Trends and Gimmicks

I think the Brewery Pub/Grill concept is a current fad. They keep building more and more and even the ones in remote rural locations, people flock to them and pack the restaurants these days. 10-15 years from now they'll become passé and several will be out of business I'm sure. Enjoy them for now, live in the moment.

Also the fad of using chalkboards and writing the beers on tap on them. Seems to be make your place more trendy/hip if you use the chalkboards with colored chalk to list your beers. Maybe its been around for a long time out west or in more cutting edge eastern cities, but they've only popped up where I live for the last 5 years or so. I have nothing against them, I understand they are easy to update, just taking notice its a current trend in brew pubs that's all.

 

This is a good observation. A lot of times I've noticed a local event (like a 10K race, 4th of July festival etc) will have a beer garden and its usually your easily obtainable stuff. The local craft brewer should wheel out their rare stuff they only sell at the brewery that few can get.

I was pleased with the Oktoberfest they had in Frederick MD this fall. Flying Dog brought out Belgian Devil brew-house rarity to the event. Barley and Hops (local brewpub), had numerous quality beers and I believe one they served on cask as well (might have been Brewer's Alley can't recall). It was a respectable beer event. I'll go again if they have quality brews and obscure stuff again.

 

Chalkboard menus are a fad? Would listing the beers in non-colored chalk be better? Would you prefer a dry-erase board? Considering how cheap blackboard paint and chalk are, and how cash-strapped start-ups are, the combo seems like a no-brainer.

 

I have no problems with the chalkboards. Just saying, I've only seen them recently and thus I have a hunch its a passing fad in the pubs and in 10 years we'll see something else. No issues really.

 

Really? Not me, I would try BBA Westvleteren 12 in a heartbeat.

I'm not afraid of bucking tradition in the least, traditions are recommendations, not bibles. Every beer we enjoy bucked tradition once.

 

a couple trends i see in the last 18 months
more 4-pks(not a fan)
more canned beer(huge fan)

 

Ok, I'm in.

Breweries, tickers, and "whale watchers" going batcrap crazy over special releases...and the unintended consequence of said breweries not being able to keep up with the explosive craft beer growth or maintain a good enough margin on said special release to make enough of it.

Which also gives way to the aforementioned "bad beer festival" or "bad beer event" threads that usually get started b/c someone tried to put something on draft into a swing top bottle and sell it on eBay for a million dollars.

I remember when beer was released, actually made it to better beer shelves, and folks here would actually give you a head's up about it (vs. killing each other for it now).

 

This past summer, I had a beer that, if described to me, would sum up a number of fads - Newburgh Brewing's CAFE Sour. It was a sour beer made with African ingredients (like teff and gesho) blended with cold-brewed African coffee. In fact, on the brewery's own website, the beer is introduced including in the following way: "Ethiopian-inspired sour beer with cold-brewed Ethiopian coffee... why not?" That beer just screams "gimmick," with the "throw crazy stuff in" mentality of DFH blended with this year's uptick in American sours blended with the infusion of coffee into everything.

That said, it was my favorite discovery of 2013... I just couldn't get enough of the stuff. Remarkably drinkable, the sour notes and bitter notes meshed beautifully, making for a beer that I could equally enjoy on a blazing hot summer afternoon as I could on a cool fall evening. I was sad to know they only brewed the beer once, and I'm constantly nagging them again.

The point is to illustrate a point made several times already - well-made beer is well-made beer. What many are calling a "gimmick" is the addition of other ingredients to the "base" elements of beer (water, yeast, hops, grain). The point that many seem to be missing, though, is that introducing unusual elements is more likely to increase the difficulty of brewing delicious beer, not give the brewer a way to cover up so-so technique. Most seasoned home brewers can whip up a drinkable pale ale, but the idea of throwing the kitchen sink into a beer and coming out with something outstanding sounds really intimidating.

More often than not, brewers that use unusual or "gimmicky" elements with the beer end up producing so-so but not outstanding beer... just like so many brewers that AREN'T using gimmicky elements are making so-so but not outstanding beer. Truly great beer is very difficult to make, and kudos to those who can make it both with and without these "gimmicks."

