Puzzled by Pale Ales

As a casual beer drinker, I’ve recently noticed a trend in certain “Pale Ales” at various Microbreweries. I guess they’re considered American Pale Ales but don’t really know for sure.

My stereotypical idea of a “pale ale” is a lower alcohol beer (typically 6% or less) which tastes like…beer, but with some body, maybe some citrus, maybe a touch hoppy/bitter, maybe a little “amber”, maybe a little hazy. Sierra Nevada springs to mind. There are plenty of local examples that fit the bill and that I’ve found quite satisfying.

Recently I’ve encountered a different type of “pale ale”. Very light creamy yellow coloring and cloudy, sometimes very cloudy. Seemingly very low alcohol (tasting anyway). It’s like seltzer water with some beer flavoring and coloring and maybe a few drops of lemon juice. Almost like a super light turbid shandy. It seems like the breweries are selling it so fast that they whip it together and sell it before it has a chance to become…beer.

I honestly never remember running in to this stuff before this Summer (Tired Hands in Ardmore, PA and Strong Rope near Long Lake, NY). What’s going on?

RT

Your color descriptions make it sound like you are referring to “hazy” pale ales, which I’ve also noticed an increase of offering around the NW, but not to the extent you see in PA. It’s the logical continuation of the hazy/NE IPA craze to IPAs cousin.

Like with all “hazy” or “New England” hoppy beers, most are meh, but when made well can be quite excellent.

Today I think you have to look at the producers IPA. Their Pale Ale would most likely be a darker, maltier and less hoppy version. I don’t think they are using as benchmarks and copying Sierra and Anchor anymore these days.

Wish I had a better picture of it…but that’s it on the left in the mostly empty glass…at Strong Rope. Looks like light carbonated/frothy lemonade. Flavor-wise, barely recognizable as “beer”. The hazy orange/tan IPA on the right was actually quite tasty…not crazy bitter.

RT

Richard, that picture looks like I already drank a lot of beer.

Not sure what the ABV actually was, but my sense is that you could sip that Pale Ale all day long and remain more focused than the photo.

RT

Yup, definitely describing New England-style IPAs vs. more “traditional” IPAs – hazy, super fruity, etc. To me, the best NE IPAs are usually on the more viscous side with tons of heady, juicy fruit aromas and the worst are lighter bodied, far less heady and simplistic (and often show off-putting yeast aromas).

Richard, you might find enjoyment from one of the better producers of NE IPAs - Jorge was offering some Tree House in CC and IIRC they’re one of the originators of this style, a very fine product.

Alex, no mention of IPA on the menu/board. Just “Pale Ale”. Low alcohol, advertised around 5%. Their IPA (the more orange beer) was probably a NE IPA…much like your descriptors. Tasty with a listed 7%. Pleasantly bitter. Double IPAs are usually way too much for me. A little bitterness adds interest.

The solution is obviously to ask for a taste before ordering. Which if rejected…makes me want to ask: “Do you have anything here that tastes like ‘beer’?”

I might be off base, but it feels like minimal thought goes in to these Shandy-esque Pale Ales. They crank it out fast to have something to sell that’s low alcohol.

RT

I am seeing a lot of “hazy” pale ales these days for sure. They can be hit or miss just like their big siblings. Personally I avoid the maltier ambered pale ales which seemed to dominate the market for years and go for the cleaner, fresher lighter styles of pale ale- for lack of a better description- pilsner style pale ales.

As an aside, the brewer in Pilzn who invented the Pilsner had traveled to England to better understand how they made their beers, as they were the palest beers in the world at the time. Supposedly this explains the relatively high hop rate in Pilsners.

When I’m at a brewery that doesn’t serve a lager, I will always go for the Pale Ale unless they have a Bitter. Frankly, I have no interest in drinking a beer that’s over 7% alcohol and I’d really prefer to drinks something that’s around 5% ABV. A 7% beer requires too much sipping/nursing to be worthwhile.

I’m mostly with you Rick. Especially during or after a bike ride…I want something refreshing.

Seems like everyone is brewing high octane stuff. Tougher than it should be to find quality less than 6%. Is it that much harder to do? Customers aren’t interested?

Some local menus are loaded with offerings from 8 to 11+%. I’ve no interest and would opt for wine at those ABVs. But they keep brewing the stuff so it must sell.

RT

While the craft beer crews I hang with are most excited about the barrel aged beers that typically run 8%+, the beer places I haunt tend to have a strong selection of 6% and under beers, including lagers, pale ales, IPAs, dry stouts, sours, Hefeweizen, etc. And the broader interest in those beers are popular.

As an anecdote, at a recent beer share, the group was most excited about Suarez Family and Wayfinder Pilsners, whereas they usually geek out over bourbon barrel aged pastry stouts, lambic, IPAs. The times they are a changing…

Scott. You and Rick are magnitudes more sophisticated when it comes to “beer” than either myself or the average microbrewery customer. Locally, one can definitely find quality at 6% (or less)…but you need to be choosy or just lucky (they happen to have something tasty). Guess it’s not unlike wineries. The establishments that seem more serious about “beer” tend to offer better lower alcohol brews.

With so much competition, there must be a ton of pressure for microbreweries to make whatever sells with a high enough profit margin to keep the lights on. Most local microbreweries are augmenting their beer with kitchens, dining facilities and food trucks. Both of the breweries with the crappy “pale ales” were obviously spending tons of money on looking more visually appealing…outdoor seating, landscaping, etc.

