Controversial Beer Opinions Thread

You like that wide of a variety of tastes but not Belgian beers... interesting.

 

Have you ever aged a Ten Fidy? Age it for a year, drink it at about 45-50 degrees then tell me it doesn't taste like super chocolatey coffee. No vodka taste, alcohol is well hidden. I find Ten Fidy to be the best non-barrel aged stout I ever had.

 

Personally I find it more interesting that so many people like that strange clovey yeasty taste. I don't hate it exactly, and I'll often try them when out a brewery just to experiment, but for the most part I just don't enjoy it and the more prominent its presence is the less I generally like the beer (I had a very nice table beer at Mystic Brewery last week that was quite mild on that front). Other than super funky beers and diacetyl in pilsners, it's really the only flavor in beer that I consider a general minus rather than a plus.

And since this is the controversial beer thread, I can't help but think that if the lighter Belgian ales ever explode in popularity, there will be a segment of people who will complain that the new cohort of drinkers who enjoy them don't really "like beer" and only want to drink clove and banana cocktails.

ETA: And while I love darker Belgian ales like St. Bernardus 12 and Rochefort 10 where that flavor is very subdued and/or dominated by other flavors, I find that most of the American versions of quads I've tried seem to double down on that yeast taste (as we are prone to doing) so I don't generally care for those. For instance, I liked Troegg's Mad Elf well enough, but Boulevard's is way to spicey for my taste. Ommegang was somewhere in the middle.

 

Although I kinda giggled at that, light colored Belgian ales are anything but "clove and banana cocktails".

Comparing Mad Elf with any classic quad is an exercise in futility. It is as much a quad as an NEIPA is.

 

Is this a controversial opinion?

If not, and you're just voicing your concern for newbies, they should probably think twice before posting in a thread entitled the "Controversial Beer Opinions Thread". Just sayin'.

 

Super true.

 

Sierra Nevada Celebration is no more a "true" IPA than a modern milkshake IPA brewed with vanilla and blueberries.

 

Here's a real controversial opinion that I believe-

Trillium is not that good. Fort Point is great, the rest is below average

 

Them's fightin' words!

 

Says you. They taste less "like beer" than an NE IPA does to me. Same goes for Hefeweizens to my palate. Why exactly are some people acting like there's an obligation to like these particular beers? Is it really that hard to imagine that the very particular flavor of those yeasts may not work for everyone? There's an obligation to respect these beers because of their historical significance, there is not an obligation to enjoy them.

If you'd slow your roll you'd see that I am not comparing it to Belgian Quads. I am comparing it to other American Quads. And since Troegg's has the least prominent yeast flavor, I enjoyed it more than either Boulevard or Ommegang for that reason.

*My initial post double posted for some reason, and when I went and deleted one of them both disappeared. So if anyone happened to read the first one, that's why its gone and this was my second draft

 

This is a problem with your narrow definition of what beer should taste like, not an issue with estery and phenolic beer. Before yeast isolation and, in particular, lager brewing, the vast majority of beer was either estery or phenolic or both.

As far as the historical obligation to like these beers goes, I don't think there is one. Agreed that they aren't for everyone, but I don't think anyone's looking down on anyone else because they don't enjoy them. Some people, myself included, do take umbrage with people who say, "I know beer and these beers are bad.", when they simply do not have an expansive enough palate to enjoy them.

Ahh . . . I see. Seemed to me as if you were saying, "Because Mad Elf doesn't have a lot of yeast derived flavor, it is, therefor, like a classic Belgian quad." My fault.

 

You're ratings say otherwise unless 4+ is a rating you give to below average beers.

 

Lambic and gueuze are Belgian beers/styles (of course).

This isn't aimed at anyone specific in this thread, but since pre-craft Belgian beers include: saison, blonde, lambic, gueuze, Flemish red brown, Scotch ale, Pilsner, porter, dubbel, tripel, etc, it doesn't really make too much sense to paint with too wide a brush and talk about that "Belgian taste." Granted, the term "Belgian" is often used in regard to yeast character and has its uses, but nobody is going to state that Rodenbach and Saison Dupont have the same yeast character... and people are throwing the term around a little too casually here. If anyone here complains about an "American taste," that person would be told that they haven't experienced enough American beer (and probably mocked a little).

 

Telling someone else they are wrong to brew a beer other than your way, is wrong in itself. Do you know my palette?? Not all hefeweizens use pilsner malt. And the ones i prefer like Erdinger, use 2 wheats and a 2 row summer barley. So,maybe you should send them note letting them know they are making their beer wrong.

No, i said a weizen must have wheat in it to be called a wheat beer. If you don't put wheat in a beer it isn't a wheat beer. Its a pilsner or some other barley beer( which i admittedly don't and won't drink. However I am not telling you to put 100% wheat in your pilsner and claiming it will taste the same.

You can't honestly believe this. Have you separated the grains and fermented and ate them(i.e. put in a bread)?? This just shows you like being contradictory and argumentative.

I never said pils malt doesn't work in hefe I said I don't like it in MINE and you claimed I was making my beer wrong. Maybe you should actually practice what you preach and read completely a post before trying to be the know all of beer.

 

Aslin is probably the most under-rated of the big NEIPA makers.

 

You would have a hard time convincing me that scotch ale, pilsner, and porter are Belgian styles. There are very few examples of these, even now.

 

That's actually not AT ALL what I said. I said I don't like esters, and I don't like some Belgian STYLES. I did not say I don't like Belgian beers. Don't put words in my mouth.

BTW esters are considered a flaw in certain beer styles, but allowable in others; much like diacetyl.

 

I take umbrage with people who claim that anyone who doesn't like the same beers they do lack an expansive palate. We all have different tastes. That doesn't make one person superior to the next as you seem to be implying.

 

Dunno, I don't think CounterCulture, Intelligentsia and the like are pushing dark/French roast.

 

You are the only one who chose to imply superiority. Narrow palate or expansive one, everyone's on the same level. People simply need to know where they are in the spectrum, is all.