Are you a Hop Head?

After my experiences at the HBC and tours of some breweries over the past 3 days, I've discovered that craft brewing has cranked up the IBUs to new levels. It seems like every brewery now makes a double IPA.
What I would like to know is, how many of us here are hop heads?

I've got to say that I am not a hop head. I don't mind a moderately hopped beer but when the aroma, flavor, and bitterness, reach out of the glass and smack me I just can't enjoy the beer.
I'm not saying bitter beers are bad. I just think they are not meant for me.

Opinions? Do you like or dislike where the hoppiness levels are going in craft/ home brews?

I definitly am.. tons of hops makes me happy inside.

I have to say I am not. Every now and then, for a change I like to get a nice hoppy beer usually with a meal. I am actualy on the other side of the spectrum when it comes to the balance of a beer. I like really malty almost sweet beers like Spaten Optimator. ummmm Optimator

I love a really, really, hoppy beer (that bottle of Pliny in Dude's room was making me drool), but I can also really appreciate (and have been craving) a lot more malt-focused beers. I'd call myself more of a hophead than not, but it's not like I'm EXCLUSIVELY a hophead.

the_bird said:

I love a really, really, hoppy beer (that bottle of Pliny in Dude's room was making me drool), but I can also really appreciate (and have been craving) a lot more malt-focused beers. I'd call myself more of a hophead than not, but it's not like I'm EXCLUSIVELY a hophead.

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It still smells like hops after we rinsed it out.

i can enjoy a good IPA, but i don't prefer it. I personally only add it to balance and as a preservative. BRING ON THE MALTS!

RichBrewer said:

After my experiences at the HBC and tours of some breweries over the past 3 days, I've discovered that craft brewing has cranked up the IBUs to new levels. It seems like every brewery now makes a double IPA.
What I would like to know is, how many of us here are hop heads?

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It seems to me that a lot of people, majority BMC drinkers, think that hoppy beer=better beer. The local micro around here sells an Extra Pale Ale that, IMO, is supposed to look and taste as much like BMC but with a ton of hops added in.

I like certain beers with a lot of hops but I don't like certain beers just because they have a lot of hops.

Hops have grown on me recently, perhaps it is just the search for something new...that being said though, some are too bitter for my tastes. However, I have found that creating beers with good hop flavor and tremendous hop aroma can be fun, sidestepping the heavy bittering addition.

I have found that im very picky about hoppy beers, some I love others that get good reviews I don't like at all. Im sure it has something about the hop combination.

As far as I am concerned the only reason hops are used in brewing is to balance the sweetness of the malt and make the brew more enjoyable to drink.

Using too many hops? You may as well just graze in the meadow...moo...moo.

I'm an unabashed hophead. I can appreciate malty beers (stouts are my second faves after IPAs) but I loves me a good beer with bold hop bitterness, flavor, and aroma.

The thing I absolutely love about what I'm hearing from you guys, is that craft brewers are actually LISTENING to beer drinkers and experimenting and giving the beer drinkers flavors for which they are asking.

I enjoy them to a point. I'm mainly a Malt Fan Man, but I do like some Hop Character. For the most part tho, IMHO, a lot of the smaller breweries have gotten carried away with hop usage.

The nice thing tho is, making it yourself, and finding the Hop Character that you prefer. Not predetermined by someone else. :rockin:

Ize

This is where I like my brews:

I like IPA when it is true to style, I'm not a big fan of huge bitterness. I prefer the english style with a nice biscuity flavour but I also like the american style with lots of citrus flavour.

That said I'm definitely more interested in a balanced beer and failing that, more malty than hoppy. I always have IPA in bottles though, no way I could do without some nice bitterness.

My current favorite commercial brew is Goose Island IPA.

I have no idea what it tastes like (the malt in the beer, I mean). When you drink it your're just hit with a very fresh, citrusy, maybe even minty hops flavor that's not too bitter. Doesn't hurt either that the alcohol content seems to be pretty healthy, too.

One tap on my kegerator is dedicated to 100+IBUs I am a full blown hophead

Hophead all the way....:rockin:

I really like a good hoppy brew that has a big malt backbone.
Huge bitterness with underlying maltiness, there's nothing better!

BierMuncher said:

This is where I like my brews:
View attachment 1945

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That chart is great! I've saved it and I'll be using when I formulate beers.

Love the hops...just about every other brew is an IPA.

I've never tasted a beer that's been too hoppy but I like malty beers.

Let the hopheads have their IIIIIIIIPAs. Too many brewers are over-hopping styles that do not call for high hopping. Why bother? Last bar I went to had ONE non-IPA and that was so heavily hopped, you would never have know it was meant to be a Red. One more brewery crossed off my list.

Eventually, this trend should reverse, but it might kill craft brewing first by driving out variety.

RichBrewer said:

That chart is great! I've saved it and I'll be using when I formulate beers.

