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As a craft beer lover, I'm really at odds with what to think about where the scene is today. There are so many breweries out there that are brewing some really

As a craft beer lover, I'm really at odds with what to think about where the scene is today. There are so many breweries out there that are brewing some really great beer and coming up with some interesting styles. In many places there's a recapturing of what I'd call "beer as place" with beirgartens, brew-pubs, and breweries themselves having a more open and inviting experience to hang out and drink beer. It's tasty, fun, and enjoyable. But there are downsides to all of this as well. The market is SUPER trendy, and breweries have the choice of either jumping on the bandwagon of the style-du-jour or being left by the wayside. Because there are so many breweries and they are so young, the overall quality is just okay with maybe one beer being notable and the rest being slightly sub par. Then you have this issue of investment firms and bigger conglomerates buying up successful microbrews and sucking the life out of them. I love beer, and in many ways you could say that the American beer scene has never been better. But that doesn't mean that there aren't dark sides to all of that. I drank plenty of Magic Hat over the years, and it's a shame that there are certain names out there (Goose Island is one that comes to mind) that used to stand for a solid craft brewing operation that are now just marketing veneers on top of investment bankers and big corporations.

grasshopperpurp 6y ago
I used to be really into discovering beers, but I usually just drink Founders All Day IPA these days, with a German Pilsner as a backup. There are only a couple months out of the year here in Florida where I'd want something that over 5%, though.
- andygcook 6y ago
  As I venture more into my 30's, I almost exclusively drink session beers when I want something hoppy. Drinking even one 8%+ ABV DIPA leaves me pretty much useless the next day. Founders All Day IPA is a solid go to. Other session IPAs/APAs I enjoy are Notch Left of the Dial, Lagunita's DayTime, Harpoon Rec League, and Zero Gravity Little Wolf APA.
  - grasshopperpurp 6y ago
    I like the Daytime, but I don't believe I've tried the others. I'll sprinkle them in the rotation - assuming they're available in Florida. Ty!
- beezle 6y ago
  You should try to get your hand on some of Lawson's Super Session #N, N varying by time of year and reflective of the type of hops used.
  - grasshopperpurp 6y ago
    I'll keep an eye out for it - very cool idea. Thanks for the rec!
- kodt 6y ago
  It’s funny because some of the “hot” breweries in Florida are known for making big sweet 15% barrel aged stouts year round.
  - grasshopperpurp 6y ago
    Yes, it is! Back when I was in the middle of my discovery phase we went to a Cigar City release party for their barrel-aged stouts. It was June or July, and everyone was packed into the warehouse - sweaty and impatient, as the event was a mess. But, the Cucumber Saison was the best thing about the experience. Unfortunately, it's only good (imo) on tap. But, to your point, even Cigar City's flagship IPA is 7.5% and way too heavy for the climate. We find it very ironic that a brewery from Michigan makes a wider, better range of refreshing beers. I hope they're able to stay open after all of this, but my favorite brewery in the area is Flying Boat (St. Pete). They don't distribute, but their beers are consistently refreshing across styles. It's located at the end of a quiet, suburban neighborhood, so you you can have a beer outside and watch the neighbors mow their lawns.
- MrMan 6y ago
  La Rubia for me
itronitron 6y ago
If you're feeling down on the US craft beer scene just visit Europe (after Covid runs it's course) and you may realize that US craft beer is quite strong by comparison.
- coldpie 6y ago
  I started drinking in the mid-2000s. This was around when the American craft brew scene was really taking over the nation, but the jokes all my European colleagues told were about how American beer is piss-water. Imagine my surprise when I went to Europe, this fabled land of "real beer", and found that they had at most one or two taps at the bar, and asked if I wanted "dark" or "light". No brand names, no styles, no variety. Just a perfectly adequate, ho-hum ale, pint after pint. This is better than our huge, burgeoning, incredibly active and creative craft beer scene? It seems like the "American piss-water" jokes have finally subsided today, but for a good decade there, I was real defensive about the American beer scene :) [*] Note: This is a friendly, lighthearted anecdote about my personal experience 15 years ago. Please take it in the spirit it is intended. I miss you, Europe.
  - dang 6y ago
    It's true, that reputation lasted for many decades. Here's Monty Python's classic "making love in a canoe" joke from 1979: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8aPABF7nW4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8aPABF7nW4 [1]. Also this from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4336790 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4336790: The old brewer's joke which goes like this (I'll use your examples): A Budweiser salesman, a Coors salesman, and an Anchor Steam salesman meet in the hotel bar at a beer convention. The Budweiser man says, "I'll have a Budweiser." The Coors man says, "I'll have a Coors." The Anchor Steam man says, "Just water for me." The other two look at him and say "What? Just water?" "Well," he says, "since you guys aren't having beer I won't either." The American craft beer Renaissance has been an amazing thing. Thank you Jimmy Carter! https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2010/08/how-jimmy-carter-saved-craft-beer/315886/ https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2010/08/how-jimm... ... err, maybe: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2010/08/jimmy-carter-not-the-king-of-beers-updated/61599/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2010/08/jimmy-c... [1] One of the comments on that YouTube clip complains that it was originally a Canadian joke. The canoe makes me think that might be true.
kevin_thibedeau 6y ago
I'm really getting tired of the IPA fad. I loved IPAs when they were a niche product and you could sample most of them in a reasonable time span. Now they're 90% of the shelf space and other deserving varieties are hard to find. Most of the newcomers are poorly executed hacks that follow the simplistic formula: IPA == bitter hops, therefore let's overload on hops. I won't drink any IPA that wasn't around 10 years ago just to filter out the garbage.
