Hops are not better!

These posts, although fictional are very similar to ones I have read.

Oh my gawd, you can't add an extra teaspoon of grains unless you adjust your hop amount.

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Just throw in the whole 2 oz pack, you can't have too many hops.

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Why is it that you HAVE to balance sweetness/maltiness with hops, but you don't need to balance hops with maltiness?
I enjoy the flavor and bitterness of hops, but I think an IPA is overkill, so some of the beers out there annoy me. Hopzilla (and others) are praised for being unbalanced, but a sweet beer would be criticized or more likely mocked.

This was a rant, but I wouldn't mind feedback. Cheers!

Who says you have to?

I guess Dog Fish Head didn't get the memo. They seem to do alright regardless.

IPA is overkill. That was the point. But under it's original conception it was not meant to be consumed so early.

IPA is a myth... I hear they are all but extinct...

That being said... Have you lost your mind!!!!!!!!!!!!!... I have fresh hops in my pillows, in the shower... I boiled them down into an aerosol and use them like AXE... I tried making a lubricant, but the wife said NO WAY... oh well

Brew what you like.

If you like malty, go for it.
If you like hops, go for it.

Firebat138 said:

I tried making a lubricant, but the wife said NO WAY... oh well

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Well they do have an anti microbial quality. Though they seem to do nothing to yeast :cross:

I think I understand what the OP is getting at. I like hops, but I also like malt. Lately though it seems everyone is hung up on adding more and more hops and hop flavor to their beer, sort of like hot sauces having to have the qualities of pepper spray in order to be good.
I will say a hoppy beer is really nice after a hard mountain bike ride, for some reason hops is the best flavor in the world then.

Hop monsters just market better than malt monsters.....

I agree. At the beer fest, and of 75 beers or so, I'd say almost half were IPAs or related. I also agree that the industry is very hung up on hoppy beers. Could just be a fad. Maybe it will blow over eventually.

I think ALL beers need balance to be good. Some, like a Munich dunkel, will be balanced toward the malt while some (IPA) will be balanced towards the hops, but it still needs balance.

For a hop bomb, the beer needs a malt "backbone" to provide balance as well as making the beer drinkable. I joke that "mo' hops is mo' better" as I love a hoppy beer but the beer has to be a great balance of hop flavor, aroma, bitterness, and malt or it's not a good beer.

There are lots of sweet beers that aren't criticized or mocked- some of the best dopplebocks have no hops flavor or aroma at all and definitely lean toward the sweet, as do many Scottish ales. It's all about the style- I wouldn't want a Scottish IPA nor would I want a hoppy dopplebock as much as I love hops.

Maybe it's not fashionable to brew "to style" around homebrewers, but I often do because having a hoppy bock would be weird while a malty IPA might also be weird, due to the lack of balance.

IFMracin said:

Brew what you like.

If you like malty, go for it.
If you like hops, go for it.

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^ Just about everything after this post is either wrong or redundant. Who cares what breweries are putting out to the public? You're a homebrewer. You have the ability to brew almost anything you want.

You suck at beer

I, like many before me, had the IPA as my "gateway beer" into the craft scene. I still enjoy a good, bitter IPA or Imperially, stupidly hopped beer from time to time.

That being said, I have grown fond of malty (or even yeasty) beers in the past year for a number of reasons. 1) They tend to be cheaper to make. 2) They have unsurpassed complexity (or simplicity, IMO). 3) More people will drink more of my homebrew when it's not as bitter.

On a side note... Where are all the hopheads at? I'm surprised this thread isn't heated yet

Isn't a balance of malt to hops the same as a balance of hops to malt??

Really the question is just one of popularity. Someone will brew a malty beer someday that gets the attention of the masses and then the question would be, "Why are there so few hop forward beers available?"

IFMracin said:

Brew what you like.

If you like malty, go for it.
If you like hops, go for it.

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+1, There is no right or wrong here, just what works for you as an individual.

wSelwyn said:

On a side note... Where are all the hopheads at? I'm surprised this thread isn't heated yet

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I'm a total hophead! I LOVE IPAs, as that is by far my favorite style.

But the best IPAs aren't simply Hop Juice- they have a malt backbone and the correct amount of bitterness to balance the malt although they are definitely hop forward.

But I also think a great dopplebock or maibock is wonderful, and I think an oatmeal stout after dinner is heaven.

Saying one characteristic is better than another is like saying, "Chicken for dinner sucks and the people that eat it them aren't gourmets!" Well, maybe if they're talking about Chicken McNuggets. But not if you're talking about chicken cordon bleu served with roasted asparagus.

The same is true for beer styles. There are some fantastic IPAs, and IIPAs, and there are some not very good ones. I can say the same about Scottish ales, Irish reds, etc. A good example of the style is all about balance, in whichever direction that balance lies.

Just as I don't want a hoppy dopplebock, I don't want a sweet IPA.

I too love hops but agree that there needs to be some basic malty beer behind it. I think some of these breweries are just pushing the envelope to extreme and personally I'm not a fan.

IMO some pale ales are becoming IPAs and IPAs are becoming DIpAs and DIPAs, well, some of them are so over the top I don't even enjoy them

I like when someone posts a recipe with a pound and a half of Crystal malt and people freak out, as if the beer was going to be like drinking maple syrup.

Could it be because more malt/less hops generally means a sweeter seeming product? Those who really enjoy sweet (or dislike bitter) find other beverages more to their liking, and thus there is sort of an upper limit to how sweet a commercially available beer can become before its target audience abandons it for other beverages?

Whereas more hops generally equals more bitter taste. There are not as many places to turn for those who want increasingly bitter drinks, and thus there is a greater upper limit to how hoppy you can make a beer and still have a sizable market.

Just speculation. Cheers.

MisterTipsy said:

I like when someone posts a recipe with a pound and a half of Crystal malt and people freak out, as if the beer was going to be like drinking maple syrup.

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Kinda funny right now I am drinking a beer with 11% crystal malt so it should be nearly undrinkable according to some on this site. But you can't really even taste the malt, just hops. But it is fine, I brewed it to be like that. Like I said before at times I want something malty, at times I want something hoppy.