Classic craft beer?

Indeed, it will be!

 

It'll certainly be entertaining to see where the chips fall.

The current craft beer market is much like the Titanic and, like the ill-fated ship, there are only so many lifeboats. No brewery is immune to the cold waters of market saturation, so breweries big and small better be on their game because hypothermia sets in quickly.

 

Severely underrated comment tbh. Quality content right here

 

So many factors here. If I was to brew a classic west coast ipa, I wouldn’t have any qualms about using an inexpensive base malt because with the bitterness, you’re going to cover up the subtleties anyways. I’d be looking at somewhere around 55 cents a pound for base malts. In comparison, I feel like a more flavorful malt is in order for NEIPA’s. I expect to spend 70 to 85 cents per pound on malts with the ones that I use for NEIPA’s.

For a west coast IPA, 3 lbs of hops per bbl is pretty typical with varieties like CTZ, Centennial, Chinook, Cascade, etc. I’d expect those varieties to average in the $9-$10 per pound range. For NEIPA’s I’ve gone as low as 4 lbs per bbl and as high as 13.5 lbs per bbl. Most of our hops are in the $14-$16 range. That is with contracts (all for over 1,000 lbs) not buying spot hops.

The most common NEIPA yeast strain is a true top cropping strain. Some breweries do force it to bottom crop, but that’s a poor practice. Most people also dry hop during fermentation which makes harvesting even more of a challenge. With a west coast IPA, I don’t know of anyone using s top cropping strain. Getting 8 generations of yeast out of a lab pitchable should be a reasonable expectation. If you’re buying fresh yeast every time and have no means of propagating from the lab pitch, you could expect to pay about $40-$50 per bbl. In reality, most brewers do propagate, but that costs a day or two of production and still costs quite a bit more than cropping and using multiple generations.

 

That was the joke.

 

Haha I’m blushing

 

Where did you come from lol? Well a great example does exist.

 

This can't be answered since I haven't come across this scenario.

 

Not taking anything away from what @honkey has said and I definitely appreciate his contribution, real-world comparisons, and commitment to make the best beer that he possibly can, but I find that I, myself, can make NEIPAs that are comparable to what can be found on the market with what we'll call "normal" ingredients. Now, might my NEIPAs be better if I used the ingredients that he mentioned? Sure, but if I already make versions that are very good (again, in my opinion), then why would I source more expensive ingredients for what would be, at best, a marginal improvement in my end product?

All that said, on a commercial level, if more brewers had his mindset, the quality of craft beer as a whole would no doubt skyrocket.

 

This is the most well-articulated version of this phenomenon that I have ever heard. Thank you. What you outlined here is exactly what bothers me about craft beer lately.

 

Not sure I necessarily agree with you guys. I see people making @islay ’s “new beer drinkers want familiar flavours and are just in it for the scene” comments a lot at the moment.

Sort of a similar point I made earlier, but I remember joining this site and, only seven years ago (and for a few years after) people were shaking their fists at the new influx of beer drinkers for a very different reason. Back then it wasn’t that these new beer drinkers were delicate lambs who could only handle familiar, non-beer flavours. Almost the polar opposite - that wave was too extreme. They insisted on palate-wrecking double digit DIPAs; hoppy, boozy American barleywines; 15%+ stouts; etc. That was “cool” then.

If I’m being honest, I was among the fist shakers despite being new - like many people on here, my interest in beer predates my BA join date. The beers I grew up with in the UK, the “beer that tastes like beer” to me, were almost exclusively cask-dispensed, lower ABV styles. Bitters, pale ales etc. And although I really liked a lot of what the American scene had to offer, a lot of it seemed too extreme. Big for the sake of bigness.

Back to the present day. I personally don’t think that in the space of a quarter generation, the new beer drinker palate has gone from armor-plated to delicate flower. I just think people want to chase the new/sexy. In another seven years god knows what that will look like - but it changes constantly.

For me personally, yes the ubiquity of certain styles is always a bit annoying. I do think the pastry stout (can’t stand that term) phenomenon is overstated. In the NYC-area at least, the focus is more on the NEIPA and to a lesser extent the fruit sour. I’d love to see more variety. But it’s not all bad. I do like that it’s standard for a DIPA to be ~8% ABV now for example - very glad that those 10-11%’ers paint strippers are largely a thing of the past

Who knows though. Maybe I’m a closet cake/fruit lover.

 

Every day I wake up and wish I could get my favorite styles made my favorite ways and get them for the same price as beers made by less talented brewers with less care and lower quality ingredients. Then I open my front door and enter the real world.

 

Henry Royce once remarked (though in connection with his cars) that "quality is remembered after the price is forgotten."

 

I also want to subscribe to his newsletter or blog.

 

What year was the best year for craft beer for you?

 

To me when I think of classic craft, I think of Sam Adams and Petes Wicked....

 

I believe @zid said it before - but I may be mistaken.

I am perplexed why there is so much focus on making beer “taste like everthing.”

I love innovatation and the broad canvas beer is enjoying but getting a bit silly in some places.

 

Some will win, some will lose, some of us will sing the blues. If it's something we like and gets discontinued; seems like a lot of that happening.

 

That sure sounds like me.

 

I'm more perplexed by the breweries putting odd things into beer that are not supposed to have an effect on the beer.'s flavor The Veil made a friend chicken beer and basically said if you think you taste fried chicken in it you are a moron.

Why fucking put it in there then? Right, as gimmicky nonsense. Then you can overcharge people under the guise of the extra cost of the fried chicken that no one can taste. Fuck off with all that. Still have bandy-legged halfwits lining up too.