- Ductapemaster 6y ago
  Really sorry you feel that way bud. Honestly, I totally get it — IPAs are way over-represented in the craft beer scene, especially in CA where I'm at. However, their prominence has led to a really interesting market of new IPAs that use brand new styles of hops, or hops that traditionally have been unavailable in the US market. For example, hops from New Zealand have made their way to the US and now that the trendiness of "magic mystery" hops from another place has died down, some beers made with them are just fantastic and taste nothing like the IPSs of yesteryear. I totally get being tired out of an extremely prominent style, but I'd encourage you to seek out some brews made with new hops as some of them are just very different and exciting. Of course, there's tons of other beer out there that's not an IPA, so by all means please continue to explore those spaces too!
- vb6sp6 6y ago
  > I won't drink any IPA that wasn't around 10 years ago just to filter out the garbage You might be missing out on some really goods ones with this strategy
  - albedoa 6y ago
    No kidding! Tree House was founded in 2011. You won't find anyone calling their beers formulaic garbage. I understand the want to change it up. I seek out breweries that I haven't been to before or that have a deep catalog of beers that aren't found on shelves. Flights are a great way to try those beers, and their styles are usually of more variety. One of my favorite breweries is Hermit Thrush in Brattleboro, Vermont. They specialize in sours, mostly aged. They source their aging barrels from all types of industries. Not only does the same recipe result in a different beer across multiple barrels, the same recipe results in a different beer each time a barrel is used. If you look, you will find so much to explore. The space might feel dominated by IPAs, but other styles are benefitting from the rise of beer culture.
snapetom 6y ago
I've personally witnessed/been involved with the quality decline and the trendiness you speak of with two other "craft" markets - coffee in the mid 90's and liquor distilleries in the past 10 years. When I talk to tourists here in Seattle, of course they eventually ask about the best coffee places. If they're at least able to add "not Starbucks," I'm honest with them and tell them that there's really only two downtown that I like. These days, there are plenty of roasters, but the majority are pretty meh to outright bad. Same thing with craft distilling in the past 10 years. The first wave of small batch distillers were revolutionary, but then many imitators jumped on the bandwagon. Bars and restaurants pitch them as being "local" and therefore, good. Being local has nothing to do with being good. Some of the worst alcohol I've had were "local." It's gotten to the point where I purposely avoid ordering anything "local" unless I know who's involved in the distillery. And don't get me started on "craft vodka." As with the discussion of online communities (reddit, Facebook) recently, I wonder if there's anything that remains good once it gains popularity. Or maybe I'm just an elitist hipster.
- wk_end 6y ago
  Just curious - which two roasters in Seattle do you like?
  - snapetom 6y ago
    Haha. Anchorhead and Slate. Slate got some bad press last year on labor practices at their stores, but they still roast excellent coffee. If you're just outside of downtown either in SLU or south of Pioneer Square, Elm is good, too. There's also Bluebeard in Tacoma which is fantastic.
- chipotle_coyote 6y ago
  So which are the two downtown that you like? :) I'm not in Seattle -- I'm in Silicon Valley, with a fairly high chance of ending up in Sacramento this time next year -- but I'm always curious.
  - snapetom 6y ago
bpyne 6y ago
I supported American craft beer since the mid-90's until a few years ago when everyone went nuts with hops. American breweries seem to have become a copycat industry. Nowadays I'm going back to European beers. In particular, I'm looking for German doppelbock these days. But anything from Belgium is usually excellent.
- scottlocklin 6y ago
  Americans are as much sheep with beer now as they were when your choices were Bud, Michelob and Schlitz. Overhopped beer is disgusting and generally (badly) hiding infections or stale malt tastes. The only good thing you can say about it, besides the fact that it's estrogenic enough to make boobs grow[1], is it tastes as shitty when it travels as it does when it's fresh. [1]https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/84/6/2249/2864760 https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/84/6/2249/2864760
  - krebs_liebhaber 6y ago
    Forget "soyboys" - beer-boobs are the real threat.
WorldMaker 6y ago
> The market is SUPER trendy, and breweries have the choice of either jumping on the bandwagon of the style-du-jour or being left by the wayside. Because there are so many breweries and they are so young, the overall quality is just okay with maybe one beer being notable and the rest being slightly sub par. Then you have this issue of investment firms and bigger conglomerates buying up successful microbrews and sucking the life out of them. If there's hope, and it's hard to see sometimes, it's that most of the trends are at most regional. It's more rare than not that one of these trends jumps coasts, for instance. Many of these trends seem to be truly localized, or at least move in waves. (Anecdotally, by the time my West Coast friends were talking about hazy IPAs/New England IPAs, the trend had already come and gone in Kentucky.) From the level of "everybody in my city is drinking the same thing" perspective it feels the same, but from a high level it mostly means that no big corporation is themselves dominating the trends, almost all of them look to be following the trends, lagging them quite a bit, and/or entirely missing them. Goose Island, to follow your example, is no longer seen as an innovator even if folks don't know the why is that they are a brand arm of A-B InBev (the international conglomerate owners of Budweiser, etc), and no longer "local" despite how much they pretend to be. The last nationally distributed beer I can recall trending as a fad is the one mentioned in this article, Magic Hat #9, and as the article itself points out, it is possible to take comfort that in building that success model Magic Hat more accidentally burnt national distribution bridges behind them than pave the way for more conglomerates to follow (or even the shell of themselves owned by a conglomerate to continue to succeed at that level), all the while paving behind them communities more likely build locally, trend regionally at best.