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Here's one without the bullet.

I always refer back to this when formulating a recipe. Especially if I'm tweaking a clone. It helps me maintain the malt-hops profile if I want to lower the ABV a bit.

BierMuncher said:

This is where I like my brews:
View attachment 1945

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I 2nd Rich's opinion on the chart. I like both malty & hoppy but gravitate to the balanced area. Awhile back I have made a few good beers that were malty and hopped well and would have said I prefer malty. (Used pre-hopped extracts)

Earlier this year I made a few beers on the malty side w/o much steeping grains to add flavor complexity (a mistake) and found them to be under-hopped or two sweet. They are drinkable but just a little too sweet for me. I also made another beer that still under hopped but the saving grace is the late hop additions for smell and flavor.

My problem was that wasn't making adjustments for LME and DME substitutions. Opting for the DME over LME, hence too sweet. So now I'm making sure to calc the IBU's first. ( Toss in the fact that pre-hopped LME & unhopped DME) Opps!!

I also noticed that I like the head formation on lighter beers with higher hop rates. With higher hop rates the head retention is better since the maltiness isn't there. Since I've been growning hops I've started adding more flavor and aroma hops. I'll be making more balanced beers with higher hop flavor & aroma.

So I'm kind of a hophead, I like hoppy beers and malty one too. Depends on my mood.

Unabashed and total HOPHEAD here. I love hoppy beers, but really appreciate and love a fine malty brew too.l

You can't make a beer too hoppy for me, but it does need to be balanced by enough malt backbone and alcohol to make it a good brew. I currently have an over the top Imperial IPA on tap - Knock 'Yer Hops Off - with over 300 IBU and 9% a/v. Its on the darker side of IPA with a lot of specialty malts (SRM~15+) giving it a huge complexity and mouthfeel. not overly astringent.

Funny how we all see the beer world through our individual preferences....lots of malt lovers think the craft/micro trend towards higher IBUs is not good - that too many beers are too hoppy.....NOT ME....I think, in spite of the hop revolution, that many beers out there are too sweet and syrupy in the finish, not dry enough, bitter enough, or hoppy/floral/citrusy, enough for my bias.

CHEERS!

On tap:
Knock Yer Hops Off Imperial IPA
Clubhouse Pale Ale
Lawson's Light Lager (American lite)
Homer's Hefeweizen (Bavarian)

In Primary:
Thunderbrew Pale Ale
Homer's Hefe II

In Secondary:
Knock Yer Hops Off Imperial IPA (Dry-hopping/for bottling)
Stony Hill Pilsner (German)

Cold Lagering in Kegs:
Lincoln Woods Lager (Marzen style)

In Bottles:
Too many to list! This years maple and sap brew crop (6 varieties), Maple Imperial Stout, Belgian Dubble, Fistful-o-Hop IPA......and on and on!

I think that chart is way off. DFH's 60 Minute IPA is 1.060 OG, with 60IBUs. That puts it off the chart as far as hoppiness goes, but that beer is probably one of the most balanced IPAs that I've had, almost bordering on too sweet/malty for me.

Am I reading it wrong?

I'm currently conditioning what amounts to be an IIRA, and am a huge fan of high hop beers. I disagree that high hop levels are going to ruin the craft beer industry. Infact I was over in NY and it was DIFFICULT finding a good high-hop beer over there. The Brooklyn IPA was.. meh. The only good IPA I found was the Lagunitas Maximus IIPA, but that was from california. You may be seeing lots of high hop beers over on the west coast, but I didn't find many in NY, and I found none in montreal.

I find a lot of beers now a days are way out of balance, skewed towards the bitterness and way out of whack hop flavor.

My favorite styles, porter and hefeweizen, are low in bitterness with practically no hop flavor. Even English bitters aren't that heavy on the hops although there is a bit of hop flavor. It's a rare IPA that I can drink and actually enjoy. If I wanted grapefruit I'd drink grapefruit juice! :cross:

Here's my issue: whenever I stay in the middle of the IBU range for a particular style in ProMash, the end product ends up way underhopped. I don't know if it's just homebrewing and the procedures, or my palate, or what, but I've found that my beers end up much, much better when I tend towards (or past) the upper IBU limit for a style. I like hoppy beers, but am by no means solely a hop-head. I can drink a Ruination once in awhile, but it's almost like I'm doing it to prove my manhood or something. But I find that commercial brews that have the same IBU's as my beers tend to be much more bitter than mine. I brewed my first IPA awhile back, and the reaction I got from my beer-drinking & -brewing friend was that it tasted like a pale ale, not an IPA. It had 63 IBU vs. 1.071 OG according to ProMash, which is off the chart according the table above. So, maybe it's not my palate? My first thought is how the hops are stored, but mine are about as anal as it gets: vacuum-sealed and freezer-stored. SO I dunno...all I can say is, I tend towards the upper end of style guidelines. My DIPA that I brewed last night...uh...supposedly it'll have 110 IBU's. Mwah ha ha.