 

Exactly this. I'm always cautious when discussing different ingredients added to beer because experimentation is key - but there's a limit. Hot peppers, moon rocks, book pages, doughnuts, etc., seems much more gimmicky to me (not that I wouldn't be interested in trying those things)

 

not sure your analogy makes sense to me. steak and coffee are single ingredients that can be served on their own and enjoyed. they can also be added to with other ingredients to create different recipes and dishes. with beer you are already dealing with a recipe (combination of various ingredients) no matter what style you are talking about. your logic suggests that clean lagers are the "pure" beer recipe that can stands on its own, and any style that deviates from that is getting fancy to grab attention.

to me it's entirely subjective what the pure, true way to brew beer is, just like people from around the world would argue the same thing about steak dishes. Mexicans might say carne asada tacos are the pure way to serve steak, marinated in lime juice and spices, grilled, served with onions, cilantro and salsa roja. Koreans would say the only way to eat beef is marinated in sesame oil and garlic and grilled over charcoal, etc.. for each group it's not a deviation from another style, but the way it should be.

the same is true for beer styles. a barleywine is not trying to be more flashy or extreme than a lager, it's just a different style. just like barrel aged stouts, IPAs, etc...

 

This conversation is very subjective. Everyone has their preference as to what they look for in a beer. To me, I don't want my beer to mimmick the taste of a cucumber salad or peanut butter & jelly sandwich or a maple bacon donut. No thank you. For me, when the main ingredients of a beer (grains, hops, yeast, bacteria) take a back seat to the specialty ingredients, that's when I look at it as a gimmick or faux beer.

Oak, as well as other wood types are far from gimmick, they have and always will play a vital role in beer and brewing techniques. The increased use of wood is a good trend as far as I'm concerned. Oak and other wood types can be used for so much more than flavor production. They act as medium for colonies of yeast and bacteria to take up residence and propagate generation after generation, to produce nuanced house character in beer and expand our portfolios of fermentational isolates. Without the use of oak & other wooden vessels I doubt beer would be anything like what it is today.

 

BA'ers being (insanely and senselessly) entitled is definitely a trend on the rise for 2014.

 

you can make this amazing thread but you cant make an "_________________" thread.

 

Its all a gimmick, anything outside of AAL's are a gimmick. That's we all tried them, thats why we go to this website. A gimmick is used to inspire curiosity and sell things in the aftermath. Is that not why we all go apeshit over barrel aging, some gimmicks are great some are voodoomaplebacondonuts

 

So, are you asking whether people on here agree or disagree with you? Barrel aged beers may be a trend right now, but I haven't been into craft beer long enough to give a fair opinion on that. Waxing could certainly be a gimmick if people think that a beer is going to be of top quality because it's waxed.
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Personally, I'm not a huge barrel aged beer fan, but there are some brews that I enjoy. As far as waxing goes, I could care less whether it's waxed or not. If it sounds appealing to me, I'm going to buy it regardless. It think he's saying that dipping a beer in wax is a gimmick, whereas barrel aged beers themselves are a trend.

 

I'm pretty sure the waxing of bottles is meant to be a second barrier to oxidation for long term cellaring. It has a purpose. Looking good doesn't hurt either though.

 

Most gymicky craft beer? Id go with the voodoo bacon maple doughnut ale..............Gymicky as all hell and utterly unnecessary.

 

I wish I could get something as good as BCBS on the west coast at all, let alone off the local shelf. It's not hype. It's word traveling.

 

Yeah, but at least all of those are flavors. I'm a fan of most DFH beers, but if the moon dust in the beer isn't the #1 gimmick I don't know what else could top that. That certainly isn't for adding and quality flavors to the batch, just a gimmick to interest people to either buy that beer and/or get people talking about DFH so they aren't obscure and forgotten about. Easier than brewing next world class beer with all the competition out there...just throw in some moon dust.

 

Or they have already brewed world-class (90 min, Indian Brown, etc.) beer and are having fun being the artist that the brewing profession is built upon?