grasshopperpurp 6y ago

I used to be really into discovering beers, but I usually just drink Founders All Day IPA these days, with a German Pilsner as a backup. There are only a couple months out of the year here in Florida where I'd want something that over 5%, though.

andygcook 6y ago
As I venture more into my 30's, I almost exclusively drink session beers when I want something hoppy. Drinking even one 8%+ ABV DIPA leaves me pretty much useless the next day. Founders All Day IPA is a solid go to. Other session IPAs/APAs I enjoy are Notch Left of the Dial, Lagunita's DayTime, Harpoon Rec League, and Zero Gravity Little Wolf APA.
- grasshopperpurp 6y ago
  I like the Daytime, but I don't believe I've tried the others. I'll sprinkle them in the rotation - assuming they're available in Florida. Ty!
beezle 6y ago
You should try to get your hand on some of Lawson's Super Session #N, N varying by time of year and reflective of the type of hops used.
- grasshopperpurp 6y ago
  I'll keep an eye out for it - very cool idea. Thanks for the rec!
kodt 6y ago
It’s funny because some of the “hot” breweries in Florida are known for making big sweet 15% barrel aged stouts year round.
- grasshopperpurp 6y ago
  Yes, it is! Back when I was in the middle of my discovery phase we went to a Cigar City release party for their barrel-aged stouts. It was June or July, and everyone was packed into the warehouse - sweaty and impatient, as the event was a mess. But, the Cucumber Saison was the best thing about the experience. Unfortunately, it's only good (imo) on tap. But, to your point, even Cigar City's flagship IPA is 7.5% and way too heavy for the climate. We find it very ironic that a brewery from Michigan makes a wider, better range of refreshing beers. I hope they're able to stay open after all of this, but my favorite brewery in the area is Flying Boat (St. Pete). They don't distribute, but their beers are consistently refreshing across styles. It's located at the end of a quiet, suburban neighborhood, so you you can have a beer outside and watch the neighbors mow their lawns.
MrMan 6y ago
La Rubia for me

