Back to Basics

I believe the thick stouts of today are mostly made through much longer boil times and perhaps extended aging. Adding lactose to stouts isn't a new thing but that's not how breweries are achieving the body on lots of these modern highly regarded stouts.
Same with the fruit smoothie thing, humans have been adding fruit to beet since the beginning of beer but I'm not aware of a tradition that involves basically adding soured ales to fruit smoothies.

Again, I'm not personally a big fan of those particual innovations. But that doesn't preclude them from being acknowledged as a new addition to the canon of brewing technique.

 

I am so conditioned by Dovetail $15+ packs that I just walk by without paying attention. Metro's Jet Stream is not a bad beer, but they make it only occasionally, not every year I think, and it does not always make it to our far suburbs. I do make border runs, but I actively dislike Dancing Man. If I were compelled to buy domestic I'd go with Oberon.

 

But I don't think long boils are anything new, if they are let me know (as in breweries didn't know about it, or couldn't do it before, they just chose to do something else), and almost all new big ABV stouts I see around me use lactose and a bunch of ther crap, though why they would be making them in Texas all year round is beyond me (and another topic ha). I'm a huge Miles Davis fan, Kind of Blue made every other jazz and jam band from the 60's and 70's use modes. Though he didn't create modes, and other musicians new about modes before, he just made it the trendy popular and sophisticated thing to do. I don't know, I'm probably just being ornery for no good reason here, carry on

 

Well, no. Brewers have adding various things to beers for centuries, and probably longer. Adding a thing that hasn't been added before isn't innovation, it's just adding different things.

 

My budget understands completely.

Really? I think it's a very good rendition of the style.

Well, I like Oberon a lot -- big favorite for many years, but it's not a Weizen. And really, if you count it in the modernization of the American Pale Wheat Ale, it's not really "traditional," either.[/QUOTE]

 

So you're stance is that there is no more space.for innovation in brewing beer? Unless.someone invents an entirely new process that has never been used in any form in brewing?

I think people get hung up on the word innovation because it seems they often interpret it to mean invention. Adding fruit to a sour ale isn't anything new.MMixing a sour ale 50/50 with fruit puree is an innovation, its a different way of doing something, a change in a typical process. I wouldn't call pastry stouts an innovation but I would say that the super long boils and extended aging that brewers use to achieve this super viscous body is an innovation.

I think the jazz example that @champ103 cited above is a perfect example of a reasonable threshold for innovation. It's not invention its just taking existing inputs/processes and using them in modified ways to produce a novel outcome

 

A couple things. I certainly think there is room for innovation left in brewing, and the dictionary agrees with your usage: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/innovation . I do tend to see innovation closer to invention than just doing things differently. Shrug.

I'm also of the opinion that there is very little new under the sun, things just get adapted to new uses and approaches. I don't think the percentage of fruit added is an innovation, just a change in the amount. I'm not actually sure what it would take for me to see as innovation in the brewing world, (but again, I tend to see innovation as a synonym of invention), so unless, for example, someone develops a way to make wort without steeping grain (innovative and inventive), instead of just a different piece of equipment, process, or ingredient, innovation is gonna be rare, in my view. Giving an old thing a new name does not make it a new thing.

 

I would kind of argue yes, that very little innovation has happened for beer styles overall. The actual brewing tech has grown a lot, and is where the real innovation is IMO, and maybe that splitting hairs on my part. Though taking my music analogy further, the creation of the 12 inch LP was the catalyst for much of musical expanses, because from that point on a musician could present 40 minutes of music and an entire artistic vision to people for home consumption. That could never have happened before. Without it, no Kind of Blue, no Sgt Pepper, no insert favorite influential music you like from the last 80 years. The music itself is just rearranging of theories and influences from a particular genre. Anyway, those are my thoughts, good discussion.

 

Ya I definitely see the same thing. And I think that it hits on something that is central to the whole issue. I'll use a local brewery as an example. They are a wonderful.brewery who makes many many styles. They have an altbier, a dubbel, a kolsch, a bitter, a triple, a dry Irish stout, a simple porter, two or three pilsners (one German regular feature plus they've made an " Italian" and I believe another one off), plus other basic styles.

They also have about 10 regular rotating pale ale/ipas plus a constant stream of one off/experimental hoppy beers. Why? Probably because the ticker crowd overlaps heavily with the hop head crowd while the altvier drinker probably is happy to drink the same (good) alt pint after pint.

 

Being the 7492nd brewer to dump candy or cup cakes or fruit puree into a beer is not innovation.

It is trend chasing, the polar opposite of innovation.

 

So no breweries should adopt the innovations others make? I don't understand this line of reasoning at all, no one is saying (well, I'm sure we could find someone saying it) that every brewery thay makes a milkshake IPA or a smoothie sour is innovating but the introduction of those styles are the result of innovation from multiple sources within the industry.

 

Shame on u Pooh bah. U should know it’s not that simple.

 

Nice strawman, but that's not what I said.

 

OK well what you said was simply an evisceration of a straw man argument that no one put forward. But you can rest easy knowing that you are correct, being the 8000th person to do a thing does not make you an innovator

 

Actually, it is that simple.

 

I just want Sierra Nevada to bring back Summerfest. The hazy easy drinking summer brew they put out this year to replace it sucks. There are alternatives but I would really rather be able to buy 12 packs of Summerfest.

 

I think mastering the basics is important in any art and science (and brewing, in my opinion, is both art or science). So much of our culture pushes people to get a C- in the basics and an A+ in creativity and innovation. I think that causes problems in many arenas, brewing being just one.

I could easily live out my days with a steady supply of Weinstephaner Helles, Timothy Taylor Landlord, and Sam Smith Taddy Porter.

 

My go-to beers these days are SNPA and Trapp helles, with something more exotic occasionally showing up. It's just good beer. I like a good IPA, of any variety but it is not my favorite style. Good bocks,hefes, saisons, wee heavies and dubbels are my favorites. These are a little hard to find around here. Too much shelf space has been ceded to IPA's, cider and now seltzer. I don't have anything against cider, except when mediocre examples crowd my favorite beers off the shelves. Can't really get into seltzer.