The Truth about Craft Beers...

MonkstownHoop · 08-03-2015 06:27PM

pauliebdub wrote: »

What annoys me is that my local off licence used to have a fantastic selection of German beers, anything you could think of and loads of rarer types, not so much anymore as they've been replaced by hipster **** that comes in tiny bottles.

Hipster Ha Ha poor fool

MadsL · 08-03-2015 06:27PM

Can we all just agree that anyone using the word "hipster" in 2015 is a bit sad.

nlgbbbblth · 08-03-2015 06:28PM

MadsL wrote: »

Can we all just agree that anyone using the word "hipster" in 2015 is a bit sad.

No. It was valid in 1985 and has been ever since.

MonkstownHoop · 08-03-2015 06:28PM

MadsL wrote: »

Can we all just agree that anyone using the word "hipster" in 2015 is a bit sad.

But what will people use to describe things that are different and new?

AnonoBoy · 08-03-2015 06:29PM

MonkstownHoop wrote: »

But what will people use to describe things that are different and new?

Hoopla?

Selfish Giant · 08-03-2015 06:31PM

Baby Jane wrote: »

O'Haras stout I don't understand the love for - found it awful the one time I drank it.
Therefore, based on my individual experience, people who like it don't really like it and are just being hipsters.

Your individual experience has led you to conclude what other people do and don't like? That is an extroardinarily stupid thing to say.

AnonoBoy · 08-03-2015 06:33PM

Selfish Giant wrote: »

Your individual experience has led you to conclude what other people do and don't like? That is an extroardinarily stupid thing to say.

Read that post again with your sarcasm detector turned back on.

pauliebdub · 08-03-2015 06:33PM

MadsL wrote: »

Can we all just agree that anyone using the word "hipster" in 2015 is a bit sad.

Why?

MadsL · 08-03-2015 06:35PM

nlgbbbblth wrote: »

No. It was valid in 1985 and has been ever since.

Gotcha. Any male with long hair is a damn beatnik.
Valid in 1967 and has been ever since.

AnonoBoy · 08-03-2015 06:36PM

pauliebdub wrote: »

Why?

Are you not sick of hearing it?

It used to just mean skinny jeaned, handle-bar moustachioed people who rode fixies, listened exclusively to ironic albums on 8-track and vinyl and livied in Williamsburg.

Now it can mean someone who drinks a beer that the person uttering the H-word hasn't heard of.

We need new words for these things.

Links234 · 08-03-2015 06:36PM

pauliebdub wrote: »

Why?

Because it's a meaningless term that people throw around willy-nilly to mean "anything I don't like"

Eutow · 08-03-2015 06:36PM

pauliebdub wrote: »

Why?

Maybe because it is just a term that has now lost all of its original meaning.

MadsL · 08-03-2015 06:39PM

pauliebdub wrote: »

Why?

Is anyone who eats in restuarant that you have never been to a hipster?
No.

Yet this silly waffle about people who enjoy beer that hasn't had a $12m marketing budget thrown at it being "hipsters". The word is utterly meaningless in this context.
Sigh.

I think for many people coming out with this crap, simply their masculinity is defined by the colour and brand of the pint in their hand, hence the hostility.

The Rape of Lucretia · 08-03-2015 06:40PM

MonkstownHoop wrote: »

But what will people use to describe things that are different and new?

Groovy.

MadsL · 08-03-2015 06:43PM

Damn Hepcats, daddio.

Selfish Giant · 08-03-2015 06:43PM

Sky King wrote: »

'Craft', like 'Artisan' and 'Home Made' is just some wankology word that people who operate high cost base businessness which can't compete on price use to justify charging a premium price for their mediocre produce.

Have you ever heard of a fine vineyard in France offering 'Craft wine'? For fk sake!!

There's no dark mysterious art to brewing. There's nobody stirring a cauldron of mysterious elixir tasting the wort and adding a pinch of hops and a sprinkle of malt to get the mixture just right. Commercial brewing is process engineering, plain and simple. Plenty of 'craft' brewers in Ireland are not process engineers, have no technical capability, are using poxy equipment bought on a shoestring budget with the result that their product tastes like it was fermented in a horse's bowel.

That said, some of them do produce good beer. The 'craft' beer movement, despite all the wankology associated with it, is a good thing, because it equals more variety in pubs and off licences and local brands that people can get behind.

The Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, although a relatively large company, would still be considered a craft brewer. Yet you'll notice their product placement in certain episodes of Friends, and I assume they've gotten even bigger and richer since that series ended 11 years ago. So clearly they're a big commercial beast like all the others. I always take the term 'craft beer' with a pitch of salt, because it doesn't mean that the beer actually tastes nice, or that there isn't a guy in a suit pulling the strings. I think there's too many people interpreting 'craft' as meaning 'quality', or 'integrity'. Ultimately it's about how the beer tastes, and in fairness, all of the nicest beers I've tasted fall into the 'craft' category, despite Guinness Foreign Extra Stout, which is a truly world class beverage.

nlgbbbblth · 08-03-2015 06:45PM

Links234 wrote: »

Because it's a meaningless term that people throw around willy-nilly to mean "anything I don't like"

I don't use it like that.

AnonoBoy · 08-03-2015 06:46PM

Selfish Giant wrote: »

The Sierra Nevada Brewing Company, although a relatively large company, would still be considered a craft brewer.

In the states you have to brew under a certain quantity annually to be allowed call yourself a 'craft' beer. As small breweries grew they campaigned for this amount to be raised so they could maintain the 'craft beer' label.

