"Unfiltered" "X"

[phendog]

I've noticed unfiltered beers are on the rise. Recently, I visited a Sweetwater Tavern. I like their food and their beer is usually pretty good. This time they had an Unfiltered Kolsch on the menu. I tried a sample and it was good, so I had a pint. Actually, it tasted like the one I currently have on tap at home.

However, this got my homebrew brain working. Kolsch by style is crystal clear. Was this unfiltered version simply a case of needing to free up a fermenter before full floc due to brewing schedule (don't think they have a bright tank or spin down) or is there something more to this upswing in unfiltered style?

 

[VagueSkunk]

Anything "hazy" seems to be quite popular right now. I don't mind it, some others consider it to be an affront to all that is holy.

 

[SlitheryDee]

I've read that hazy beer in general is in vogue at homebrew conventions. Perhaps that's bleeding over into the commercial side now. I guess we have NEIPAs to thank for that, but it seems like a curious development to me. I mean, the haze of NEIPAs is a byproduct of how it has to be made in order to get it's characteristic flavor. I kind of doubt that anyone was actually praising the haze in the beginning though. It was just how the beer had to be in order to taste like it did.

Now that we've connected haziness with this style we like, it's showing up other places. It seems like people are missing the point here though. Haze isn't intrinsically good just because. Nobody is improving their beer with nothing but haze. If there's haze, it should serve a purpose in terms of flavor, or at least be an unavoidable consequence of the manufacturing process. Now I realize that being hazy doesn't necessarily hurt the flavor either and is really sort of the default state of young enough beer, but this feels reactionary to me. Haze is in, whether it serves a purpose or not. It's like people focused in on this one superficial aspect of a beer style and gave it undeserved importance. That rubs me the wrong way. /rant

 

[ProblemChild]

marketing - - meaning they cut back on expense and effort on their beer and used "Unfiltered" as a means of making it sound good to the masses.

Some beers are proper as unfiltered and cloudy, but a Kolsch?

 

[casualbrewer]

Sounds like laziness to me