"Craft Brews" vs BMC... Who is better?

[Clarke]

I don't consider BMC craft, I call it industrialized, more machine than man.

 

[Homercidal]

New Homebrew name:

More Human Than Human

 

[kombat]

I always see it purported that crafting light merican lagers is so hard. How?

The exceptionally clean profile doesn't provide anywhere for flaws and off-flavours to be masked.

You can ferment a double IPA a little hot and no one is going to notice a few fusels or some green apple under all that bitterness and hops. But in a Light American Lager, even a little diacetyl is going to be unmistakable.

 

[iijakii]

The exceptionally clean profile doesn't provide anywhere for flaws and off-flavours to be masked.

You can ferment a double IPA a little hot and no one is going to notice a few fusels or some green apple under all that bitterness and hops. But in a Light American Lager, even a little diacetyl is going to be unmistakable.

Right, but with temperature controlled ferm. chamber, good yeast pitch, d-rest. Standard practice for any other lager.

 

[ericbw]

Right, but with temperature controlled ferm. chamber, good yeast pitch, d-rest. Standard practice for any other lager.

If you have perfect temp control, sanitization, yeast management, etc. you can do it. But it takes a lot of effort, knowledge, and skill to get perfect temp control, sanitization, yeast management, etc.

If you're making some other kind of beer that isn't based on the cleanest flavor, lightest color, etc. you can dry hop the crap out of it, or add some "character grains," or add some fruit or herbs or a piece of wood from St. Peter's cross*, then you can mask ANY flaw. Strong diacetyl in an imperial chocolate cherry stout becomes "a hint of butterscotch," and it's within the style and expectations.

THAT's why people say it's hard. Just like it's hard to keep a white shirt clean when you eat ribs. Red gingham plaid is your friend in that situation.

*or any other secret ingredient

 

[ericbw]

Incidentally, I am doing an unintentional D-rest right now on an Irish Red. I peeked in at the temperature (which was hanging nicely around 62-64, and I see it is up to about 68. I only try to carefully control the temp for the first week, then I stop worrying about it.

And a "hint of butterscotch" in Irish Red is ok!

 

[slym2none]

New Homebrew name:

More Human Than Human

Add some Robb Zombie art, and you win!

 

[bob1852]

I always see it purported that crafting light merican lagers is so hard. How?

The "there's no where for off flavors to hide" mantra is oft repeated by those that have never brewed a light American lager.

 

[iijakii]

@ericbw I agree to a point, but I think you're making brewing out to be a bit more grandiose than it is. Reading a yeast package that says to ferment 50-55 and keeping within that range with a fridge/freezer and temp controller isn't really requiring a bunch of skill or effort. Building a starter or pitching extra yeast isn't either.

Requires more effort perhaps, but anyone doing lagers should have this stuff anyways. And any craft brewery would for sure have temp controlled fermenters and good yeast pitching practices.

 

[GilaMinumBeer]

The "there's no where for off flavors to hide" mantra is oft repeated by those that have never brewed a light American lager.

This.

@ericbw I agree to a point, but I think you're making brewing out to be a bit more grandiose than it is. Reading a yeast package that says to ferment 50-55 and keeping within that range with a fridge/freezer and temp controller isn't really requiring a bunch of skill or effort. Building a starter or pitching extra yeast isn't either.

Requires more effort perhaps, but anyone doing lagers should have this stuff anyways. And any craft brewery would for sure have temp controlled fermenters and good yeast pitching practices.

I don't personally think that the batch effort is all that impressive. What I find impressive is everything that takes place after fermentation. I also find it impressive that you could take a well cared for sample from say 6 months ago, and compare it to a batch put in the can yesterday and there is no discernible difference.

IMO, the real effort in macro brewing comes through in the blending process. And, IIUC, determining those ratios is still a very analogue process for AB/Inbev.

As for the craft/BMC which is better question. Neither is better. they both have their place and shine equally depending on circumstances. For me, BMC shines on really hot days either after a hard days work or while under the sun. Anything heavier just weighs me down and makes me sluggish.

But on a cool crisp night, with a fire going, give me a rich stout or a thick Barleywine.

 

[PlexVector]

The way I look at BMC is it's easier to not have off flavors the less flavor you have. It makes the mechanization of making beer a lot easier because you have less levers and knobs to adjust.

 

[kombat]

Having brewed several lagers, yes, in my opinion, they are actually harder than it seems. They're much more sensitive to temperature schedules, yeast pitching rates, and so on. It can be quite tricky trying to minimize acetaldehyde and other yeast by-products on such an otherwise blank slate.

