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Craft beer - a personal journey [1]

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Date: 2022-08-27

Who knew beer could be so diverse? Herein a selection of beers chosen by the author during a recent visit to Hopworks Urban Brewery, Portland, OR

Much to the horror of the original poster, a recent story here on DKos on liquid cannabis and the Pabst Brewing Company quickly devolved into a discussion of good and bad beer in the comments. In particular, I was astonished to read comments critical of the craft brewing industry. Much of the vitriol was directed at the recent trend toward hoppy, fruity, or hazy India pale ales. Most commenters seemed to agree that the craft brewing industry had gone to hell and was now indisputably in the toilet. Please allow me to respond.

IMHO, the development of the craft brewing industry was the third greatest accomplishment of the second half of the twentieth century — right behind the internet and the personal computer. (I think the smart phone was a 21st century development, but if I’m wrong, craft brewing falls to fourth.)

Brewing beer is straightforward. Malted barley is boiled for an hour (the “wort”) with added hops for bitterness, flavor, and aroma. (Hops are a family of aromatic flowers that are added to the wort at different times to create beer’s bitterness as well as different flavors and aromas.) Other grains or ingredients may be added to the wort at selected times in the boil. Then the mixture is cooled and yeast is added. Fermenting takes place over the course of a few weeks as the yeast interact with the starches to produce alcohol and CO2. Ale yeasts ferment at room temperatures, while lager yeasts require refrigeration. When the yeast have consumed all the available carbs, they fall back asleep and the finished beer is decanted into kegs, bottles, or cans as desired.

Prohibition destroyed the American beer industry. Before 1920, there were thousands of vibrant small breweries in the US brewing dozens of different beer styles. All those small breweries were put out of business during the Prohibition era. After Prohibition was repealed, the beer industry was dominated for more than 50 years by the 3 large brewing companies that were able to recover quickly. Regrettably, they conspired to brew a single beer style — the pilsener lager. While the original Czech pilsener was a delicate and honorable beer, the Americanized version became a bland, inoffensive style that succeeded commercially through a cynical marketing strategy that preyed on the naivete of the American public.

In the 1980s, a few small microbreweries started up in defiance of the pilsener dominance. My brother introduced me to the world of craft brewing at McMenamin’s in Portland, OR in the 1980s. Having grown up with the American pilsener as my only example of beer, I was astonished to discover that beer could take on so many different flavors, colors, and consistencies and still be called “beer.” Dark beers, hoppy beers, wheat beers, sour beers, malty beers, high alcohol beers — the choices made me giddy. Specialty recipes that hadn’t made an appearance in America for 70 years started a resurgence. Americans were soon drinking pale ales, brown ales, red ales, Scotch ales, cream ales, stouts, porters, hefeweizens, trippels, dunkels, saisons, lambics, extra special bitters, goses, and barleywines, as well as new variants of the old standby, the pilsener lager.

The beer style known as India pale ale (IPA) had been developed in England in the mid-nineteenth century with a high hop content (a preservative) and a high alcohol content (also a preservative) to survive the long voyage from England to India. The IPAs brewed in the US during the craft brewing revival quickly deviated from the original concept. While originally a hoppy beer, some brewers tried to differentiate themselves by adding even more hops to cater to the “hopheads” while some toned down the hops and alcohol content. Flavored IPAs became popular, mostly citrus flavored, but often with other fruits as well. Before the 1980s, beer drinking was mostly a male pastime. Once beer styles became more interesting, women joined the crusade, and many more recipes were developed that catered to a broader market.

To everyone’s and to no one’s surprise, the craft brewing industry grew quickly. Brewing beer is a relatively simple, foolproof process, and inexpensive to start up. Changes to the federal tax laws in 1978 allowed hobbyists to brew their own beer at home. Ingredients were added to beer that violated beer norms, which startled and irritated the beer purists, but which were ultimately settled in the marketplace. Brewers started improvising recipes to differentiate themselves from their competition, and the race was on.

A word about hazy beers, which seems to be one of the current popular fads. All beers start out hazy from the yeast and unfermented solids left in suspension, but are traditionally filtered to create a cleaner, more attractive drink. But the suspended yeast are high in vitamin B, which is not only healthier, but has a natural anti-hangover effect.

While I have rarely found a craft beer I didn’t like, I have to call out 2 of my favorites: Brew Free or Die Blood Orange IPA, brewed by the 21st Amendment Brewery in San Francisco, and Peanut Butter Milk Stout, brewed by Belching Beaver Brewery, Oceanside, CA. So much for beer purism.

I celebrate the creativity of the craft beer industry. While some recipes may shock and surprise the palate, I find the willingness of today’s brewers to try new styles and to experiment with traditional recipes to be heartening. If some styles offend beer purists, let the market be the judge, so say I.

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