RT

I’ve definitely spent a lot of time, money, and wasted calories determining where to find the local, high quality beers, but I agree with your take above. The exciting thing for me is 2-3 years ago you could not find lagers at most Seattle breweries or beer bars. Now, they and other low ABV beers (Incl solid session IPAs) are ubiquitous. As you note, that requires trial and error to find the quality versions (despite their ubiquitousness, IMO WA breweries other than Chuckanut are light years behind OR breweries in crafting well made lagers, which is why I’m glad Rick and Wayfinder distribute here).

Due to high real estate costs, the most popular/successful Seattle breweries here don’t have kitchens or fancy facilities. Many don’t even have regular food trucks. Fine by me as I’d rather the $ be invested in making better beer than nicer tables and bar countertops.

On a side note, I’ll be in Philly area in mid-November to visit an old friend. Will only have one day/night (Friday) in Philly itself, any beer recommendations? Not sure how many places I’ll be able to visit as my buddies tend to prefer liquor. Definitely stopping at Monk’s Cafe, but open to suggestions for other places. From my research, was thinking Tired Hands Biergarten, Love City Brewing, and Brewery ARS. Fermentery Form sounds really interesting, but they are only open on Thursday’s.

Thumbs up for Monk’s. Belgian brews, mussels and frites. It’s a bit grubby and touristy…and still worth it!

The Philly Microbrew scene (including the PA and NJ suburbs) is booming. I know next to nothing about it. The local options within just 10 -15 miles of home are pretty overwhelming.

Don’t order the “Pale Ale” at Tired Hands. Lots of award winning brews, or so I’ve heard, and I don’t know which they are. Frankly I like plain jane Conshohocken Brewing…it’s more convenient from points north and easy access from the paved Schuylkill River bike path.

RT

Lower abv beers ‘tend to be’ less durable because of the lower alcohol and lower hop intensity, which act as preservatives. The New England style IPAs have always had the reputation of fading out quickly even if they are stronger because (and Rick can correct me if I’m wrong) the way they use the hops are mostly for aromatics and less bittering, which is more fragile and fades out faster. Kind of like making a red wine using carbonic maceration for short-term fruitiness makes the wine not as age-worthy, to mix my metaphors. The bigger, super-sized IPAs tend to get more hype on social forums, have more trade value and ‘wow’ factor, and end up surviving the shipping and trading process better

RE:Breweries and kitchens. Given the choice, most brewers I have come across would want NOTHING to do with the restaurant side if they could help it. It’s a completely different muscle to run that type of business, along with the hundreds of $Ks worth of equipment and space must be devoted in the startup cost. Depending on the state, some ABC regulations may require it to be a part of the license; when one of the more successful craft breweries in Virginia first opened about 14 years ago (Blue Mountain) their original facility allotted the smallest square footage of space for the kitchen the law would allow, maybe a 20X20 space for one chef to work. Much bigger now, of course. The single greatest moment in our craft brew scene was in 2011 (IIRC) when that specific law was changed, allowing breweries to essentially operate under the same guidelines and restrictions as wineries. Now all you need are four walls and a concrete slab to get started, and the brewer’s talent can take them as far as they want.

Beer doesn’t age anywhere as well as wine. That said, beers with high bitterness (either malt or hop bitterness) and/or high acidity and a lot of unfermentables tend to age better than others. In addition, lagers tend to age better than ales. For years brewers have honed their craft to make beers last longer before going south. Unfortunately the process for making hazy IPAs and pastry Stouts go against best practices when it comes to making beers for the long haul. I would think of these new beers being more like making “natural wine”. In other words, God only knows what will happen after a couple of months.

As for restaurants and brewing, I never had the slightest interest in running a restaurant. In fact, at some point I think you need to decide what you are - a Brew Pub or a restaurant with a brewery.

Can you explain this? When I think about beers that age well, the list that I’m aware of is almost exclusively ales: barrel aged sours, Belgian Tripels and strong ales, certain styles of stout, barleywine (I don’t like them, but they do age)…I’m probably forgetting some, but that’s all I can think of at the moment. Do you mean hang on in the short term, like 1-2 years (this I could see, as so many German lagers are inexplicably great after over a year in bottle and questionable transportation and storage conditions during that time), or genuinely age for multiple years and develop different characteristics?

I’ve tried a number of Tired Hands beers (a neighborhood beer bar regularly has their beers on tap). I’ve yet to have a wowza beer from them, but some solid efforts. Duly noted on the pale ale!

The beers you describe will age better than most lagers, but frankly, the beers you’re talking about are a small fraction of the ales purchased in the U.S. For most beers made, a lager will keep better (think one month vs three months here) than an ale. The reason has to do with properties of the yeast. Lager yeast will stay in suspension and active much longer than ale yeast. Yeast is the most effective guard against oxidation. This means at packaging, the dissolved oxygen will be significantly lower in a lager than in an ale, everything else being equal. For example, we find that the dissolved oxygen in our kolsch-style ale is roughly three times what it is in our Pilsner (26 ppb vs 9 ppb, where anything below 100 ppb is generally considered acceptable). More oxygen means more staling sooner.

In beers where staling is part of the aging process (the beers you describe above), yeast type is less important. Instead, factors like alcohol, unfermentables, and acidity and/or hopping (timing of hopping too) become more important.