 

[PlexVector]

But once you have it dialed in it's easier to maintain consistency.

 

[hunter_le five]

I like to homebrew 'Murican adjunct lagers, from time to time. Some have been pretty solid. Others have been less so. If you make a mistake, it absolutely does stick out like a sore thumb.

I'm not going to say they are "extremely difficult", but the margin for error sure is minimal.

 

[JONNYROTTEN]

What exactly do you factor in to that cost? Grain and hops? Grain and hops and yeast? DME for the starter? Propane? Water costs? Chiller water costs? Sanitation & cleaning solutions consumed? O2 for oxygenation? Minerals for water treatment? Bottle caps? Etc?

I understand that you don't need to amortize equipment once capital is sunk. It's not a business in that sense. And I agree with folks that say that you don't need to account for putting a dollar value on your time.

But in a lot of cases, I think we subconsciously try to underestimate the amount of money that we spend on batches outside of the basic hops/grain number. I.e. for a 5 gallon lager batch, if you use dry yeast, you'll probably need 2 packs, so you're probably spending $8 right there. If you use liquid, you're spending $8 plus whatever you need in DME and yeast nutrient to make a starter. And for a lager, ideally making a big starter or stepping it up. That doesn't leave a great deal of room in the budget for your malt & hops!

A 30pk of Miller Lite at my local Bevmo is $17.99. That's about $28 for the equivalent of two cases / ~5 gal.

That's pretty cheap. I'd be hard pressed to brew some batches cheaper than that.

The cheapest beer you can buy is BMC the cheapest way to buy it is buy the 1/2 barrel.A half barrel is 15 gallons for $100.I can brew 15 gallons of cream of three crops (closest thing to BMC) for $50.So 1/2 price for homebrew.A good IPA higher OG will cost around $75 for a 1/2 barrel.So even the better homebrew beers are $25 cheaper than the cheapest beers bought the cheapest way.If you don't mind the work its a no brainer

 

[Billy-Klubb]

New Homebrew name:

More Human Than Human

Add some Robb Zombie art, and you win!

did I ever tell y'all about when I got kicked out of a Rob Zombie concert at the Full Throttle Saloon in Sturgis, SD? it floccin' happened.

 

[Psylocide]

did I ever tell y'all about when I got kicked out of a Rob Zombie concert at the Full Throttle Saloon in Sturgis, SD? it floccin' happened.

'Sir, we've asked you multiple times to leave Mr. Zombie alone... And frankly, throwing your **** stained whitey tighties up on stage while shouting 'Rob can ROB me of my virginity' was the last straw.'

 

[BreezyBrew]

I actually just decided to crack a Yuengling lager open, after typing this out. lol

I was talking to my neighbor who used to work for Yuengling in Tampa. She said they pasteurize the bottles but not the kegs. I'm not sure how true this is, but it's worth doing a taste test.

 

[Billy-Klubb]

'Sir, we've asked you multiple times to leave Mr. Zombie alone... And frankly, throwing your **** stained whitey tighties up on stage while shouting 'Rob can ROB me of my virginity' was the last straw.'

it was a lot less exciting than that.

 

[ericbw]

@ericbw I agree to a point, but I think you're making brewing out to be a bit more grandiose than it is. Reading a yeast package that says to ferment 50-55 and keeping within that range with a fridge/freezer and temp controller isn't really requiring a bunch of skill or effort. Building a starter or pitching extra yeast isn't either.

Requires more effort perhaps, but anyone doing lagers should have this stuff anyways. And any craft brewery would for sure have temp controlled fermenters and good yeast pitching practices.

People mess up all kinds of recipes. Something makes one person't efforts better than another. That's all I'm saying. It isn't hard for those who find it easy.

 

[slym2none]

did I ever tell y'all about when I got kicked out of a Rob Zombie concert at the Full Throttle Saloon in Sturgis, SD? it floccin' happened.

I have ears for this story.

 

[Billy-Klubb]

I have ears for this story.

it's pretty boring. the owner of my old local (Goat Boy) used to MC at the Throttle. he got a great deal on a bus ride from his bar, St. Joe's Pub, to the Throttle with a ticket purchase. a bunch of folks took the bus ride and we all got hammered starting at the bar and on our way to Sturgis. I was waiting for the show to start and the crowd kept trying to push in tighter, as they seem to do. security jumped on me and pulled me out for "pushing". a few of my friends got the same treatment for similar things. they escorted me back to the bus and I told them to tell Goat Boy exactly who they just kicked out. ticked off, I slammed a few more tall boys and passed out waiting for Goat. he tried to wake me to take me back stage. but once I'm out, I'm out. security got their butts chewed and I got a bunch of free beer and some hand rolled cigars the next time I went to the Throttle.

