Are we approaching a perfect beer or just getting bored with current styles?

Neither.

 

I think perfect beers have already been made, but people keep thinking something can be better than focal banger, tree house offerings, coveted bourbon barrel stouts, etc.

I like the idea that great beers have already been made and more are coming.

 

Technical perfection makes for a very boring beer and I think it's been achieved many times. Reason I like trying beers is for the crazy, fun stuff I've never had before and doesn't always taste that great!

 

I suppose you could consider it approaching perfect. There are so many breweries that can make outstanding beers, that the different between some of them is near on negligible. Think about the Olympics, and the minute difference between first and last. With more and more outstanding breweries, it becomes harder to stand out and win with a lead.

 

Perfect beer? Not possible if ratings come into play and they have to. No perfect 5 beer evah on the top beers list of any beer centric website.

And no, I am not bored with the "current" styles. For the vast majority, I have found some that tickled my fancy. Seeking out samples of beer styles I don't favour and finding at least 1 that agrees with my palate is sooo rewarding. Prost!

 

Gose/sours seem to have exploded this summer... granted, they were around in the previous years, but damn, everyone's got a gose out now. Hopefully, when summer grinds to a halt, gose production will drop off a bit.

 

There is no perfect beer.

That said, I am not sure that the latest trend of breweries making 10-20 different DIPAs and 10-20 different IPAs is moving the beer world forward.

 

I'm not sure I want perfect beer anymore than I'd want to hang around with perfect people. Vive la difference.

 

The perfect beer has been being brewed in Chico CA for over 35 years.

 

Agree with 57md, just like a perfect world, there can be no perfect beer. Beer is like us. We are different. We are unique under are own conditions. We have learned to love, not just ourselves and others, but many other things in life including beer for their imperfections. There are some who would consider "bitterness" or "booziness" or "sour" and "roasty" flavors to be an imperfection or a blight within a particular style of beer that they love, whereas to others, some of those flavors are simply what they love. As long as we live in a world of differing tastes, and have different styles of beer that cater to those particular tastes, there will be no such thing as a perfect beer....and thank God for that

 

If there were a perfect beer, we'd have nothing to talk about here anymore. Me, I'm hoping to see a trend towards more classic styles, specifically lagers (Märzens, Helles/Dunkel Munich Lagers, Pilsners, etc.) rather than the big, in your face, palate wreckers that dominate today. I don't think there's anything wrong with those types (e.g., juicy IPAs and barrel aged stouts), but for me, they get in the way of conversation and require too much of my attention to enjoy. I'm just starting to get back into different lagers (very happy that O-fests are now lining the shelves) and am trying to bring beer back to what it originally was for me--a simple pleasure to accompany good food/friends/family etc.

 

X2. When I think about a "perfect beer" my mind passes over the personally high rated big stouts, dipas etc and what comes to mind are offerings that are not extreme in any way. Namely weihenstephaner original is the beer I think of when I think of "perfect".

 

Beer Geeks are constantly looking for the next BIG thing. As long as US craft breweries cater to the Beer Geek market you can be rest assured that there will be constant development here.

Cheers!

P.S. Who would have guessed that Sierra Nevada would produce a year round Gose beer brewed using Prickly Pear!?!

 

Perfect/near perfect beers have already been nailed in England, Germany and Belgium for various styles over the past decades/centuries. The U.S. has been steadily improving the quality in beer making overall year after year, both in making tasty old world beers closer to the origniators, new hybrid styles that are amazing, and resurrecting extinct styles and improving them. The beer quality is still improving IMO as a whole and quality beers continue to get easier to find even with a lot of startups brewers making not very good beer. Some perfect beers are being made along the way as well.

 

I think most people are wired to get bored with something that they experience regularly, it becomes mundane rather than special. It might still serve a purpose, and be enjoyed, but it wont generate the same level of excitement anymore. Perfection can thus never be achieved for perpetuity imo, it can only be fleeting and temporary. But enjoyment can be achieved and maintained over the long haul, at least with some people.