[Idea] Same brew, less alcohol?

I think that the sweetness (body) tends to be heavier to balance out the higher ABV so if you take the alcohol away you will be left with a much sweeter beer.

 

I don't agree with "the higher the abv, the better". The sweetspot for me tends to be beers between 6-8%. Once you get over 8%, there's an increasing probability of being able to taste too much alcohol. There are exceptions, but once the alcohol overpowers the beer, it ceases to be beer for me.

Also - there are plenty of flavorful beers that fall under 6%.

 

Low abv, balanced, complex and great tasting brews can be brewed, certainly, however there will always be tradeoffs in comparison to the high abv big beers you are looking at. For example, that viscous mouthfeel the big beers have - that's really hard to obtain in a low-abv (<5%) beer while still building that flavor profile you want. If you are looking at really hoppy IPA's, on the other hand, you need a lot of malt to balance the hops out, again, more alcohol. You can make a killer low abv pale ale, though.

If you are asking if you can make low-abv versions of the big beers you are mentioning and still retain the flavor profile, balance, and other characteristics that make them great...the answer is going to be no. You can create flavorful reproductions, but they will be diminished versions of their high abv counterpart.

 

Malted barley is saccharified (turned to sugar) and that sugar is fermented to alcohol. Any different mount of Barley would change the ABV but also flavor. So i'm guessing it's not possible. You would end up with a variant of the beer but not the same beer flavor.

 

Same brew? no
Delicious brew? yes, I drink tasty sub- 6% beers all the time.

 

Yes, we call them Amber ales, I dig Full Sail Amber.
Low abv. DIPA's are Pale Ales, I love FW Pale 31 and Drake's 1500.
Obviously low abv. Imperial Stouts are just regular strength stouts, I like, Sierra Nevada Stout, Black Butte Porter.

 

is the 5 to 6% beer to strong for you? In the UK they have a LONG tradition of what THEY defined as session beer.
I assume you not going down that road? can you lower the malt bill yes of course. I ask your question another way, have you ever tried the so called standard beers? You know ESB, PA, Mild. Keep in mind Mild is age not a style.

many of these taste just fine, they are not over the top big crazy throw in anything you can think of beers. Home brew a few and you will understand the joy of a simple beer. its why I love a WIT. or a mild ale.

In other words the brits have been drinking these for many a year.

 

What you're generally asking is backwards.

If you go by the BJCP style guidelines than what makes up a barleywine is in part, the ABV. It falls into a range. As someone above mentioned, an Amber Ale would be a lighter ABV version.

There are definitely lower ABV beers with a lot of flavor, but I completely agree with @stealth that the actual mouthfeel and body of the beer cannot be mimicked in a lower ABV beer. To a small extent, a lower ABV Amber Ale could be sweeter (and by that, I mean have a higher FG and therefore more residual sugars). That would make the body slightly thicker. That doesn't tend to go well with type 1 Diabetes though. For your health you could get a higher ABV beer with a dryer finish and be better off in some ways.

For truly flavorful, intense beers with low ABV, I think sours are it. There are 4% ABV sours with as much flavor as some of the very heavy hitting American ales with big ABVs. Obviously they are dry and light bodied though. The extreme flavors come from a combination of aging and bacterial processes and can make some funk stuff though.

 

well go to philly or IF you can the UK. cask is the key to favor town in low ABV. IMHo YMMV

there is supposed to be a place that does cask about 1 hour south of Atlanta I been meaning to get up there to try. I got to hit dings site to find the name of it.

btw there are pockets of cask in many places, I just do not live near any. sadly.
How well done they are is a whole other topic.

 

Dont fight it. =D

 

First let me quantify my position. I consider anything under 8% a low ABV beer but that's just me.
Higher ABV = my limit of how many I have is lower = save money [sometimes].
Lower ABV = higher limit = spend more money [most of the time].
What I don't like is when there's only a $1 price difference between a 4 or 6 pack of something that's 5% and a 4 or 6 pack of something that's 8%. Yes it tastes great, but I also drink for the buzz. There are plenty of beverages that taste great and don't have alcohol so if I don't want a buzz, I'll drink them and not have to pay for alcohol.

 

IDK about you, But, I don't see nothing wrong with drinking only two of those beers. The best thing about great beer is that unless you're beer bonging bigfoot, you'll wake up fine.

I like bitter American from 21st amendment. its like 4% and has flavor. I might get booed but magic hat does a great job with having flavor and low ABV.

 

Enjoy your high alcohol beers but drink a lot of water while doing so, in between sips perhaps, and maybe a pint of water between beers. The beer stays the same, your taste & enjoyment of the flavors stay the same, but your stomach doesn't know the difference and it hits your bloodstream much differently than if you just drank a high abv beer alone.

 

You had me until the Mocha Porter comment, one of the worst craft beers I've ever had. I agree that the sweet spot is around 7%. As someone also watching my calories, I generally try to just drink less quantity and enjoy what I like. I love the effort, but even beers like Founders All Day IPA, just seem to be missing quite a bit. That being said, there are quite a few great lower ABV Saisons, APAs, Pils, etc...

Some favorites;

Hill Farmstead Edward 5.2 abv
Saison Dupont 6.5
Victory Headwaters Pale Ale 5.1
Sierra Nevada Tumber 5.5
Sam Adams Noble Pils 4.9
Victory Prima Pils 5.5
Sierra Nevada Summerfest 5.0

 

OP funny how you knew you'd get that token "send those 8%+ beers over to me I'll take care of them"

 

I definitely notice a difference in the flavor and mouthfeel once a beer sinks under around 5.5 or 6.0. Some manage to achieve more robustness than others, but at ten bucks a sixer, I don't usually take my chances with them. I think you can get some big flavors, but I don't think you can mimic the flavors and sensations brought solely by big alcohol presence without the alcohol.

On the flipside, once a beer starts pushing eight or so I think twice about the sixer because I know I'll only be able to have a couple, and once you shoot up to ten or twelve in a big bottle, I don't go there too often, cause I'm not going to come home from work on a Tuesday and crack something like that. However, those beers still have a place in my heart.

Might be fun to start sampling every low abv beer you can find though. A lot of the lists on this website are sortable by abv - you could just pick a brewery or style you like and start at the bottom.

 

Personally, I think a beer above 8% has to be pretty special to justify the calories and alcohol's unwanted side effects. If I was diabetic I wouldn't touch them...too many residuals sugars...but that's just me. However, as others stated above you won't get the same mouth feel from a low-ABV beer as you will a 8+% beer, but that doesn't mean you can't still have a ton of flavor. Especially if you like hoppy beers...a good low-abv pale ale can have a greater perceived hop flavor than many DIPAs, regardless of the listed IBUs. I wholeheartedly endorse the suggestion above for 21st Amendment Bitter American...4.2% with a great hop flavor I would take over many IPAs/DIPAs.