I like IPAs and I’m secure enough to not be bothered by the mockery my basic brothers and I face online.
This thing got really popular for some reason. It must be awful!
My perspective is that the “basic” people can’t wait to bring up how much they despise IPAs and without a single exception the reason is always “they’re just SO hoppy!!!”
Well given that they’re the most hoppy of the common types of beer, that reason for not liking them is hardly surprising or in any way illegitimate 🤷
Not liking them, and not liking other people liking them are very different things.
Such is true.
Which is exactly why I think it’s an unnecessary and boring thing to talk about. If someone asks them, they should just say no I don’t like it. Instead they volunteer the information and emphatically state the reason as though it’s a surprise or unique in some way
But of the near-infinite number of things a person dislikes, they only meme about a couple. The Internet loves an easy target…
of the near-infinite number of things a person dislikes, they only meme about a couple
only meme about a couple
a couple
Are you NEW? 🤦
Nope, just bored to death by the seagulls constantly squawking “THING BAD! THING BAD!”
I heard a real-world explanation about why IPAs are the most common and commonly-sought craft beer. Half the reasons are unflattering, but a few are valid.
- They’re harder to fuck up because the Hops covers every damn thing and is so forgiving. Ever heard a cooking show talk about how hard a perfect Filet Mignon is because you can’t hide behind anything and everyone knows what it should taste like? Ditto with a good red ale or even pilsner.
- Similarly, nobody is known for their signature Filet Mignon because (within reason) a filet is a filet. Ditto with most types of beers. IPAs give opportunity for a lot more variety. Which is why you have more breweries making them, and then more people consuming them. I go out of my way to find non-MGP whiskey because MGP whiskies all taste the damn same to me, and I usually find a couple unique bottles every year. I can respect someone who wants to try a totally new beer every week and just fall back on a few faves.
- Related again to #2. Beyond being “SO hoppy”, IPAs have more unique flavor profiles than all other beers combined. Different hops can net you notes of orange, lemon, grapefruit, or notes of the pith of one of those, or notes of the rind of one of those. Different amounts or processing of hops can give you different intensities of those. That’s a lot of flavor profiles from sweet to sour to bitter, all in the same category.
So I’m “basic” nowadays re: beer, and I despise IPAs because I literally cannot stand the bitter&pithy ones (esp Grapefruit Pith), and there’s no easy way to know what an IPA will taste like till you’ve paid for it and cracked it open. I also get reflux and nothing blows that shit out of the water like an IPA. There’s a hops shop down the street from me, but if I’m going to brew a beer (super rare, I usually make whiskey or mead) it’s gonna be something will a chill flavor profile.
there’s no way to know what an IPA will taste like before you crack it open
That’s why I like brewers that publish their hops. I’m the opposite of you, I live for the citrusy, fruity type of hops and despise the more traditional floral/piney strains. If I see simcoe on the bill I’ll go to bed sober, but if you’ve got Willamette or Cascade I’ll make tea from them.
Meanwhile I don’t even have an idea what the hell am IPA is. Is it like a kind of beer?
Stands for India Pale Ale. i was originally told they used to brew stronger beer to make it last the long trip to India before refrigeration was a thing.
So it tends to be higher ABV and more bitter or hoppy to go with the higher alcohol content.
The hop part is a bit more interesting. The strong beers of the time weren’t enough to keep the beer from getting infected. However, hops are a natural preservative. The oils have antibiotic properties. They were initially used as a preservative for weak British ales and the taste was a side effect but not necessarily the desired effect. When they had trouble shipping their beers across the world, they would pack the beer full of hops so it would make the trip. Eventually, Brits in India developed a taste for the bitter beer that was shipped to them and a beer style was born.
Thanks, I knew I was missing something. It’s been probably 10 years since I did a brewery tour that actually taught anything.
What if my enjoyement is making fun of basic white dudes drinking IPA’s?
Those dudes are so basic the pic looks ai-generated.
IP-AI?
you seem racist
Ah, projecting our own thoughts onto others I see.
Vegans, PSL girls, IPA guys, furries, and anime nerds seem to be the most popular targets for boring, basic memes.
Good beer is good beer.
I’m German. I look down upon these pesants. The best beer is dark and unfiltered. Anything else cannot compare.
I’ve had your beer while in your country. Much respect and all given the history and contributions to beer over all, but after a week…it got boring.
