I haven't really looked at LODO but to me it falls into the same category. A lot of work for a little gain. But that is my opinion.
This is not a response that says "you're wrong." More of a post that cogitates on all this. If LODO doesn't produce a knock-your-socks-off beer, or at least one objectively better, then IMO it's largely a waste of time.
I've noted this before; the idea of LODO was appealing in that it made sense. Before I dove in, I wanted to try some to see if it was worth the effort, the fiddling. Alas, no way to do that.
So the only way to test was to try to do it myself. I've been working toward better and better process using LODO techniques. Not there yet, but the effects have been discernable.
Here's the odd thing: I'm not a huge Pilsner fan, but I've brewed one a couple times with LODO. The idea was that if LODO qualities could be evident in a beer, that's where they might be that. Won a small local competition with it, which is why I brewed it the first time, and I've had one guy who's a pilsner fan and who has the best palate I know, try it and give me feedback. His response to both batches? It's.....well, paraphrasing, stupendous. His only comment is he'd rather have a different yeast, but the flavor pops.
Another guy on this board has tried it. I don't want to out him but I'll probably ask him to respond with his opinion of it.
I kind of secretly was hoping that it didn't make much difference, at least not to me, but it does. I'm still experimenting with it. I brewed a beer in December we had three weeks later (an Amber) that was, to my taste, the best beer I've ever done. LODO. I'm trying to reproduce that, have another Amber in a keg right now conditioning a bit. It's been 15 days since I brewed it, I'm getting impatient.
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I wonder if some of what people get or don't get out of LODO is simply what their palate can perceive. Some talk about oxidation and apparently they are sensitive to it. Either I'm not sensitive to it, or somehow my beers don't oxidize much.
Some of the LODO guys are....well, pretty anal about it. They're concerned about oxygen ingress through keg serving lines, past the bottle cap, even through the impurities in bottled CO2.
Some of it I think is WAY overkill. But I continue on with my explorations. Geez, I want to reproduce that beer from Christmas.
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I also wonder if those who have tried LODO and can't see much use to it have had a flaw in their process someplace. That's the difficult thing about it--if I can't see it making a difference, is it simply overblown or have I screwed up the process someplace?
For me, is *is* more fiddly, and takes longer. I've got the time back down a bit, but it's still longer. I have to preboil the strike water to drive off oxygen from it, then chill it down to strike temp, have a mash cap, a lauter cap, underlet the grist, crush just before dough-in (or underlet
), as I said, it's fiddly.
In the end, even if it has a discernable effect to me, it might not to you. I've come to wonder if my like or dislike of breweries is a palate thing. I was in Asheville NC last month; we went to several breweries, but the one that stuck out hugely was Pisgah Brewint in Black Mountain. Most breweries offer little I find decent; Pisgah was stunning. Beer after beer.
This weekend visited Milwaukee, same thing--couple of breweries, Meh! But The Gathering Place? Wowee!
What if you thought differently about those breweries? Maybe you'd like beer at the ones I'd rate as "Meh!" Is the difference in those places that in some the brewmaster makes choices in yeast, process, ingredients that resonate with me--but they wouldn't with you?
In the end, I wonder if the same could be said of LODO.
Just a little thinking out loud and as always, YMMV.