itronitron 6y ago

If you're feeling down on the US craft beer scene just visit Europe (after Covid runs it's course) and you may realize that US craft beer is quite strong by comparison.

coldpie 6y ago
I started drinking in the mid-2000s. This was around when the American craft brew scene was really taking over the nation, but the jokes all my European colleagues told were about how American beer is piss-water. Imagine my surprise when I went to Europe, this fabled land of "real beer", and found that they had at most one or two taps at the bar, and asked if I wanted "dark" or "light". No brand names, no styles, no variety. Just a perfectly adequate, ho-hum ale, pint after pint. This is better than our huge, burgeoning, incredibly active and creative craft beer scene? It seems like the "American piss-water" jokes have finally subsided today, but for a good decade there, I was real defensive about the American beer scene :) [*] Note: This is a friendly, lighthearted anecdote about my personal experience 15 years ago. Please take it in the spirit it is intended. I miss you, Europe.
- dang 6y ago
  It's true, that reputation lasted for many decades. Here's Monty Python's classic "making love in a canoe" joke from 1979: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8aPABF7nW4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8aPABF7nW4 [1]. Also this from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4336790 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4336790: The old brewer's joke which goes like this (I'll use your examples): A Budweiser salesman, a Coors salesman, and an Anchor Steam salesman meet in the hotel bar at a beer convention. The Budweiser man says, "I'll have a Budweiser." The Coors man says, "I'll have a Coors." The Anchor Steam man says, "Just water for me." The other two look at him and say "What? Just water?" "Well," he says, "since you guys aren't having beer I won't either." The American craft beer Renaissance has been an amazing thing. Thank you Jimmy Carter! https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2010/08/how-jimmy-carter-saved-craft-beer/315886/ https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2010/08/how-jimm... ... err, maybe: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2010/08/jimmy-carter-not-the-king-of-beers-updated/61599/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2010/08/jimmy-c... [1] One of the comments on that YouTube clip complains that it was originally a Canadian joke. The canoe makes me think that might be true.

kevin_thibedeau 6y ago

I'm really getting tired of the IPA fad. I loved IPAs when they were a niche product and you could sample most of them in a reasonable time span. Now they're 90% of the shelf space and other deserving varieties are hard to find. Most of the newcomers are poorly executed hacks that follow the simplistic formula: IPA == bitter hops, therefore let's overload on hops. I won't drink any IPA that wasn't around 10 years ago just to filter out the garbage.

Ductapemaster 6y ago
Really sorry you feel that way bud. Honestly, I totally get it — IPAs are way over-represented in the craft beer scene, especially in CA where I'm at. However, their prominence has led to a really interesting market of new IPAs that use brand new styles of hops, or hops that traditionally have been unavailable in the US market. For example, hops from New Zealand have made their way to the US and now that the trendiness of "magic mystery" hops from another place has died down, some beers made with them are just fantastic and taste nothing like the IPSs of yesteryear. I totally get being tired out of an extremely prominent style, but I'd encourage you to seek out some brews made with new hops as some of them are just very different and exciting. Of course, there's tons of other beer out there that's not an IPA, so by all means please continue to explore those spaces too!
vb6sp6 6y ago
> I won't drink any IPA that wasn't around 10 years ago just to filter out the garbage You might be missing out on some really goods ones with this strategy
- albedoa 6y ago
  No kidding! Tree House was founded in 2011. You won't find anyone calling their beers formulaic garbage. I understand the want to change it up. I seek out breweries that I haven't been to before or that have a deep catalog of beers that aren't found on shelves. Flights are a great way to try those beers, and their styles are usually of more variety. One of my favorite breweries is Hermit Thrush in Brattleboro, Vermont. They specialize in sours, mostly aged. They source their aging barrels from all types of industries. Not only does the same recipe result in a different beer across multiple barrels, the same recipe results in a different beer each time a barrel is used. If you look, you will find so much to explore. The space might feel dominated by IPAs, but other styles are benefitting from the rise of beer culture.