I’m happy to be a peasant with never ending variety of styles and variations within styles without being hamstrung by some unimaginative and restrictive laws.
There’s variety too, you just didn’t get to see it during your stay. The laws are now much more liberal than they used to be.
But yeah, when you go to a basic place, many German beers have a similar character I would say. Normally there’s just the difference between light, dark, red, weizen and then the mixed ones.
Drinking weizen makes me feel like I’ve had drink and food at the same time, so rich.
My stomach says thanks but no thanks haha
Canadian IPA is dark and unfiltered.
Dark beer is for winter and autumn. IPA is for spring, summer, and not going off on a sea voyage to the colonies.
Edit: also when I was in Germany I mostly drank white wine. Germany is the only country that produces palatable white wine, whereas good beer can be had in many countries.
Germany is the only country that produces palatable white wine
Wow wow wow, take it easy there, them are some fighting words.
We should aspire to be friends with all beers. Let us appreciate all styles for the unique qualities they bring to the table.
Except sours, those are gross
I’m German too, while I usually prefer southern german beer with a strong wheat, malt and yeast flavour I also occasionally like to explore other flavours like IPA or more exotic ones from different countries. I mean, drink what you like or don’t drink at all (which might be better, health-wise). Gates open, come on in.
I don’t get it.
I don’t even like IPAs all that much.
But like… Pumpkin Spice is a seasonal artificial flavor that is I think annoying to people because it’s made its way into everything from marshmallows to crackers to milk.
IPA is a style of beer. That’s it.
IPAs don’t even taste the same, people just think of the (ex: Sierra Nevada) hoppy taste and assume it’s all the same.
It’s not even a seasonal style of beer.
I don’t know if it’s like this where you are, but in Scandinavia if you like beer but don’t like IPAs, you’re shit out of luck for like the last five years at least. It has completely taken over the beer aisles at like 70 % of the offering. As someone who hates that bitter taste with a passion, the fact that it makes the selection of beers that I enjoy so much smaller, means it’s akin to how I imagine pumpkin spice taking over in the US during fall, except it isn’t just seasonal.
That sucks. It was like that here in the US about 5 years ago with IPAs. Every micro brewery made like 10 IPAs and nothing else. They are still the most prevalent style but there is a noticeable shift toward making lagers or less hoppy ales the past few years and it’s been a really nice change.
I hope we’ll see that soon as well. I’ve been mostly into malty, full-bodied varieties, and recently also sour beers and gose. Those have started to appear in stores, but not reliably. It feels like they’re testing the waters, and are cycling through brands quickly, so once you find a favorite, it’s already gone. Hopefully it’ll stabilize with a decent selection of all types.
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They’re both popular, and something that you can just not buy if you don’t like them, but people like to complain about because they see the popular thing around, and it bothers them.
Also, pumpkin spice doesn’t have to be artificial. It’s just the spices found in pumpkin pie. It’s usually just cinnamon, clove, nutmeg and ginger.
It can be artificial, but it’s like complaining that “apple” is a seasonal artificial flavor.
It’s the middle of Oktoberfest season, and you went with IPAs for this meme?
Not to mention, there’s literally pumpkin spice beer.
Well, they couldn’t go with Helles because it’s actually good.
Oktoberfest beers (Märzens) literally have carmel malts, they’re the Starbucks of beers.
I am a basic ass white dude and this is accurate.
as the small brewery industry developed I went from “fuck IPAs” to “hit me in the face with another pinecone please” and I’m not sorry
Oh man I love that piney taste
Second this.
I like drinking IPAs.
Fight me?
I’ve never really considered hops to be an interesting flavor. It’s just… flat and bitter to me.
I truly don’t understand why so many people love IPAs, or try to sneak extreme hoppiness into other beer styles. (An IPA with fruit juice is not a saison! And a 70 IBU “kolsch” is a war crime!)
As a person who prefers the complex, bright and earthy flavors from grains and yeast, getting face-fucked at the end of every sip by a one-note weed pine cone is so disappointing.
one-note weed pine cone
Single greatest description of the taste of IPA I’ve ever read.
I truly don’t understand why so many people love IPAs
Flavor nuance. I don’t like hopsy beer myself, but there’s a LOT of different profiles out there. I’ve even found a few IPAs I liked.
