a store owners interesting thoughts about ipas

Indian Pale Ales were invented by Christopher Columbus to make the trip across the Atlantic and served at the first Thanksgiving. Now that we have that straight.....

Yes, hops are a preservative but do we honestly think we are using them for that purpose in todays IPAs? Hops today are used primarily for the flavor. I am sure the flavor faded just as fast in the historical styles. So hopefully we can all stop trying to use this argument in the future. Another little tid bit, IPAs were historically smaller beers which further separate them from the modern day style making these arguments more ridiculous.

 

This. Stone goes with a 90 day best by for a lot of their stuff, and I think that's a pretty good rule of thumb. 90 days means(more than likely) someone drinking your beer when it's actually at its peak and not just 'okay.' Respect to breweries that are willing to date beer based on that because it absolutely means people will pass on your beer and buy another(perhaps undated, even) beer in place of it.

 

I saved up my allowance and bought a time machine. These are first hand facts.

 

The beer that people used to drink was (presumably) relatively awful in comparison to today's fine crafts. It was surely frequently stale, poorly sanitized, full of off flavors, used low quality ingredients, and on and on. But, it's what they had, so it all tasted fine to them. They didn't have modern brewing equipment, sterilization techniques, proper cleaning ingredients, immaculately maintained hop farms, etc, etc...

Point being, a 6 month old IPA back then would not have tasted any weirder to them than half the crap they drank. Today, we can get flawless 3 day old beer from hundreds of miles away at our local liquor store. We're spoiled, and we like our hoppy beers as fresh as possible.

 

not that i myself care about the history of IPAs (at least not enough to ever argue about it), but i'd bet money that the wiki entry was written by someone who's been on one side or another of a beer nomenclature argument on BA in the past 2~3 years.

p.s. dear everyone, hops are put into beer for bitterness, flavor, and aroma, full stop. those 3 things exhaust the purpose of hops.

there might be something you put on food that raises your risk of cancer. however, you are probably not putting it on your food to raise your risk of cancer. whatever hops do, they are put in beer for all and only those 3 reasons above.

 

I'm just going off the rumors about how many areas (mine in particular) were kept from getting Celebration fresh because the distributor wanted to get rid of all of its Tumbler.
Which could be just that, a rumor, or it could have been a factor.

 

I buy bargain priced IPAs and never check the dates. I've never had one that I could not enjoy.
BTW, I love Bakersfield / Lake Isabelle and the proximity to all the neat stuff that surrounds it.

 

I think the better question is why you're letting work get in the way of a gallon of IPA.

 

QFT.

IMO, a smart brewery would rotate their IPAs, IIPAs, and PAs on a seasonal basis that way customers know they are getting their product fresh. In addition bottle dating beer should be a federally mandated law.

For example. I'm not sure why Sierra Nevada isn't running things on a 4 season basis. Fall = fresh hop ale/estate. Winter = celebration. Spring = Ruthless. Summer = Hoptimum. Or something along those lines. I just want this stuff fresh if it is a PA, IPA, IIPA, etc. FRESH FRESH FRESH FRESH FRESH

 

As I said, please stop blaming a system which you may or may not understand.

I'm really not trying to be harsh...but simply perpetuating rumors on a site such as this does much, much, much more harm than good.

 

I was just trying to put in perspective one example of where my presumptions came from.

Obviously, you are biased, since you must work for a distributor. I love that you take pride in your work, but not all distributors across the country have employees such as you.

I am not doing any harm... I just raised a topic of discussion... accused no one.

I am not blaming anyone. I am not blaming you.

please stop taking offense to my opinion.

I am allowed to have my opinion, and I am allowed to express it based on my experiences.

people are allowed to disagree.

the fact that you distributed bud light within 3 days of its bottling/canning does not mean that every beer has changed hands at its most efficient rate across the country.

either way, I know you will continue to defend your point, and I won't completely buy it based on my experiences, so we can just consider this debate moot, and move on.

 

For those who want confirmation about just how correct cbeer is, read up on techniques for using burning pitch to sterilize insides of barrels back in the day. Uggghhhh!!! What we think of as beer is a different animal than some of what our ancestors were drinking and (presumably) enjoying.

 

Pilsner Urquell used to repitch their fermentation barrels after each batch -- a practice they continued well into the 1990s. Fresh Pilsner Urquell from that very source is one of the best beers I've ever had.

 

The IPA craze is a bit exhausting and ridiculous to say the least. The style is very hit or miss for me personally, I'd rather have balance than a bitter choke down, that being said I continue to search the style as I do the others in search of finding truly great style worthy of the cash. Honestly, I'm amazed at how much I enjoy Two Hearted and Nugget Nectar but being a fan of both brewers I think it's more a reflection on the brewer than the style. Not knocking any style, just amazing to see such fervor among both manufacturer and consumer for a particular style.

 

Pitch was used in the US industry to line (not to sterilize) the standard wooden beer kegs into the early 1950's, at least, as well as for the short-lived steel kegs (one of the reasons that stainless steel replaced them).

As George Ehret put it in the 1890's:

"The pitching of barrels...serves the two fold purpose of facilitating the process of cleaning and of preventing the beer from acquiring a smell of wood...".

He also notes that no adequate substitute had yet been found "...for none of the substances have that peculiar, although exceedingly faint, flavor for which the ordinary pitch is so highly prized by both the brewer and the drinker." 25 Years of Brewing, 1891.

As "herrburgess" notes above, many wooden fermentation and lagering vessels in breweries were also lined with pitch or other substances (like shellac, laquer, and other "neutral coatings") to prevent infection, preserve the wood, prevent "wood" taste and saturation, etc.

Here's a story of Falstaff employees re-lining the wooden tanks with a type of beeswax in the Ft. Wayne brewery used for Ballantine India Pale Ale up until 1990 (page down half way to "On the subject on ale...").