridiculously high ABV.

EDIT: go ahead and cue the "Bible-Belt South Carolina" jokes, but the cartoonish character of "craft" beer in this country is also in part to blame.

 

America inspired? Careful, you sound almost like you are giving us credit for something, marquis might track you down and smack you with a CAMRA directory.

 

Well, one thing's for sure, the new breed of UK craft breweries with their craft kegs sure didn't get their inspiration from CAMRA.
And BTW, I eat CAMRA dictionaries for breakfast.

 

That's hilarious. A good Brit friend in college used to always bitch about that at bars. "That's not a proper pint!" he'd say.

Gotta love those guys

 

Putting things in perspective, keg craft accounts for 3% of small brewery craft beer production in the UK.The influence of the US lies in the more mainstream area of shifting tastes , there are a lot more hop forward beers on sale than of late.Although "Golden Ales" as a substyle predate the US craft era , they do often showcase American hops. But influence from abroad has always been a feature of UK brewing.For instance, for over 150 years we have relied on imported hops and current UK hop production is only a tiny fraction of our brewing needs.
Unlike the US, the UK has a large infrastructure to support cask beer. In general there's little need for craft keg as the same brews could be sent out in cask though of course there are outlets where cask is unsuitable or not possible. The breweries I know which do produce keg versions of their beers do so as an extension of their portfolio , to gain access to outlets which either can't do cask or do it so badly that no self respecting brewery wants its products to be sold there.

 

The thought of seeing someone do that is driving me nuts right now...