Sierra Nevada "West Coast" Stout?

Same stout, but I guess they are being more precise with the language nowadays. It's the original 'West Coast Stout', from before there even was such a thing . (it just means 'hoppy', fwiw)

 

I hardly ever see their Stout or Porter on the shelves. Some of my favorite classics too.

 

Thank God stouts are already completely opaque, otherwise it wouldn't be long before we started hearing about "New England Stouts".

 

Hate to say it but it seems to shelf turd here. Not sure why. I enjoy them especially when it drops below 70 degrees here in the desert.....

 

Blonde stouts exist, so it's possible for someone to make an slushy, orange stout...

 

I remember reading in the first M. Jackson's "Pocket Guide To Beer" that SN was "experimenting with a strongish (!) stout"...the Pale Ale being their only product at that time.

 

Need to re-visit this one.

 

I only drink east coast stouts

 

They had to come up with something, Stout IPA is probably already taken.

 

SN did do a Hoppy Lager, why not a Hoppy Stout?

 

Pale stout?

 

Now yeah- but back then? I think it was enough just to get people accustomed to having a 'stout'.

I don't know exactly who coined the term 'West Coast Stout', but the first time I saw it was in Dr. Michael Lewis' book for homebrewers called Stout in the mid 90s. Naturally, there were plenty of examples by that time, although no category yet for homebrew competitions.

 

Cascade (West Coast Variety) hops from day one. Not sure many Stouts in 1980 featured them.

 

Dear lord, I do love the conjecturers. At some point this silly hobby of quantifieing the relative merits of something that can not be measured to exactitude but admired by multitudes and described my minutiae. Tis the height of comedy.

 

I'm not sure I'm following you, but all I'm pointing out is that it's an old term. I suppose it's seeing new life because some brewers want to give their customers more specific information. I recently took a chance on a new beer because it was described as a West Coast Stout on the label.

 

And based on that wording I'd bet (conjecture :-)) that you expected the stout to show hops prominently in the flavor profile.

 

I did, and it did . Even though it came from PA.

 

Yeah, even though not labled that way we've had such a stout in PA for years, so really Victory should have added "East Coast Stout (when fresh)" to Storm King years ago to prevent such pre-emption.

 

New Albion also had a stout, brewed before Sierra Nevada's, but I don't think I've ever read anything about its hopping level. It might be safe to assume it was hopped with Cascades. (Boulder Stout also predated SN's, but not exactly "Coastal").

Before the "craft era" a number of west coast breweries brewed stouts in the post-Repeal era - Rainier (both SF and WA), Golden Glow and Acme's Bulldog are ones that come to mind.

Grossman's book, and, IIRC, sierranevadabill on these forums, both mentioned that the SN Stout was the first beer they brewed once their microbrewery was complete. "(November 15, 1980) Our first test batch of beer five barrels (150 gallons) of Stout... [Grossman]" but, as with many of the early SN brews, they apparently dumped it. Some sources put the commercial release of Sierra Nevada Stout in 1982, by which time there were probably a few other "microbreweries" with stouts on the market. Bert Grant gave 1982 as the first year of his Imperial Stout, which he claimed was 75-80 ibu's but does not note which hops were used. Wouldn't be surprising if he went with a more traditional hop.