Are "session IPAs" improving?

I realize it's getting increasingly difficult to sell beer in a crowded marketplace, but are we truly past the point where brewers can't sell a new hoppy pale ale without having to piggyback on this ridiculous "session IPA" marketing gimmick? Or should we be suspicious of brewers that feel the need to use this to sell beer?

 

Reference to Session IPAs as "hop water"? Check.

Reference to Session IPAs as American Pale Ales? Check.

Reference to the original IPA being brewed with high hops/alcohol to survive the long voyage to India? Check.

Reference to how Session IPA isn't really a style or is some subversion of the concept of styles? Check.

Reference to the term "session IPA" being a marketing gimmick? Check.

Reference (correctly) to Boat Beer as the best session IPA? Check.

Reference to where the ABV cutoff should be for a session beer? Check.

Alright everyone, I think we've covered it all. Time to shut this one down. That's some nice, efficient work people--just a little over two pages of posts. Next time, I think we can do even better. Let's go for one page.

 

Carton did that 3 years ago with Boat. For some reason they are hung up on not calling it a Session IPA though.

 

Not trying to be a wise guy here, the can says, "Session Ale," on the front. And in their explanation of the beer (back of the can) they say, "an IPA for everyday drinking."

 

keep doing this

 

Its semantics and its space. I just think of Boat as a "hoppy session ale for double ipa drinkers." It's too small yellow and hoppy to be a pale, its too linear and crisp and way too small to be an IPA, so we go with "session ale" and try to help people know what to expect in the description.
I wrote that long description 3 years ago when there wasn't a notion of "session IPA." Now that there is i might have gone with it as the easy way to explain what Boat aspires to be, but it wouldn't be exactly right or more helpful then what's there, so for now we let that stand and try to figure a better paragraph for the can now that there is one.

 

doesn't "taste like" a double per se. It's supposed to be more like methadone for a IIPA junkie if that makes sense.

 

I agree that this is the case, people do go GaGa over anything brewed in that "Sugar Hill Brewery". That said, I love certain Lawson's beers and think very little of others; this particular beer is exceptional for the style.

 

You know nothing of what you say

 

No, they're terribly imbalanced low ABV pale ales that rely solely on huge late hop additions to appease the people who put hop aroma ahead of you know, flavor and body.

 

But ~5% ABV pale ales have been around for a long time. I'm not sure what it is about these beers, apart from their apparent terribleness, that requires them to be called something besides "pale ale." Except, of course, marketing gimmick.

 

Just because prior attempts at brewing a pale ale didn't use as much hops doesn't mean adding more hops makes them a different beer. Try Edward some time. If that isn't hoppy enough for you, then there is something wrong with you, yet they seem fine with the moniker "pale ale."

Brewers are trying to sell beer, too. Don't take everything they say at face value.

 

I love session's, one of my favorite styles currently.

 

I'd prefer the style to be be named American Bitter. It's more appropriate than tagging IPA on the end of something and I feel promoting excessive drinking is a dangerous path to travel down with the general public.

 

Some use adjuncts to lighten the body, so that they are easier to drink in some quantitiy.

 

See, now you're just making shit up. "Out of the session range?" As defined by whom? HopHands by Tired Hands is quite hoppy and clocks in at 4.8%. They call it a pale ale. Is that also out of the session range? Or have they mis-classified it?

Slightly more hops and slightly lower ABV than usual doesn't make something a new style. It might be a different take on an old style, but the fact that it's hoppier doesn't make it new. I'm sorry you've bought into the marketing gimmick and are now stuck arguing otherwise, but that's life, I guess.

 

Combining the BJCP and BA style guidelines, you come up with something like this:

English IPA: IBUs: 40 – 60 ABV: 4.0 – 7.5%
American Pale Ale: IBUs: 30 – 50 ABV: 4.0 – 7.0%
American IPA: IBUs: 40 – 70 ABV: 5.5 – 7.5%
Specialty IPA, Session IPA: IBUs: 40 – 70 ABV: 3.0 – 5.0%

If you look at the overlaps in there, it is a bit of a wonderment there is so much passionate debate on the topic of whether a "Session IPA" is properly called an IPA!