Buford said:

If I wanted grapefruit I'd drink grapefruit juice! :cross:

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That's my biggest complaint with american IPA's. Way to damn much citrus flavor.

I like bitter beers, but ones balanced with a malt/hop flavor not just a ton of cascade (or other citrusy hop).

I love IPA's and barleywines, but I actually could not drink a DFH 120 and had to pour the $9 bottle down the drain (Sorry guys). I had met my tolerance for hops in that beer.

Jeepsn Beer, I agree with you 100% on DFH 120. Some friends of ours brought over a 120 for us all 4 to split, 3oz each. No one could finish their portion. It was sickly sweet and disgusting.

I like DFH 60 minute, Racer 5 IPA, Stone IPA, Deschutes Inversion IPA, Deschutes Hop Henge, and Lagunitas IPA, but these beers are very well balanced for the hop flavors they give, DFH 120 wasn't balanced, it was an assault on my palate.

RichBrewer said:

That chart is great! I've saved it and I'll be using when I formulate beers.

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Ever since I saw that thing, I have been using it and it works very very well.

RichBrewer said:

Opinions? Do you like or dislike where the hoppiness levels are going in craft/ home brews?

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One trend that I have been noticing more than just "IBU creep" lately is the use of nontraditional new hop varieties in traditional recipes at a lot of brewpubs and some craft brewers. There is a brewpub in the next state over that has simcoe in almost every single beer.....Brown ale, dubbel, schwartzbier, scotch ale, oatmeal stout, pilsner and a bunch more all have simcoe in the recipe.

david_42 said:

Eventually, this trend should reverse, but it might kill craft brewing first by driving out variety.

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Yeah, hopefully. I have a problem with breweries that everything is waaay overbittered. Drives me nuts because, what exactly sets each brew apart then?

Bitterness is a very influential component in the brew for sure. I'd say most of my very best brews have been coming in around 10-15 IBU, save for the Pils ,Oktoberfest and APA (which are somewhere in the 20's depending). I have an IPA slated, but it won't be with citrus hops.

brewt00l said:

One trend that I have been noticing more than just "IBU creep" lately is the use of nontraditional new hop varieties in traditional recipes at a lot of brewpubs and some craft brewers. There is a brewpub in the next state over that has simcoe in almost every single beer.....Brown ale, dubbel, schwartzbier, scotch ale, oatmeal stout, pilsner and a bunch more all have simcoe in the recipe.

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Once you get on the more IBU wagon, it will be hard to correct. If a head brewer gets on that wagon, forget about it. I liken the experience to what chiliheads (yes guilty of that) go through. I have found I 'self correct' once I peak at a tremendous amount of heat I go back to little or no hot food. I could very easily see this happening with IBU.

One thing I stand by is when I make a recipe and it hits the mark...I DO NOT CHANGE IT. It would be just way to easy to start f00king around, but experience as a teacher has told me to let sleeping dogs lie.

zoebisch01 said:

Once you get on the more IBU wagon, it will be hard to correct. If a head brewer gets on that wagon, forget about it. I liken the experience to what chiliheads (yes guilty of that) go through. I have found I 'self correct' once I peak at a tremendous amount of heat I go back to little or no hot food. I could very easily see this happening with IBU.

One thing I stand by is when I make a recipe and it hits the mark...I DO NOT CHANGE IT. It would be just way to easy to start f00king around, but experience as a teacher has told me to let sleeping dogs lie.

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I know exactly what you mean with the chiliheads..been there too.

Beyond just IBU you have a flavor profile issue with those beers. Using a hop with a unique flavor like simcoe just doesn't fit with some of these beers. Heck, experimentation is one thing but just dumping something like simcoe in every beer you make goes past creativity and into excess IMHO.

I enjoy a good amount of hops as much as barely any. They are each their own different styles. I still consider myself relatively new in this hobby (as compared to some of you) and still trying to get the intended hop flavor/aroma profile for each recipe kit downpat.

If I had to choose only one type of beer to have, it'd be an IPA. I can drink a nice malty beer and enjoy it, but I love hops. I'm not so crazy about the flowery and/or piney flavored hops, but I still like them. As for the rest of the hops, bring 'em on!

I enjoy a "smack you in the face" glass of hoppy goodness. However I also enjoy a "thick as molasses and twice as black" glass of imperial stout, and a wonderfully malty double bock, and a spicy fruity Belgian Strong, and even a refreshing Mild.
So bring on the hops, but save room in the fridge for malty and roasty and other beverages also.

Craig

It looks to me that breweries are right on track. So far 80 percent who answered the poll chose the top two answers.

Here's to 100 IBUs!