snapetom 6y ago

I've personally witnessed/been involved with the quality decline and the trendiness you speak of with two other "craft" markets - coffee in the mid 90's and liquor distilleries in the past 10 years. When I talk to tourists here in Seattle, of course they eventually ask about the best coffee places. If they're at least able to add "not Starbucks," I'm honest with them and tell them that there's really only two downtown that I like. These days, there are plenty of roasters, but the majority are pretty meh to outright bad. Same thing with craft distilling in the past 10 years. The first wave of small batch distillers were revolutionary, but then many imitators jumped on the bandwagon. Bars and restaurants pitch them as being "local" and therefore, good. Being local has nothing to do with being good. Some of the worst alcohol I've had were "local." It's gotten to the point where I purposely avoid ordering anything "local" unless I know who's involved in the distillery. And don't get me started on "craft vodka." As with the discussion of online communities (reddit, Facebook) recently, I wonder if there's anything that remains good once it gains popularity. Or maybe I'm just an elitist hipster.

wk_end 6y ago
Just curious - which two roasters in Seattle do you like?
- snapetom 6y ago
  Haha. Anchorhead and Slate. Slate got some bad press last year on labor practices at their stores, but they still roast excellent coffee. If you're just outside of downtown either in SLU or south of Pioneer Square, Elm is good, too. There's also Bluebeard in Tacoma which is fantastic.
chipotle_coyote 6y ago
So which are the two downtown that you like? :) I'm not in Seattle -- I'm in Silicon Valley, with a fairly high chance of ending up in Sacramento this time next year -- but I'm always curious.
- snapetom 6y ago

bpyne 6y ago

I supported American craft beer since the mid-90's until a few years ago when everyone went nuts with hops. American breweries seem to have become a copycat industry. Nowadays I'm going back to European beers. In particular, I'm looking for German doppelbock these days. But anything from Belgium is usually excellent.

scottlocklin 6y ago
Americans are as much sheep with beer now as they were when your choices were Bud, Michelob and Schlitz. Overhopped beer is disgusting and generally (badly) hiding infections or stale malt tastes. The only good thing you can say about it, besides the fact that it's estrogenic enough to make boobs grow[1], is it tastes as shitty when it travels as it does when it's fresh. [1]https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/84/6/2249/2864760 https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/84/6/2249/2864760
- krebs_liebhaber 6y ago
  Forget "soyboys" - beer-boobs are the real threat.

WorldMaker 6y ago

> The market is SUPER trendy, and breweries have the choice of either jumping on the bandwagon of the style-du-jour or being left by the wayside. Because there are so many breweries and they are so young, the overall quality is just okay with maybe one beer being notable and the rest being slightly sub par. Then you have this issue of investment firms and bigger conglomerates buying up successful microbrews and sucking the life out of them. If there's hope, and it's hard to see sometimes, it's that most of the trends are at most regional. It's more rare than not that one of these trends jumps coasts, for instance. Many of these trends seem to be truly localized, or at least move in waves. (Anecdotally, by the time my West Coast friends were talking about hazy IPAs/New England IPAs, the trend had already come and gone in Kentucky.) From the level of "everybody in my city is drinking the same thing" perspective it feels the same, but from a high level it mostly means that no big corporation is themselves dominating the trends, almost all of them look to be following the trends, lagging them quite a bit, and/or entirely missing them. Goose Island, to follow your example, is no longer seen as an innovator even if folks don't know the why is that they are a brand arm of A-B InBev (the international conglomerate owners of Budweiser, etc), and no longer "local" despite how much they pretend to be. The last nationally distributed beer I can recall trending as a fad is the one mentioned in this article, Magic Hat #9, and as the article itself points out, it is possible to take comfort that in building that success model Magic Hat more accidentally burnt national distribution bridges behind them than pave the way for more conglomerates to follow (or even the shell of themselves owned by a conglomerate to continue to succeed at that level), all the while paving behind them communities more likely build locally, trend regionally at best.