 

[slym2none]

I get the feeling that if if Billy Klubb was pushing, you'd know you'd been pushed.

 

[kmjloki]

It seems to me that most craft beer drinkers just don't like the taste of BMC. That's all well and good, but the "hate" is directed more toward their marketing than the actual product.

"Beechwood Aged" "Triple Hopped" "Cold Brewed" (which doesn't really make much sense to begin with) are terms that, while true, give the consumer an over hyped idea of what actually goes into the making of BMC. "This Miller is triple hopped. I've not heard of anyone else adding hops three times, so that must mean they're doing something different than everyone else. This must be a great example of a hoppy beer!" That kind of thing really gets to me because I've had family tell me that BM's Centennial Blonde recipe is way too bitter (I've not tried to give them any IPAs). BMC seems to be relying more on marketing than the quality of the actual product.

I get it, it's marketing, and they're in the business of making money. But at the same time, that kind of misinformation makes it harder for beer geeks to share what beer can actually be. Beer doesn't have to be a transparent, watery tasting carbonated beverage with a slight bitterness that you down after mowing the lawn. A lifelong BMC drinker might look at a cloudy hefeweizen and decide that it won't taste good, because beer shouldn't be cloudy, or beer served above 35F is probably going to suck because it isn't ice cold.

At least that's been my experience...

Seeing that i would write alot of what is said here ill just second it!

 

[Bosh]

Also lite lagers DO have something to mask off flavors: water and cold. Freeze distill a cheapo lager and drink it at cellar temp and it gets a whole hell of a lot easier to notice imperfections.

 

[Magnus314]

BMC type beers are actually really easy to make. I don't get why everyone thinks they are so hard... I assume they never tried or didn't look up how the breweries do it first.

If you want a 5% "Bud" you brew up a 1.068 or so "mix", ferment to 7.5%+ ABV and cut it back with R/O when it's all finished.

"Anything Lite"? Use a long mash and brew to 1.045+, use amylase if it makes you happy. Then cut back to 4%-ish when finished.

That way you never have big "consistency" issues because the process is always the same every time, the water is the same, and any small variations batch to batch are lowered by 1/3 to 1/2 by brewing high and cutting back to where you want it.

Schlenkerla on this forum has some great recipes to start with.

I've shared my own experiences with "regular" beer for my non-craft friends. The easiest thing to say is that my kegs float at the annual superbowl party before the BMC cooler even gets low.

 

[drainbamage]

I get the feeling that if if Billy Klubb was pushing, you'd know you'd been pushed.

Really hard. With a fist. In the berries.

 

[ericbw]

I've shared my own experiences with "regular" beer for my non-craft friends. The easiest thing to say is that my kegs float at the annual superbowl party before the BMC cooler even gets low.

All you've done is make an argument that your beer is preferred over BMC. Maybe because it has more flavor; maybe because of "marketing."

That doesn't mean it's consistent or that consistency is easy.

Personally, I prefer variations from batch to batch.

 

[Billy-Klubb]

All you've done is make an argument that your beer is preferred over BMC. Maybe because it has more flavor; maybe because of "marketing."

That doesn't mean it's consistent or that consistency is easy.

Personally, I prefer variations from batch to batch.

I am the same way. I aim for what I feel like at the time, which can vary in small to large amounts of difference.

It's my art, my craft. I love being able to use an ever shifting canvas to reflect, in a multidimensional media, all the stability, chaos, love, anger, joy, abstract imagination through sight, aroma, and taste. to me, it's liquid marble. a painting that's always changing a little at a time. an endless song that just knows exactly what you want to hear.

 

[Magnus314]

The point isn't that they are always exactly the same, only that a good amount of consistency isn't that difficult to achieve.

I've had Bud that was sweet, some skunked, some "tinny" with a weird metallic taste.

So they're not 100% consistent either.

And more flavor isn't always better. "Cleaner" but less flavorful beer is less satisfying to the pallet and generally gets drunk up faster, at least in my experience.

 

[mattdee1]

The point isn't that they are always exactly the same, only that a good amount of consistency isn't that difficult to achieve.

I've had Bud that was sweet, some skunked, some "tinny" with a weird metallic taste.

