I dont understand: distaste for hops

The craft breweries in my area are not using American hop varieties to hop their Pilsners. Examples are Troegs Sunshine Pils, Stoudt's Pils, Neshaminy Creek Trauger Pils, and I could list a half dozen more.

I don't think I ever tasted a US craft brewed Pilsner brewed with American hops. Can you provide some examples of this?

Cheers!

 

August Schell uses Sterling in their Pilsner. It is pretty darned nice.

Some of the American varieties are derivatives of noble hops, and can be fresher. Mt. Hood, Liberty, Vangaurd, and Ultra all come to mind. Crystal has a little Cascade parentage that shows through.

Some say to make a blend of several and you will have fresher hops that really shine do,pared to old noble hops. I am going to try that.

 

Left Hand' Polestar Pilsner uses: Magnum, Mt Hood and Sterling all US varieties.

 

I don't get this. You can't "bastardize" a style. Styles are just general guidelines, and only exist because somebody long ago did something creative, people liked it and copied it. At what point in time does it become fixed and no longer subject to continued creative evolution?

I like Peak Fresh Cut a lot more than Pilsner Urquell. I like Dogfish Piercing Pils better as well (the pear juice works brilliantly). I think the suggestion that somehow the formula for Pilsner from 1842 is now forever the benchmark is nonsense. I actually buy both those American Pilsners and I probably wouldn't buy a traditional one using only SaaZ hops. If you want something that tastes exactly like a German or Czech beer, buy a German or Czech beer. I want U.S. craft brewers to be more creative than that.

 

I enjoy 077XX often since a bar about 2 miles from my home keeps it on tap. What top shelf DIPA do you feel are as good if not better than 077XX?

 

Variety isn't much a problem in stores, it's in bars.

Even with places that have like 50 taps - often more than 50% of them are IPA's.

 

Exactly!

 

If a style has developed into a general range of expectation and someone decides to take a hard left turn with ingredients, it's being bastardized. A German-style Pilsner using, for example, Cascade hops is no longer a German-style Pilsner, it's "evolving" into a different beer

But some of those hops, especially the newer ones, aren't (unfortunately) taking on the direct characteristics of the traditional noble hops. It's a shame, but I also find these renditions to be more "evolutionary" than substituting something completely out of style (such as Schell's -- but wasn't that a specialty Pils with the Sterling?)

Sounds like a great idea. Also sounds experimentation-intensive for most small breweries.

 

Exactly right.

 

Schell is not distributed in my area; I have not had the pleasure of drinking that beer.

Cheers!

 

They pulled out of MI a few years back, had it at the Bell's 30th anniversary party at their booth.

Maybe @unterhopft can comment? He might know if it was special.

Edit, Steve, I agree that Cascade or even Crystal will get too much American quality in there. A homebrew trick is to blend equal amounts of Liberty and Mt. Hood if you can't find Mittelfruh, and that trick ends up very close.

 

For me, i can not find anything that comes that close. But a few that ive enjoyed as much are Dirtwolf and a lower end IPA i actually just had that, not similar but was also enjoyable is Town Beach by Narragansett. It had that tropical juicyness i found in 077XX but nothing compares fully to me, it just had this mango juicyness. Cheers

 

I'm going to disagree with you that you can't bastardize a style. If that's the case, why do we even have styles to begin with? Why not just label everything "beer". If I tried playing basketball with a soccer ball, I'd be bastardizing whats known as basketball, that shouldnt be considered innovation IMO.

 

IPAs - good IPAs and mainstream good ones are everywhere in Southern California now - are delicious, flavorful and filled with hops that are great for our health. Cheers! Yes, I do seasonal variety packs and have a weakness for Boston Lager, but otherwise I never look back except to trade-off Torpedo with Nooner (which brings out the best qualities of each brew). IPAs are just a better mouse trap.

 

Others have given examples above. You're fortunate to live in southeast PA where many breweries honor the German heritage of the region by making a range of excellent lager styles. I think Stoudts is one of the best in the northeast US. I'll be coming down for their Octoberfest celebration on Columbus Day weekend.

 

When I first started drinking craft 4 years ago I thought the "IPA" was the epitome of craft beer, however, I've come to learn that there are dozens of styles, all beer doesn't have to be hoppy to be good, and a lot of people I know just don't like bitter flavors in their beers. The hop sensation is not for everyone.

 

Guess im boring cause its rare i will drink outside the IPA circle of beers. Hoppier the better, IBUS higher the better, ABV 6.2 or higher and keep making doubles. Now i do like a hoppy lagers for example Sierras Hoppy Lager and i do look for different ones in the store, but my eyes go for the IPAS everytime. Finest Kind to Goose Island and everything better. I even like Compass Rose which is underatted in my opinion. Tastebuds play a major role in everyones selection. Thats the beauty of the craft beer industry, to have a wide variety to please everyone.

 

When I joined in '08 I was definitely in the IPA/hop disdain camp. However, not wanting to blindly damn any style I did more research & never stopped trying & tasting until the worm finally turned. Now, I definitely appreciate hops & IPAs/APAs more as a whole & try to promote to friends of mine that have the disdain to not stop trying, tasting & experimenting to find what may work for their palate/tastes in a very hop forward landscape.
Once I realized that hops, much like grapes with wine, have tremendous variation & variety as well as how brewers use & utilize them in the beer making process it helped me to discover what I liked & what I didn't.
Don't consider myself a hophead by any means, but I'm in a much better place since joining BA in '08.

 

"Styles" are a made up concept, and the concept itself is in fact a relatively recent obsession.
None are set in stone and there is no 'official' arbiter of what constitutes any given style (and certainly not the BJCP guidelines, which were developed and intended for homebrew judging).

The beer world would be far better served if less emphasis was paid to brewing to style.
Brewing with style should always be the more important goal (to broadly and liberally paraphrase Lew Bryson, one of the more objective and sensible modern beer writers).

What's most important is the flavor experience as it relates to what is in your glass, "styles" be damned.
If you want to get really technical, remember that one of the most popular "styles" these days--IPA (most especially American IPA) --is itself a bastardization since IPA was traditionally quite long aged, not consumed young and green as it is these days.

The whole thing is actually sort of like the ever increasing meaningless-ness of the term "craft beer"...but that is for another thread.