I suppose the connection would be that if it is ok for “west coast” IPA’s and APA’s to be out of style on IBU’s, it is ok for “east coast” IPA’s and APA’s to be out of style on clarity.
That said - MURKY beers are not good in my experience. I have had LOTS of really good “hazy” IPA’s. I have had very few “murky” IPA’s that I would call good. I am not a fan or advocate of the “yeast milkshake.”
Personally, the thing I tend to like about the “NE IPA” is the emphasis on less bitterness and more flameout/dry hop. Chloride over sulfate. Personally, I like the smoother hop flavor as opposed to the piney bitterness and assertive bite of many IPA’s.
One thing I do absolutely agree on as a downfall of the “hazy” beers… I think it does hurt the shelf life and the flavor can be less stable. But, I have had some unbelievable beers of this style fresh, or at the source. Hopefully with NHC out east, maybe some west coasters will get a chance to sample some of the beers fresher and in better condition than they might have been able to in the past. There really are some good beers being made in this “style.”
In the end, there are a lot of great beers out there. Pliny is great. Firestone Walker beers, Ballast Point, Two Hearted, Bear Republic… etc… along with Lawsons, Alchemist, Hill Farmstead, Bissel Brothers, Other Half, Tree House…etc. I have had both spectacular and terrible clear beers. Spectacular and terrible “hazy” beers.
I am always open to trying anything. Whether or not I buy a second I leave to my experience with the first.
Okay, so my point remains unchanged. If it’s hazy and tastes bad I don’t like it. If it’s hazy and doesn’t taste bad I like it. If it’s clear and tastes bad I don’t like it. If it’s clear and tastes good I do like it.
I don’t understand the pushback I’m getting from my comment. I once had a pint from a popular and successful brewery in San Diego that looked like sludge. I took a sip and sent it back. The bartender didn’t charge me for it. If it had tasted fine I would not have said a word about it. My point is that if the flavor and aroma is good, I don’t mind what the beer looks like.
Just my personal view regarding commercial or homebrewed APA/IPA/IIPA… it should be clear. If its “hazy from dry hopping” then I ought to be smelling hops. So if you are claiming the haze comes from the hops, then show me the hops! If your IPA is hazy and has no hop aroma, there’s a problem.
If you/they/we are creating a new style, I have no problem whatsoever with that. If the new style is called NEIPA cool. If that style is moderately hazy to opaque cloudy, thats fine too. But why? Is it mit heffe? Is it wheat? Is it so incredibly hopped that its milky? Any of these are fine, but it needs to be self evident. If its yeast, it should be tastey yeast. If its wheat, are we tasting wheat? If its hops, are we having our hair blown back by hop aroma?
There’s hazy and then there’s yeasty. The latter is just not something that I think goes all that well with an IPA. The first issue is stability… when the yeast drops out, you lose the flavor.
Even the “cloudy” beers of Belgium are centrifuged and reyeasted with just enough to encourage refermentation in the bottle. I guess if you’re making IPAs, and ones that are so popular that they fly off the shelf, you don’t have to worry about stability. But when the fad shifts again (and it will faster than ever in this day and age), it’s no longer going to be a very practical style.
I don’t see it as cloudy at all. If you pour in all the yeast sediment in the bottom it might be - I decant that stuff. Agreed it’s not brilliantly clear.
If you read the Bru’s Views, John Wible states that in his case the haze is protein haze from adjuncts such as flaked oats and wheat, not yeast.
I thought Heady Topper was pretty tasty. I didn’t realize it was cloudy, but I was drinking it out of a can at a Phish show. I haven’t had the chance to try beers from any of these other breweries yet.
Really? Murky means dirty looking. I can’t even see cloudy as a proper adjective for either of those breweries beers. I had a Grande Premiere that was crystal clear in the glass.
To clarify here, I’m talking clear in the sense of zero particles, etc, not color. These beers are typically centrifuged. The only particles should be the bottling yeast. I agree that the yeast particles in the Rochefort can be pesky but what you guys are describing seems at odds with every Chimay, Rochefort, Westmalle, Achel, etc that I’ve ever had.
With these beers I’ve actually started pouring the beer into a chilled wine decanter in order to prevent the dregs from reaching the glasses. If you start pouring and tip the bottle back to vertical to stop a pour, in my experience you will end up with dregs in the glass.
I don’t think you can separate the beer from its hype- whether it be good or bad. It all colors our impressions of the drinking experience in one way or another. Hill Farmstead probably does taste better to those that have driven many hours to get it than to those who don’t have to. And I think that’s OK.
