"Ale, Lager, or an IPA?"

No stout or porter then?

 

Yes kind of odd, but I drink black IPA's all the time. Says so right on the box. Or cacsacadian dark ale. Shipyard and Sierra Nevada both make some.

 

Ales sometimes, lager sometimes, depends on style and yeast.

 

That's really not true since "pale" in IPA refers to the type of malt, and Black IPAs still use pale malt. Personally I prefer the "American Black Ale" name, but prior to its existence there was nothing inherently wrong with "Black IPA".

 

@marquis is referring to an English designation where stouts and porters aren't considered "ales", whereas the "there's only two options" comments refer to the distinction between top/bottom fermenting yeast, in which case there are only two options, and stout/porter (excepting Baltic Porter) are ales.

 

Don't start with this again, Marquis. It's been over a year - let it rest.

 

He means that "IPA" has ceased to mean "India Pale Ale" and is now only a 3 letter acronym denoting anything that is 'hoppy.'

I know this, b/c I have friends who taste anything that isn't Bud, and say "uh oh is this an IPA or something."

 

I actually get pretty frustrated with the lagers/ale split in description. If anyone has had Otter Creeks citra mantra, it is a lager technically, but tastes almost exactly like a citra hopped light IPA/pale ale, and nothing at all like most any lager I've had (pils, helles etc.). A Kolsch is technically an ale, but tastes much more closely to a German pils or other German lagers vs. either American or English pale ale or IPA. The different styles within ale and lager breakdown are so drasticaclly different, just ale or lager does absolutely nothing in describing the beer to someone. IMO.

 

Certainly. Ales and porters form two distinct and separate threads of brewing.Even to the extent of separate breweries ,different guilds, barrel sizes and so on.Arthur Guinness began as an ale brewer , failed as one so brought in Porter brewers from London and the rest is history.
Only when Porter declined in favour of mild and Pale Ales did brewers brew both types , as witnesseb by advertising as "Ale and Stout (or Porter)" brewers.This was also the case in the US , as in the case of this Boston brewery.

Later , lagers began to get a grip and breweries had to cater on the one hand with ales and porters (which are brewed in a similar way) and with lagers which required different specialist equipment.By then Porter brewing was just a fraction so it's no surprise that it was lumped together with ales.Not that they thought that Porters were Ales, just that they could be treated in the same way.

 

A Kolsch is defined as a lager in its country of origin. Germans do not consider themselves to be ale brewers , they regard this as an English thing.It's a lager because it has undergone lagering. To quote the BJCP;
"In Germany and other old world brewing centers, the terminology most typically used to differentiate beers is to refer to them as top-fermenting or bottom-fermenting.Germans think of ale as a type of English beer, and lager as a method of conditioning beer. So Germans would typically speak of Kölsch as a top-fermenting lager beer, not an ale".

 

Whereas Americans consider all top-fermented beers to be "ales", be they stouts, porters, Kolsch, IPA, or any other style; whereas bottom-fermented beers, be they lagered or not, are "lagers".

 

Don't get frustrated, enjoy the ride. Beer's a pretty fun ride.

Top-fermenting yeast vs. bottom-fermenting yeast. That's all I keep in mind. But for those outside of our little cabal, I believe most are trying to determine "hoppy" vs. "non-hoppy" and "light" vs. "dark." And even then, logic flies out the window. For example, right after Surly released Abrasive this winter, I was securing my stash. Guy walks up, asks if there's any Furious around (the store had temporarily moved it to make way for Abrasive). I told him they moved it, but suggested he try Abrasive anyway.

He asked me if it was hoppy.

"Um, yeah."

"Then I won't like it - I don't like hoppy beers" says the guy who was looking for Furious, a hop bomb if ever there was one.

Cool.

 

LOL. I would have involuntarily given him a pretty strong "are you from Mars" look; and then, again involuntarily, been driven to interrogate him for just what the fuck he was talking about.

 

I was flummoxed - too shocked to rock.

 

Ive never seen IPA as a catch-all category but I see it broken down to 'lager, ale, stout' on a few menus. Given how popular IPAs are now, im not shocked to see that kind of categorization.

 

Actually I don't find your friends question confusing at all. He wanted to know if your beer was an IPA (hoppy) Ale (malty) or a lager.

 

Except that there are malty IPAs, and hoppy beers come from a plethora of styles not labelled "IPA". There are also tons of ales that aren't particularly malty, and lager includes anything from AAL to Doppelbock, so it's not like that represents "anything that isn't hoppy or malty".

Those three choices go together like asking if the food I bought is a banana, a fruit, or meat.

 

Come on, I know lots of you have friends/acquaintances/situations out of the craft beer knowledge bubble. I think things like this are very common, lots of people don't realize ales vs lagers and the various subcategories and get confused. I can think of plenty of times hearing a comment like "eh I dont care for ales." etc. not understanding what they are saying.

Just be nice and share some info, there "may" have been a time where even we BA's didnt know everything.

 

I agree with this statement. But I wonder what the general public thinks "IPL" means then?

The question in the original post reminds me of, "Scotch, whiskey, or bourbon?"