India pale ale: more than a craft beer poster-child

Grain to Glass: Thanksgiving beer pairings for the whole family

The famous English theorist Alan Sinfield determined that all hegemonic ideologies sow the seeds of their own undoing. Sinfield must have surmised this after attending many holiday parties.
The holidays depend as much on their strict cultural traditions as they do on the annual mistakes that disrupt them—the dropped Thanksgiving turkey, the fallen-over Christmas tree. It’s built into the idea of the holiday that the holiday must go a little awry.
So allow to me continue in the time-honored tradition of reinforcing these cultural narratives, if only to ensure the survival of weird stories to share when it’s all over. Here are some beer pairings for the stereotypical characters that ought to be at your Thanksgiving celebration. Even this stupid narrative conceit is hopefully upended by the irony that hey, since when do we drink beer at Thanksgiving?
Your parents: I don’t care if your mother is a fun-loving progressive that let you have wine at dinner during your senior year in high school. When she’s standing over the turkey and wielding a large kitchen knife, you’ll be happy that you’re on your best behavior. That’s why you should pair your parents with a super low-ABV Lambic beer. Lambics are Belgian style, spontaneously fermented sour beers, meaning that the beer is fermented over a long period of time with specially cultivated “wild” yeast strains.
Wild yeast—which begets the category of “wild beers”—imparts funky, unpredictable, but typically sour flavors, and yields a refreshingly tart and rarely boozy final product. What’s particular about Lambics, however, is the addition of fruit to the fermentation tanks, giving these full-bodied, smooth sipping beers an unmistakable fruit-juicy character. I recommend picking up a bottle of the Belgian Lindemans Framboise (2.5 percent ABV), if only because Lambics are uncommon, and I’ve seen this brand around my local Whole Foods. Try their option brewed with peaches.
The stately grandfather: The first time I got buzzed, my very own stately grandfather was over for dinner and I shook a lobster claw at him at the dinner table. His reprimand has left serious emotional scars, and I’ve been desperately trying to rebuild a reputation for decency ever since. I imagine the same is true for my entire readership.
This Thanksgiving, I’m pairing my stately grandfather with a Belgian Tripel. Tripels are pale, strong beers (with ABV usually near 10 percent) that incorporate complex floral and citrus flavors with a sweet, yeasty malt backbone. This might sound similar to other Belgians beers, but the Tripel is distinct in its degree of bitterness.
Not unlike my grandfather, the Tripel’s characteristic bite reminds me at the front of every sip that I should sip my drink slowly and respectably over the course of the night. The Allagash Tripel is by far my favorite on the market: it moves through stages of spice, candied citrus and buttery malt, amounting to a beer so complex you’ll need to have several to account for its entire spectrum of flavors.
The crazy uncle: You would think that this unprincipled, unshaven stereotype ought to be crushing Buds all night long.
On principle, I cannot recommend a Bud Light. Not even in the noble pursuit of perpetuating stereotypes. Not even to my worst enemy. And so I suggest that you purchase a six-pack of West Coast IPA.
IPAs push the limits of what’s palatable, but we love them anyway. One sip of this mouth-puckering, ultra-bitter brew will put the same look on your face as one of your crazy uncle’s dirty jokes, so why not kill two birds with one stone?
I suggest Baxter Brewing’s exceedingly bitter Stowaway IPA (6.9 percent) and Sierra Nevada’s palate-torquing Torpedo Extra IPA (7.2 percent)—for their astringency and because you can find them, fittingly, in cans.
The fun aunt: Nobody rocks the pixie cut and technicolor scarf like your fun aunt. Her name is probably Deb. Her boozy alter-ego deserves a similarly merry character, so peruse aisles of your local liquor store (tip: specialty wine stores are often the best places to find a good craft beer selection) and see which of your favorite breweries are offering a holiday spiced ale.
This style varies in its offerings, but spiced ales usually attempt to encapsulate the holidays with festive seasonal flavors: cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger—maybe even some hot peppers.
The brooding, antisocial sibling: He claims that nobody understands him, but his cigarette-burned Joy Division T-shirt gives him away: he’s undeniably a stout. Plunge into the dark abyss of your humanity with the taste of roasted malt, smoke and ash. Forge in the smithy of your soul with the help of dark chocolate and bitter espresso.
Either way, the depth and range of flavor going on in this popular and delicious style will make your eyeliner run, it’s that good.
North Coast Brewing’s Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout (9 percent) is perhaps the paragon of dark, brooding brews, and luckily, you can pick up a six pack at Local on Maine Street. Two dependable backups are Guinness Foreign Extra Stout and Allagash Black, both 7.5 percent ABV.