So they're not 100% consistent either.

And more flavor isn't always better. "Cleaner" but less flavorful beer is less satisfying to the pallet and generally gets drunk up faster, at least in my experience.

I definitely agree about the less-than-100% consistency of BMC.

Thing is, the flavor is so minimal that it's kind like listening to your stereo with the volume dial turned up just past the threshold of audibility--at that level you can make pretty significant tweaks to your EQ dials before you even hear much of a change. In other words, big variation in small flavor can amount to a very small flavor variation overall.

The other night I was at an open-bar reception and the only beer choices were four different common BMC offerings. I had one of each and could hardly tell them apart, if at all. It struck me as kind of funny how, in broadening my beer horizons to homebrew and craft, I've actually lost my ability to tell any appreciable difference between the types of beers I used to drink exclusively, and have strong preferences for one over the other.

I also don't understand the allure of chasing the consistency dragon at the homebrew/hobbyist level. As long as the "variation" comes from small changes in recipe and process (i.e., not from flaws or off flavors), who cares? For me, if a beer is good enough that I can be bothered repeating it, then a tiny noticeable difference isn't going to make it or break it.

 

[max384]

I definitely agree about the less-than-100% consistency of BMC.

Thing is, the flavor is so minimal that it's kind like listening to your stereo with the volume dial turned up just past the threshold of audibility--at that level you can make pretty significant tweaks to your EQ dials before you even hear much of a change. In other words, big variation in small flavor can amount to a very small flavor variation overall.

The other night I was at an open-bar reception and the only beer choices were four different common BMC offerings. I had one of each and could hardly tell them apart, if at all. It struck me as kind of funny how, in broadening my beer horizons to homebrew and craft, I've actually lost my ability to tell any appreciable difference between the types of beers I used to drink exclusively, and have strong preferences for one over the other.

I also don't understand the allure of chasing the consistency dragon at the homebrew/hobbyist level. As long as the "variation" comes from small changes in recipe and process (i.e., not from flaws or off flavors), who cares? For me, if a beer is good enough that I can be bothered repeating it, then a tiny noticeable difference isn't going to make it or break it.

I don't think your stereo analogy works here. In fact, I think you have it completely backwards. In a beer with strong flavors (craft, homebrew), variations and imperfections are covered up by the stronger flavors of the beer itself. In a light nearly flavorless beer, those same variations and imperfections are much more easily noticed because there isn't a strong flavor to mask them.

 

[Magnus314]

I think he was talking about variation from batch to batch, not "imperfections".

Off flavors are never good and would be very obvious in a low-flavor beer for sure.

But as an example, if it's a 2 out of 10 for "Malty" and the next batch is a 3/10 that's a 50% variation, but still low-flavored enough most people wouldn't notice, or notice but not care since it's still low.

 

[mattdee1]

I think he was talking about variation from batch to batch, not "imperfections".

Off flavors are never good and would be very obvious in a low-flavor beer for sure.

But as an example, if it's a 2 out of 10 for "Malty" and the next batch is a 3/10 that's a 50% variation, but still low-flavored enough most people wouldn't notice, or notice but not care since it's still low.

Exactly what I meant.

 

[QuadConPana]

So, basically, you are saying that you don't like AB/Inbev because they operate a business? They are doing what ANY business with a significant share of the market would do regardless if the product is beer, clothes, cars, pharma, etc...

There is a huge difference between operating a business that uses its size and resources to create a better product, and using it's size to pay lawyers and politicians to keep a better product out of the hands of consumers. It took years here in Florida for beer drinkers to be able to purchase 64 oz growlers because AB/InBev had the $$$ to keep it illegal. Suppose Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts, and McDonald's paid politicians to make it illegal to sell coffee at gas stations. Would that be "operating a business". I don't think so.

Maybe it is, "what ANY business would do". That doesn't mean we should take it lying down. If I left a stack of $100's laying on the seat of my unlocked car, stealing it might be what "anyone would do". But, if they got caught, they'd be arrested.

As far I was able to research when those allegations came out, it was just a crappy third party rumor...

I first read the rumor from Anthony Bourdain who worked for the network at the time. At the time, I always told the story as a rumor. Now, since my company has a social network policy, I can't tell you who verified it. Let's just say, they were there, and it happened. And, they specifically told me that it was Miller/Coors who used their muscle. Do they have the right to decide where their advertising dollars go? Of course. And I have the right to decide where my beer dollars go, and it won't be to them.