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Originally posted by BBB63
Originally posted by Sevenlee
Originally posted by Rando7
Long thread...I liked Indian Brown and WWS but otherwise haven’t been too impressed, especially with some of their expermental stuff.
My impression is that DFH too often puts novelty ahead of taste, and that opinion was strengthened watching the TV show. Caligone seemed to run around looking for something to catch his eye or pop into his head, then immediately start acting on it without much regard for whether it actually would taste any good. I guess he gets props for trying new things though.
So it seems one of the many critisims against DFH is that they randomly pick ingredients, throw them into a big pot and hope it works out. I’m not sure where people get this idea. Maybe there are too many flavours going on for people to like but if he does all his beers as he did them in the Brew Masters series, then it’s nothing like you describe. When in Egypt, for example, he bought different spices and ingredients that were accurate for the beer he was trying to recreate and then made up a little tester of each ingredient. He then went on to mix the ones they liked and discussed with his head brewer, historian and local guide about how it tasted and and how it worked with the other ingredients. They pretty much agreed on the ingredients before they even got back to Delaware and put anything in the Mash Tun.
I can only assume there would be a similar process with all the beer they create as he did this same thing in pretty much every episode.
So maybe people aren’t fans of the taste of their beers especially in the really experimental ones and that’s cool but I think saying they pick ingredients at random and put them together without any consideration to how they taste is fallacious.
Well when you brew with some of these off the wall ingredients you simply have no idea what the final product will be like or worse what it will taste like a month or two down the road.
The issue I have is most of newer beers seem muddled, those crazy ideas get lost in translation. It is like peppered beers, either make it so I can fully taste and grasp the peppers unique character or do not waste your time and my money. That is not saying to add more peppers which brings things out of balance, but choose properly the other ingredients to highlight the flavor profile you are attempting.
I dunno. They’ve got Sam posing heroically next to that Sabco system so I’m sure they do smaller test batches before releasing stuff to the public. ;)
I am more appreciative of a brewery that’s willing to brew stuff that’s weird than simply jumping in on the ridiculous collabs (yes, I know they do it too, DFH just doesn’t seem as prevalent as others, it seems)or the "highest ABV arms race" that was going on a while ago.
It’s fine to have critical opinions but a lot of the "hate" sounds like craft beer hipsterism because DFH isn’t the It-Gal anymore. |
Originally posted by BrooHa
I am more appreciative of a brewery that’s willing to brew stuff that’s weird than simply jumping in on the ridiculous collabs (yes, I know they do it too, DFH just doesn’t seem as prevalent as others, it seems)or the "highest ABV arms race" that was going on a while ago.
It’s fine to have critical opinions but a lot of the "hate" sounds like craft beer hipsterism because DFH isn’t the It-Gal anymore.
I see collabs for the sake of collabs, the highest ABV arms race, and weird ingredients for the sake of weird ingredients as all part of the same mind-set. Brewers are putting gimmicks ahead of taste.
Some drinkers get into that kind of stuff, some don’t. At the end of Brew Masters episodes people would try the new beer and you’d see some enjoying it and some in the corner of the scene looking around like "what is this shit?". That’s fine, vive la différence. |
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Originally posted by Drake
Originally posted by SamGamgee
Originally posted by joet
MM is right and good to bring up Bells as a counter example.
I still like Palo Santo as delightful murky weirdness.
I do think the primary flaw that most people mention about the DFH IPAs is the flawed concept that hops need to be "balanced by" malt sweetness. That’s been debunked by so many successful hop forward beers.
A super gooey bittersweet beer is like a candy bar. Bitter chocolate plus sugar.
A dried out hoppy beer allows much more hop flavor to emerge. It’s a true IPA.
They certainly don’t have to be balanced by malt sweetness, but a lot of people love a sweet, malty, and really hoppy beer. I think this is Sam’s personal taste, and he has always been pretty true to brewing what he wants to.
It’s an East Coast thing. Overly malty beers are not to be desired, but while your hop juice can be a delight, we do like our balanced beers over here.
And this is exactly why the new breed of UK brewers of blessedly crystal-malt-free trans-Atlantic pale, golden, or half-IPA should completely scrub the term "mid-Atlantic" from their beer vocabulary: "mid-Atlantic" means "mid-Atlantic seaboard region", AKA "Delaware" (or wherever DFH is from) to hundreds of millions of Americans! |
I am generally not a huge fan of DFH but i must say the 75 minute is very good...fascinating brew! I dig it. |
Originally posted by sloth
Originally posted by Drake
Originally posted by SamGamgee
Originally posted by joet
MM is right and good to bring up Bells as a counter example.
I still like Palo Santo as delightful murky weirdness.
I do think the primary flaw that most people mention about the DFH IPAs is the flawed concept that hops need to be "balanced by" malt sweetness. That’s been debunked by so many successful hop forward beers.
A super gooey bittersweet beer is like a candy bar. Bitter chocolate plus sugar.
A dried out hoppy beer allows much more hop flavor to emerge. It’s a true IPA.
They certainly don’t have to be balanced by malt sweetness, but a lot of people love a sweet, malty, and really hoppy beer. I think this is Sam’s personal taste, and he has always been pretty true to brewing what he wants to.
It’s an East Coast thing. Overly malty beers are not to be desired, but while your hop juice can be a delight, we do like our balanced beers over here.
Not all of us! I prefer the west coast style myself. Balanced to the hoppy side is fine with me.
Yeah, me too... but seeing people coming to my area from the West Coast and giving perfectly good IPAs really shitty scores, just because they have taste buds left afterwards, pisses me off just a little. |
Originally posted by watson1977
I am generally not a huge fan of DFH but i must say the 75 minute is very good...fascinating brew! I dig it.
I agree. |
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I’m a huge fan of Dogfish Head and will buy everything of theirs once. They were one of the first craft breweries I drank and even if it were only for that I would appreciate them forever because of it. Thankfully they brew great beers and also brew a lot of odd beers that are hit and miss. I’m thankful we have them to brew the odd beers that they do as there’s already enough breweries brewing quality brews of "normal" styles.
As I type this I’m drinking a Dogfish Head Red and White I’m really enjoying. It’s a nice hybrid Belgian beer with wine elements that blend together well, with each added flavor complimenting something part of the base beer. It’s been hard to drink the 750 by myself I admit, but it’s worth trying. Last night I had a Saison du Buff and a 2012 120 Minute IPA, both I didn’t enjoy very much for different reasons, but I appreciate them for what they are. |
Dogfish head is a great brewery even if I don’t drink their beers all that often anymore. There’s just so much out there now. Years ago that wasn’t the case and Dogfish head was one of those breweries that pushed the envelope before others. That got a lot of people into craft beer and I am grateful to them for being one of a handful of breweries that started me on that journey. Today, I’ll try all their beers but I tend not to buy much of them. Too many good beers out there now. |
Originally posted by jtclockwork
Dogfish head is a great brewery even if I don’t drink their beers all that often anymore. There’s just so much out there now. Years ago that wasn’t the case and Dogfish head was one of those breweries that pushed the envelope before others. That got a lot of people into craft beer and I am grateful to them for being one of a handful of breweries that started me on that journey. Today, I’ll try all their beers but I tend not to buy much of them. Too many good beers out there now.
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