Yeah, I never really found the appeal of craft beers... and IPAs. Because IPA? Because craft?

I'm having an IPA right now... gifted to me recently... it's ok but I still prefer lagers.

A touch hoppy?

David

If anything, I think the Northeast/New England IPA scene has gotten much better over the past couple of years. Lots of innovation.

I like New England IPAs a lot more than west coast IPAs. New England ones have lots of tropical fruit flavors, while west coast ones are just bitter hop bombs.

I mostly like hoppy beers that aren't really IPAs these days.

Yep. I mean I don't hate it, but I often find the aftertaste to be blech... but that's just me.

It's not just you.

Sadly, some/many/most? brew folk seem to think that if some hops is good, a bushel is tres distinctive.

Hence, the title of this thread.

At that point, I'd ask if it were wort the effort...

David

Some days, I really enjoy a hop bomb of a beer.

It has its place. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to a brewery where IPAs dominate. Come to think of it, I haven’t been to a brewery in a long time. I think many beer retailers (liquor stores, package stores, ABC stores) are a little behind the times and often I find the stock is overwhelmingly hoppy beers. That’s not the real world. We spent August in AVL, home of 90+ craft breweries. We visited a half dozen and all featured a variety of beers, from dark to sour to hoppy to malty. I don’t see that same array at my local retailer. Maybe that’s why the OP was so confused about what constituted “craft beer”. It’s like buying cilantro at the grocery store and saying “vegetables taste like soap”.

The only time I like hoppy beers is when I'm eating hot wings or spicy Indian food--even then, I won't go out of my way to find/order one.

I've seen a lot of breweries where IPAs are still the dominant beer on their tap list, but most have a wide range of beers so even if they have 8 IPAs, they have 4 or 5 non-IPAs.

I remember a beer person telling me that IPA is the easiest style to learn to make, which is why there are so many of them, and that most of them are junk because the brewers don't know what they're doing.

I tend to just drink beer and not overthink it too much.

Perfect! My kind of brewery.

Me, too.

The trend now is a return to West coast style ipas, abandoning the heavily-sugared NE hazy style it seems. I love a good IPA of either variety, but crappy craft brewers were definitely ruining hazy ipas.

Yeah. I'm not much of a beer drinker. I am a big Scotch person. But when it comes to beer, I really like lagers. Yes, even Heineken.