Grain to Glass

India pale ale: more than a craft beer poster-child

This piece represents the opinion of the author:

November 7, 2014

If I had a nickel for every time I heard someone turn down a craft beer because they “don’t like IPAs”, I could buy a six-pack right now. That IPAs (India pale ales) represent the palate of all craft beers is a misconception, of course: craft beer comprises all artisanal quality ales and lagers. But to respond to the misconceivers, I will say: I’d probably use my nickels to buy some IPA.

IPAs have become the poster-child for American craft beer. How come? It departs from the typical flavor profile of the ubiquitous lager in the same way that craft beer departs from the ubiquitous mass-market beer. Of course, all craft brews represent a “breakaway” of sorts, but the flavors in an IPA have made it an icon.

IPAs are particularly dramatic. They are provocative brews, often toeing the boundaries of what is palatably safe with mouth-puckering bitterness, astringency and big, boozy flavors. Thus, style-wise, lagers and IPAs are in diametric opposition: IPAs are hoppy beers, where lagers are malty. Like craft beer, IPAs are an alternative to the mainstream (hipsters, it’s time to ditch your PBR), but it’s their particular taste that makes them especially symbolic.

But let’s get real, the misconception is also reinforced by the immense popularity of IPAs among craft beer drinkers. When I first started drinking beer, all I wanted was IPAs. I fell hard. I was besotted by boldness, bitterness and bite. I loved hops: how different strains and combinations brought unfamiliar, complex flavors to beer that I hadn’t tasted before. Readers, I started calling myself…a hophead.

Yes, I know, this is getting personal. I’m fine with it, however, because I’m not alone. American brewers love IPAs. Most American breweries brew at least one as a kind of staple, and many of the most popular craft breweries in the country are devoted to brewing big, hoppy beers.
In fact, the American affinity for IPA (especially on the West Coast, where the majority of hops are grown) is so strong that Americans have reclaimed and redefined the style on the international stage.

The IPA actually originated in Britain. The story goes that the Brits in the metropole wanted to transport barrels of pale ale to their colonies in India, but the beer would spoil before it arrived. Their solution to this problem was to increase the amount of hops added to the boil, since hops are a preservative as well as a flavoring agent. The result: a super hoppy version of the familiar British pale ale.

Of course, what we now recognize as a British IPA wouldn’t taste anything like the astringent that likely arrived in India way back when, but it was likely what inspired the idea for hop-forward, more alcoholic pale ales. But American brewers pushed the style slightly further—after all, it’s an American tradition to break away from the British. We might even attribute the popularity and reputed “boldness” of the IPA to what Americans have done to renovate the style in recent years. These changes have been so influential that they’ve made their way back to England; I recall bending elbows at a few pubs that recommended English-brewed IPAs that were clearly modeled off the American approach. One brewer I spoke with affirmed the American influence, explaining that while the Brits can take credit for the IPA’s origin, Americans are now leading the way.

While the American “East Coast IPA” is closer in flavor profile to its British counterpart, there are plenty of hoppy, innovative IPAs brewed in Maine. The Portland brewery Bissell Brothers makes an IPA called “The Substance” (6.6 percent) that currently vies for my favorite on the market. Super hoppy, but not overpoweringly bitter, this beer actually soars towards its finish when it reaches its buttery malt base and achieves a perfect balance. You can get this beer on tap at Frontier, or buy it in a 16oz four-pack of cans.

I’ll save the Freeport-based Maine Beer Company (MBC) reviews for their own featured column, but I’d be remiss not to mention “Lunch” (7 percent). MBC loves hops, but its beers are not overly bitter and the gentle and complex interplay between hops and an almost cookie-like malt is probably why Lunch is the brewery’s most popular beer.
Lastly, check out Portland’s Rising Tide’s Zephyr, if only because it’s fall, and this beer evokes the pre-winter chill with apples, citrus and pine needles. A perfect Maine beer, if I ever imagined one.

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