Are boring beers or badly made beers the real enemy?
One thing about moving outside your comfort zone, ordering beers in languages you don’t speak and knocking back what the locals drink even if you might never have heard of the beers . . . you come across both. (Same with wine, which can be even more confusing in “emerging” wine countries like Croatia and Slovenia).
While I consider this question myself I’d like to hear your opinions.
And, no, “both” is not an acceptable answer. You have to pick one.
Ordering beers I have never had is something that always brings me great joy. Though as you say you run the risk of finding simply bad as well as boring beers, I always delight in trying something new, even if it isn’t great, perhaps it will have some flavors I have never experienced or rarely see. To answer your question I would say poorly made beers are the real enemy. If a brewer isn’t going to put love into their product than what is the point? Though I am certainly no fan of dull beers, I would much rather consume a brew that was created with dignity than a piss brew that is made with no heart.
I’d have to agree with Beckel. How many have made beers that just did not turn out as expected and were boring? Granted, poorly made can cover a number of aspects, but generally the connotation is that it was made without any care or thought and just thrown together to bring a product to market. I would much rather try a beer that ended up boring by failure of planning or execution than one that had no thought put into it.
I pick neither. The real enemy of better beer is excellent beer! Once you have gone Belgian, how can the rest of the craft world compete?
But I submit to your demand for picking one or the other, I say badly made beers. Boring beers have their place when the beer is not at the forefront. I am not missing Trappist beers at ballgames.
Badly made beers, that turned more people off from craft brew in the 1990s and we still fight it often.
Badly made beers with large advertising budgets. What the hell is drinkability? There’s so much of it in some beers you can hardy taste the cold.
I’ll vote for badly made beers, even though I’ve recently run into a few yawners that disappointed me, I’d still say I’d upend a poorly made (and bad tasting) brew before a bland one.
Then again, can’t a boring beer be the result of poor brewing practices?
The enemy is boring beer. If a beer is badly made there might still be something worth considering. A boring beer has no soul. Your thing, right?
Depends, Stan: “boring” to whom? Boring’s too subjective.
So I guess it doesn’t depend after all: badly made beers. No, wait: what do you mean by that? Badly formulated beers? Badly brewed beers? Badly packaged beers?
I’m so confused.
Lew – Correct that boring is in the eye of the beholder. I’m immersed in Czech lagers right now (not actually immersed although I do like the image) and many would call them “the same” or boring.
Badly made to me means badly executed, flawed to the point they no longer represent the brewer’s intent. So more badly brewed and/or badly packaged than badly formulated. Not that I’m mounting any sort of defense for out-of-balance hoppy beers.
Badly made, which for me includes bad recipes. Like roasted malt or smoked malt that just doesn’t fit. But since you mentioned it also includes bad use of hops. That’s usally too much, and sometimes the wrong varieties.