What is your biggest problem as a craft beer lover?

Any local craft breweries producing Vienna Lagers in your area?

I am fortunate that I have two small, local craft breweries that produce high quality Vienna Lagers near me; one of those breweries is walking distance from my house. The other brewery chooses to serve their Vienna Lager using a Czech side-pull tap which greatly accentuates the mouthfeel of that beer.

Cheers!

 

Just came across a problem at, but not unique to, WoB; beers served too cold.
I get that all of their kegs are stored in the same cooler, but I just got a draft of Chimay tripel served at 35°-40°. A temp that does no favors for the beer

 

Bill, I have had this happen a few times and while patience is not always my strong suit (as you will soon read) the beer will eventually warm up.

What I have done in situations similar to yours is I wrap both of my hands around the chalice and use my body heat to warm up the beer. A bartender once saw me does this and with a perplexed look on his face he asked me what I was doing. I replied: You folks are serving this beer too cold so I am warming the beer up with my hands. This method does result in having chilled hand but: the things we do for beer?

Cheers!

 

That's a travesty! You must be east/central CA? I've never encountered that level of uniformity west of I-5 (although I haven't spent too much time between the 5 and 101 south of sac, so maybe its that barren out there?)

I believe that any problem can be its own solution. When I've encountered this too cold beer issue I simply order another beer, one that is low abv and suited to cold temps, and drinking that beer makes waiting for my original order to warm up a piece of cake!

 

ahhhh, if only the restaurant would embrace the idea of 6 or 8 oz flights. I share your frustration, although more often or not, the one I eventually choose turns out to be tapped out. One time my first two choices from the menu were dry so they actually comp'd me my third choice.

 

I'd echo what others have said. Too many of the same style. Go into a bottle shop and it seems like 50% or more is IPA's. I'd like to see more saisons, Belgians, porters, scotch ales, kolsch, etc.

 

Hangovers and spending too much money.

 

Unfortunately those others styles just don't really sell, I keep as much as I possibly can on hand and if it doesn't have fruit or hops it requires aggressive upselling to keep it moving.

 

Too many artsy fartsy beers deviating from the style.
Too many "grocery" ingredient beers.
Too many IPA's.
Variety packs have no variety.
Too many barrel aged stouts.
Too many dessert beers.

 

Southern Cal, near Victorville. Closest decent place for me to go is Total Wine in Rancho Cucamonga, about a 45 minute drive one way with good traffic. If I want to go to a place that stocks some real goodies then it's another 15-20 minutes beyond that to El Cerrito Liquor in Corona, which makes it about a 2 hour round trip drive for me (and about $25 in gas at today's prices).

Otherwise the only halfway decent place anywhere near me (it's about 20 minutes away) is a Valero gas station "beer cave" which actually is smaller than your average home walk in closet (you can almost stretch out your arms and touch the sides), and is mostly IPAs. Once in a while they get some interesting stuff there, but like I said, a very IPA heavy selection.

 

Damn, that is rough. One upside, you are one of the few people for whom the cost.of shipping from a brewery might actually be an economical way of obtaining beers. Most charge around $20 for a case and you can get a wide variety of styles!

 

You're absolutely right. I've done quite a bit of online ordering since the breweries started offering it, and in almost all cases it is cheaper than me making a drive to go to a decent store or brewery myself.

The only downside is now that the pandemic seems to be easing up I've noticed some breweries have either stopped offering online ordering/shipping or have cut back on their selection. Oh well, a small price to pay for the greater good.

 

For me there are more positives than problems around craft beer (otherwise I would've stopped by now), but the biggest issues I have in order:
1. Belly/health issues
2. Narrowing of styles, all trending to hazy
3. Hype train of certain beers

 

My Dad died at 58 in 1976. We were very close and I cherish every memory of the fine man my Dad was. He was a highly decorated veteran of the Pacific theatre in the Second World War. When I was very young (3-4-5 ) 1950s Greensboro. He would take me to The Longbranch in Lawndale Shopping Center after mowing the grass. He would have a beer and I would have a hot dog. All was good. There was a A-B poster of Custer's Last Stand on the wall and I was enamored by it. I can picture it now. In the late 80s I happened by the same old neighborhood bar, had a longneck Bud and noticed the poster still on the wall. I am still transported by that moment, to an instant as a little boy and having a visceral sense of my father that persists. I would trade this experience and memories for nothing.

 

Good question! I know that much of what I'm going to say has been addressed but I'll post my points here just out of personal opinion.

1. Too many beers, not enough time.
2. Overabundance of IPA's. Would like to see more Hefeweizens, Weizenbocks, and other styles that are tough to come by.
3. Beer belly.
4. Hard to find places that sell single cans. I can't get 4-packs of everything new I want to try and I find myself having to go far to find a retail outlet that sells single cans, although they don't have all of the breweries that I can find in 4-packs in my backyard.
5. Certain breweries not being available here in New Jersey, as I have to cross state lines to obtain then.
6. Not being able to get beer from New York breweries shipped here.
7. The "arms race" of IPA's. Tree House is wonderful but to see King Julius, then Emperor Julius, and then the next iteration makes me think that there will always be a rainbow to chase.

Yeah, this list is long but I love my beers and I know that these are all First World problems. No one forces me to drink and supposedly, I could stop at any time. In spite of these "problems", it's still a golden age now and I wouldn't trade what I've had and experienced for anything!

 

We don't have Peter Sellers anymore, but Jeff Bridges could and should give us that really cool and funny picture for our collective memories. I can really see it!

 

I see that all the time - Leighton, I presume you run a bottle shop?
I see all the time on here and other brewing forums, "I want to open a brewery / shop, and do only these fairly obscure styles..."
I can only think, "sure, and you'll be lucky to make it a year." |I can understnad wanting to concentrate on these styles - I like them all myself, but the reality of business is that you have to provide what the customer wants, even if they want Coors Light. Sure, produce and stock those other ones, but you have to sell what sells.
A place near me used to do weekly tastings, each with a different theme. We'd sometimes look at a particular brewery, sometimes a style - and those tastings are how |I got into Belgian styles, TBH.
In fact, one time we did AALs, and we basically determined, as craft beer geeks, that there were very subtle differences between Bud, Miller and Coors. Given blind, I don't think I could pick out which is which, personally.

 

I did that exact blind test once with AAL drinkers at a party and most had no idea which of the beers was their "normal" AAL.

 

My current biggest issue is that the border between our two great nations is closed (or can only be crossed with much paperwork). I used to make regular trips to NY and VT to get many of the beers that are unavailable in my province, or outside of the US. Now it is a waiting game for the border to reopen.

Otherwise, my big issue is with the flooding of the market with haze. I don't have a problem with haze, but my issue is that every damn brewery is jamming the shelves with hazy IPAs and nothing else. Give me some variety, break away from the other sheep.