West Coast IPA

I'm not sold on a separate category for this one. I feel the IPA-American is the appropriate home. It is the style.

 

I'm open for discussion but that is my starting point.

 

Expand on your discussion.

 

I think most people recognize that any more classically styled variations of IPA are essentially English IPA, so to break American IPA into West Coast IPA versus American really isn't necessary.

Before NE IPA came around, WC IPA was IPA, as it fully and entirely overtook the IPA category, relegating English IPA into its own realm.

NE IPA hit the scene as the sweeter, fluffier, fuller and hazier beer while America/WC IPA remained the bitter, clearer, crisper beer, with English staying in the English realm of milder in almost every way, a sort of middle ground.

 

This is another example of the slippery slope. Personally, I just add a comment in the review. West Coast version / East Coast variant. No big deal.

 

Agreed, and I do the same. Noting it in the review I think is substantial enough.

I did see the merit in giving NEIPA it's own category, but I think separating West Coast is unnecessary. I too think that putting them into the American IPA category suffices.

 

I remember back in the early/mid 2000s we had West Coast IPAs - hoppier, big citrus profile, clean/clear, orange in color, East Coast IPAs - maltier, amber in color, clean/clear. Then Hill Farmstead changed things, maybe some other brewers as well. I think the normal IPA at that time was the east coast version, then the west coast came out, that changed the style big time.

Cheers!

 

I prefer to keep West Coast IPAs in the IPA - American together. Lines blur, then the door of debate is open for West Coast Pale Ale, IPA, Imperial come in as well.

PS: On a simple note, I think the current title listed on Beer Advocate of the style "IPA - Imperial" needs changed to "IPA - American Imperial"...as currently none of the NEIPA 8%+ brews are put in this style but kept in the NEIPA style, so IMO it would help to better define, espeicially if there was a progression to the creation of a "NEIPA - Imperial" beer style on this site.

 

For what it's worth I agree with the OP, it would be great to have a West Coast IPA style.

I love old school West Coast IPAs & am about done with NE IPAs - just too many out there that just taste under attenuated & stupidly sweet with little differentiation to them. I would love to have this as a style, so as not to have to scan through 3-4 reviews to figure out if the "American IPA" is a hazy or not.

There are slippery slopes in every one of these style discussions & the styles could certainly be watered down enough to be meaningless. But in this case I think the style is very specific & nobody drinking one would recognize it as anything else.

 

With hazy/NE IPA's out of the American IPA mix, I think this sub-category would just be confusing as most breweries do not use this terminology. If they do now-a-days its just to designate it's not a hazy IPA. Plus, I think someone can tell the difference between a classic "East Coast" IPA beer like Victory Hop Devil with significant malt flavor, and a classic drier West Coast IPA. But then what about those in the middle (both geographically and flavor wise) like Bell's Two Hearted?

 

I am for an IPA - West Coast style category. I find that designation useful for thinking about a lot of beers, and for encouraging more (non-West Coast) brewers to make them. IMO, that would leave unfiltered (i.e., Hazy) IPAs, good ol' traditional malty IPAs, session IPAs, and other miscellania to fill out the American IPA category.