As a person who prefers the complex, bright and earthy flavors from grains and yeast, getting face-fucked at the end of every sip by a one-note weed pine cone is so disappointing.
That I’ll agree with. Not a lot of drinkers respect the mashbill anymore.
I’m the opposite. I prefer a pale ale over an IPA, but recently I found hoppy larger and it is great. I find straight larger so tasteless most of the time.
Though if I am only drinking 1 or 2 beers for the night then I would choose a dark beer.
I am not an IPA fan for the same reasons. The problem are the Brewers thinking they can just add any old hop into the mix and expect it to taste good. Then you have the consumers freaking out over a 120 IBU DIPA even though, on average, the human pallet is unable to taste anything beyond 70 IBU with an average threshold of a out 4 IBU.
Don’t get me wrong, I have had some great IPAs, but the places I’ve enjoyed them were places that knew what they were doing. Barely any bitterness and all the hop flavor and aromas.
I used to work as a brewer where the owner wouldn’t let us make any recipes of our own. All the recipes that he made us use, regardless of the style of beer, had an unforgivable amount of hops to it. The stout? 80 IBU. Fuck you, Dave.
I’m not a big beer drinker, but there are few things as disappointing as finding a bar that serves stout on tap, then discovering it’s been all hopped up.
Jesus.
If you see Dave around, tell him I think his management style is as unpalatable as his beer.
I don’t have a refined palette, and I like fairly hoppy beers. It has to have a good flavor to it though. If it’s made hoppy for the sake of IBUs, then it’s probably bad. Like joke hot sauces are disgusting, but there are some that are delicious but really painful for me to eat, even one bite.
Older IPA hops like cascade are great but only slightly hop heavy with their classic hop flavors. The hops used more recently (I think citra and mosaic?) have great flavors when pushed to high IBUs.
Hops have amazing range. Fuggles smell like dirt. Lemondrop has a strong citrus smell.
About half of beer variety is from hops. Unless your talking about Belgians. Then it’s all yeast.
While making my earlier comment, I actually looked it up to see if maybe there was something unusual about my perception of hops, but didn’t want to overload folks with info. It seems that some people are more sensitive to bitter tastes, such as those in hops, and some folks can’t taste them at all. It’s like if the whole cilantro/soap thing were less a dichotomy, and more of a spectrum. (And I’m one of the people to whom cilantro tastes like soap.)
That’s not to say I don’t recognize or value the contribution of hops to beer, but hops aren’t the primary driver of most beers flavor profile, nor should they be. In most beer styles, the bitterness of the hops are used to balance the sweetness of the malt so the beer doesn’t taste like syrup. This allows other flavors in the malt to come out, or flavors from the yeast to say hi.
For me it’s a very fine line. I think I’m more sensitive than the average person.
If the bitterness does more than balance, then it dominates all other flavors, including any flavors within the hops themselves. It’s just bitter, flat, and tastes like how bad weed smells.
I don’t believe it’s a matter of unrefined taste. I can talk to you all day about floral notes of lightly roasted grains, the heavier flavors of darker roasted malts, or what kind of funk a yeasty beer has.
But hops. Too much, and it’s just one flavor for me. I think the only time I’ve been able to enjoy a hop’s flavor was when I ate a fresh one on a brewery tour.I really enjoy mosaic hops; the best IPA I’ve ever had used them. There’s maaaaany awful IPAs, but when done well I think they’re delicious.
The best part is, I can have an IPA all year round!
3 chouffes later everyone’s having a good time ;)
No… La Chouffe isn’t anything special… Try something like Orval or Oude Geuze.
Never said it was anything special. But it’s largely available (even in neighbor countries) and I do confirm everyone feels good after three of them ;)
Everyone who doesn’t get it needs to read this.
It can be quickly summarized to the line in the article, “marketers have an insatiable appetite for turning human enjoyment into target-based profit”. Couple that with the fact that females tend to receive more ridicule for their consumption habits, and you’ve got this article.
Hasn’t aged a day
Something I should mention: I do like IPAs (not only IPA but they are tasty) and can find all 3 of the style of shirt in this weird AI looking stock image in my closet.
Soooooo…
That’s pretty true. People are so passionate about having an ipa
Beer is great
You know what’s better?
Free beer!
But have you had
Except (in my own subjective opinion) if it’s too hoppy and IPA is the kangaroo of beers.
I fucking love me a good IPA
