Session Beers: USA vs. UK

Granted, not cause and effect, and there are exceptions, but higher-ABV beers tend to have more robust flavor - perhaps to partly justify the higher cost.

 

In the US it's, "Sorry hun, there's a Tree House release this Friday."

I wouldn't call that a true session beer then. A true session beer gets better by the pint.

 

If beer works anything like spirits, then lower ABV would indeed mean less flavor

 

I take that statement to mean he’d rather drink one beer he enjoys rather than drinking a weird Session beer he doesn’t. He certainly wasn’t equating that to a session of drinking per say. The way I read that anyway.

 

Less intensity, probably, up to a point. But not being interested in beers that don't go all-out for maximum intensity seems like a kind of oddly limiting approach - it'd be a bit like refusing to listen to music that isn't performed by a full orchestra, piano, choir and vocal soloists because why would you have fewer parts when you can have MORE. Beers can be not super-intense but still be fantastically balanced, complex, subtle, surprising and basically damn tasty...

 

I've always thought some of those boozy Belgian ales were more complex at least in part due to their higher ABV, but that could also be down to their abilities, ingredients, etc. The same could be said for barleywines. Not sure how true this is for lagers like doppelbocks?

 

The term should not be used in the USA in the first. It's just another example of the Euro- Want to be that some BA's seem to have.

 

Because better session beers in Britain are full of depth and complexity and session beers in the US craft scene are usually watered down IPAs.

Forest & Main here in southeast Pennsylvania makes delicious small ABV stouts full of delicious malt depth that puts most of today’s imperial stouts to shame, as well as a variety of other great low-ABV milds, bitters and saisons.

If people were drinking more styles than just IPAs — and also got into sociable pub or biergarten drinking, rather than drinking in front of the TV or a website — I think session beers would be a lot more popular here.

 

I think Doppelbocks can be somewhat complex, but the big difference between say a Belgian ale and a Doppelbock is the yeast. Belgian yeast can add a whole other dimension that a lager may not have.

With Barleywines, especially American ones, they tend to be hoppier. Over time the hops fade and the beer can become more complex, or at least different.

For me personally, I want a Doppelbock fresher.

Then there's Weizenbocks which are a different animal altogether. Those can be just as complex as a Belgian ale or a Barleywine in my opinion. Beers like Aventinus have so much going on, and the brewery even encourages aging as well.

I think many people in the US are visiting tap rooms and beer gardens now.

 

Another reason sessionable beers at around 3.5% are specific to the UK is probably how much they benefit from being served on cask. Besides the lower carbonation, the warmer serving temperature and development in the cask both add to tasting a full range of flavors.

Not many places in the US serve sessionable beers on cask and do it right.

Not that I’m an expert on German beer, but in Bavaria they seem to be happy drinking a couple of liters or more of 5% lager in the Biergarten. I’m not aware of sessionable beers in the English sense. I was told that Radlers are for when you are biking or exercising.

 

It isn't.

It doesn't.

 

Elaborate

 

In spirits, the alcohol content is literally what's extracting and holding the flavors from the barrel. The concentration of alcohol is directly related to the concentration of flavor. Beer has a lot more potential ways to be flavorful that don't depend on large concentrations of alcohol.

 

But does increased alcohol ever mask/hide flavors in beer?

 

That’s true. My impression of the cultures of most US taprooms and the idyllic UK corner pub is different, though. I’ve never been to Britain, though, so it’s more in my imagination than any real-world experience. But one of the things I imagine being different is having milds, bitters, brown ales and low ABV stouts more readily available than 8% DIPAs, 12% BBA Imperial Stouts and Session IPAs.

 

Are you sure? Higher ABV is able to support those "big flavors", otherwise, you'd find stouts and IPA with low ABV and same "intensity" as their "imperial" cousins

 

Berliner Weisse is not a popular style in Berlin or the rest of Germany

https://www.beeradvocate.com/articles/8188/wheres-the-berliner-weisse-in-berlin/

https://www.ft.com/content/54716302-bb98-11e8-8274-55b72926558f

@Snowcrash000

 

No it most certainly is not from what I've observed in Germany and heard.

I was going to write that as a caveat, but it's a low ABV German style that's not a Radler.

 

Agreed, I wish session Ales were common here.

 

I think it is impossible to ignore the different tax systems in place in each country. Also the split between off-trade on-trade which for the UK was 53%-47% respectively for 2018. With the higher average price in the on-trade compared with the off trade and a large percentage of consumption taking place on-trade I imagine that consumers are going to be more price conscious overall and be more open towards lower priced options even if that means a lower abv (more watery beer).

I don't think you would see this headline in the US:
"Coming Saturday - the people's pint! New range of 2.8% beers which will be 50p cheaper thanks to tax reduction"

Where the government essentially creates a market segment over night through legislation (with the participation of the brewers of course) with the help of tax incentives. In Sweden we also have a 2.8% abv segment, created when Sweden entered the EU in 1995 and it was allowed to free beers up to that abv from alcohol taxation (the EU is currently debating raising that limit to 3.5%, which is the upper limit for beers sold in grocery stores here).