Selfish Giant · 08-03-2015 06:48PM

AnonoBoy wrote: »

Read that post again with your sarcasm detector turned back on.

Are you sure about that? Te me it's in line with many other equally idiotic comments in this thread.

my friend · 08-03-2015 06:49PM

Budweiser is hurting, losing market share...between the Budweiser Super Bowl ad that attacked people with taste buds and Budweisers simultaneous dissing of the same informed consumers on social media and other platforms you are witnessing the commercial equivalent of a dying wasps sting.

It's desperate stuff and a sign as to how rattled Budweiser are by the changing sands of consumer choice.

AnonoBoy · 08-03-2015 06:51PM

Selfish Giant wrote: »

Are you sure about that? Te me it's in line with many other equally idiotic comments in this thread.

Yes. Read my response which they thanked. It's clear to me they were joking and mocking those sort of posts.

nlgbbbblth · 08-03-2015 06:52PM

Getting back the OP's post - I don't agree. The majority of the craft beers I have tried have been decent. Metalman is my favourite; has anybody had the cans yet?

Bottles of Heineken at a barbecue are fine. The first pint of Carlsberg when you've had a hard day at work can taste good. But if I am in a pub where there's no craft beers on sale, my default choice will be Smithwick's.

Selfish Giant · 08-03-2015 06:52PM

AnonoBoy wrote: »

Yes. Read my response which they thanked. It's clear to me they were joking and mocking those sort of posts.

Ah, I see. My apologies. I jumped the gun on that one.

Egginacup · 08-03-2015 08:19PM

Calibos wrote: »

As a bud drinker, the day I stop being asked how I can drink 'that piss-water' is the day I stop thinking all craft beer drinkers are pretentious hipster ****.

I like my piss-water thank you very much!

If someone really liked cheese, like great Stilton, Danish Blue, Olomouc, Gorgonzola, etc with fresh bread and a good bottle of beer or glass of port, would you call them hipster **** as you tucked into your banquet of Wonderbread, Budweiser and EasySingles?

Just a little Samba · 08-03-2015 08:30PM

AnonoBoy wrote: »

In the states you have to brew under a certain quantity annually to be allowed call yourself a 'craft' beer. As small breweries grew they campaigned for this amount to be raised so they could maintain the 'craft beer' label.

The same sort of thing applies in Ireland but the difference is that in Ireland the limit is set by the government and in the US the limit is set by the Brewers Association, who just happened to be founded by the head brewers of the older craft breweries and as such they moved the goal posts as they expanded, and why not?

Sierra Nevada Pale Ale and Sam Adams Boston Lager are made the same way today as they were when they launched in the 80's, Anchor Steam is the same as it was in the 70's, the brew kits are bigger for sure, but they are still, compared to the big boys, small time players.

The entire craft beer market in the US, every brewery combined, sells less than Budwieser, Coors Light or Bud Light do individually.

dashcamdanny · 08-03-2015 08:55PM

anncoates wrote: »

It's funny. If some of the views here were applied to other products, people wouldn't be caught dead saying it.

'I love Rihanna. Anybody that listens to anything else is a fart-sniffing, wanker hipster.'

'I love burger and chips. Anybody that's into the entire range of food available in the world that isn't burgers is a pretentious arsehole.'

Nail on the head.

Very good. Wish I thought of the Rihanna thing.

Just back from the pub. Belly full of http://mcgargles.com/ red and Crean's.

Not bland , just right .
Support passionate Irish people trying to make a difference, and make a few pound in their own patch.

Its better than bland corporation blandness. . IMO (subject to objection).

AnonoBoy · 08-03-2015 08:56PM

Just a little Samba wrote: »

The same sort of thing applies in Ireland but the difference is that in Ireland the limit is set by the government and in the US the limit is set by the Brewers Association, who just happened to be founded by the head brewers of the older craft breweries and as such they moved the goal posts as they expanded, and why not?

Nothing wrong with it. It's just illustrative of how the once smaller players are getting bigger and also how important the 'craft' label is to them.

Just a little Samba · 08-03-2015 09:15PM

AnonoBoy wrote: »

Nothing wrong with it. It's just illustrative of how the once smaller players are getting bigger and also how important the 'craft' label is to them.

Ah yeah, to be fair it helps in marketing a lot.

Being eligible to be members of the brewers association is important too as it gives them the whole collective action thing.

BetterThanThou · 08-03-2015 10:30PM

I've always assumed craft beer was made with primarily natural ingredients and few if any chemicals, whereas mainstream beer tends to have chemicals in it to make brewing easier and cheaper, and to artificially improve the taste. In general, craft brewing would be a much smaller operation, whereas mainstream brewing would be a much larger operation. I'd personally see it as comparing McDonald's to a nice restaurant. McDonalds can be fantastic, for a bunch of people, it's the ol' reliable, they know the food will at least taste good, and they won't be hungry after it, but it's never going to be something incredible. A nice restaurant has a much larger selection of food, some of it may not be good, some of it might be the best meal you've ever tasted, it doesn't have the same reliability, but if you order the right thing, it'll blow McDonalds out of the water. I feel this very easily relates, I can order any mainstream beer at a bar, it'll get me drunk, and it'll quench my thirst, but it's never going to be something amazing. I can order a random craft beer, and it can potentially be undrinkable, but if I order the right craft beer, it's delicious and blows mainstream beers out of the water.

osarusan · 08-03-2015 11:12PM

Links234 wrote: »

Referel denied... what was it?

Coedo Ruri.

The Truth about Craft Beers...

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