Why all the Dogfish Head hatred?

But that being said, I still think they are more driven by marketing than by flavor. They make concept beer, where the concept drives the end product instead of the end product driving the concept.

Originally posted by radarsock

Originally posted by BrooHa
This is disheartening to me.

I’ve always admired DFH for making GREAT brews as well as for pushing boundaries. Personally, I think their 60 and 90 are solid and I will kill for Squall. More importantly, Sam and his crew have remained devoted to tinkering regardless of their commercial success or distribution.

That, to me, is the crux of craft beer.

You’ll make stuff some people will like and some stuff that some people will hate. Just make it.

If they just focused on making beer that a majority of the population enjoyed, they’d be like all the other macros.

I think I’m just going to agree with BrooHa simply because his profile picture is of Jules from Pulp Fiction!

I am amazed that people act suprised when DFH hate is brought up, they are as hated as they are loved..take that to the bank.

I’m actually kind of indifferent in regard to Dogfish. I bought a bottle of Squall when it came out and it sucked. I bought 75 min IPA and it was ok. Basically I will try their less gimmicky, hoppy beer but pass on everything else.

Originally posted by redlem

Originally posted by MilkmanDan
In classic "get off my lawn" mode, they’re not as good as they used to be. When they opened the big brewery and started filtering their standard beers, it gutted the really unique character a lot of their beers had. 90 Minute went from being a really wild, crazy hop-bomb to just another middle-of-the-road DIPA. 60 Minute stopped having a unique "cask-y" feel and became just another IPA.

It’s not that I find DFH’s beers to be actively bad, it’s just they no longer have the character I used to love. I don’t care about their crazy stuff, as I haven’t bought it in years, it’s just that I really loved 60 Minute back in the day, and it just stopped tasting vaguely the same.

It’s not a "got too big"; Bell’s has expanded hugely, and they still make loads of great stuff. They managed to grow and keep their beers at the same high level. DFH didn’t.

90 Minute in the 750ml bottle was one of my favorite beers, I still think about it, but once they started filtering it and putting it in 12oz bottles it lost most of it character.

I dont hate DFH but I dont go out of my way for them either. I put them in the same class as Rogue, overpriced decent beer with better options out there.

Isn’t there a difference ?
Like i said i don’t know their beers very well , and i don’t know the history on this brewery.
But didn’t they like started out doing the special brews , or later on tried doing something more special and just in the beginning people liking it and themself like brewing it and discovering new things or always trying to do new things ?
This goes for allot of things not only beers, and it’s kinda typical for us humans.
Something totally different but like i said this goes for allot of things not only beers, look at people who do extreme sports , when they’re done getting a kick out of something they’ll push their boundaries in order to get that kick again.
I think this goes the same for Dogfish Head ... and not only Dogfish Head.
Look at De Struise Brouwers , Urbain loves to make eisbocked stuff ...
And i think this is the same for Dogfish head, their just doing what they like, is it weird stuff ? maybe let them do what they want.
In my eyes volume of brewing or hype brewing isn’t the same as commercial brewing.
Commercial for me is when no soul is put in the beer anymore , and the thinking of the brewery is only for making more and more money.
And this happend with allot of Belgian brewerys too... but i don’t believe Dogfish is like that ...
I don’t want to pick on anybody but i’d choose Stone over Dogfish for being commercial...
I’ll probabbly get allot of critique on this , but that’s just my opinion offcourse ...

Originally posted by cbkschubert

Originally posted by redlem

Originally posted by MilkmanDan
In classic "get off my lawn" mode, they’re not as good as they used to be. When they opened the big brewery and started filtering their standard beers, it gutted the really unique character a lot of their beers had. 90 Minute went from being a really wild, crazy hop-bomb to just another middle-of-the-road DIPA. 60 Minute stopped having a unique "cask-y" feel and became just another IPA.

It’s not that I find DFH’s beers to be actively bad, it’s just they no longer have the character I used to love. I don’t care about their crazy stuff, as I haven’t bought it in years, it’s just that I really loved 60 Minute back in the day, and it just stopped tasting vaguely the same.

It’s not a "got too big"; Bell’s has expanded hugely, and they still make loads of great stuff. They managed to grow and keep their beers at the same high level. DFH didn’t.

90 Minute in the 750ml bottle was one of my favorite beers, I still think about it, but once they started filtering it and putting it in 12oz bottles it lost most of it character.

I dont hate DFH but I dont go out of my way for them either. I put them in the same class as Rogue, overpriced decent beer with better options out there.

You and me brother! Love the 90 min. Most of the stuff in the 750’s is a little weird.

Whether you like DFH or not, you have to appreciate the way they push the brewing envelope.

I’ve only been drinking craft for a few years and I really thought it was odd that I really do not care for DFH beers. This thread helps to validate my opinion, although opinions really need not be validated. This said, I am indifferent. I really like Sam after watching Brew Masters.

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.

Originally posted by Lukaduke
I will try anything "craft brewed" once and most DFH beers are certainly worth drinking once however only a few of them make me want to go back and try it again... they do tend to go a little overboard with trying new things but I applaude a brewer who is into giving things a shot and not just following suit like so many other brewers do. That being said the price is not so bad in the state I live in which. But in Maine, sometimes the availibility is slimmer than it should be. I order beer for a small retail store and in the past have found that usually about half of a what our state is supposed to recieve actually shows up so the few things I want to try sell out before I even get a chance to order them. It seems to be getting better recently now that they have cut a few states out of their distribution ring.