Enzymes and Glitter Are Hopelessly Passé: Activated Charcoal is the Next Thing in Beer!
I believe I have this history right.
- AD 1980: New American brewers signal a return to the old ways by making beer from natural ingredients using traditional processes. Their beer is an antidote to mass market lagers that use additives and industrial methods. "Adjunct" grains--corn and rice--are considered verboten and labeled, erroneously, non-traditional.
- Circa 1987: Fruit deemed permissible, but only for use in traditional, adjunct-free microbrews.
- Circa 1988: Brewers experiment with vegetables and spice; are issued a yellow card. Permissible for homebrewers only.
- 1995: Barrel-aging deemed not just permissible, but awesome.
- Circa 2000: The term "craft beer" replaces "microbrew."
- Circa 2004: Vegetable and spice beers reintroduced as "culinary beers." Tentative acceptance.
- Circa 2010: The prejudice against "adjunct" grains disappears as Americans discover they have been used to make beer for hundreds of years.
- Circa 2012: Fruit IPAs introduced to great fanfare.
- Circa 2014: Sweetened, spiced stouts, sometimes barrel-aged, become popular special-release beers.
- 2016: Cryo hops introduced.
- Early 2017: Sweetened stouts are dubbed "pastry stouts," backlash ensues.
- Late 2017: Enzymatically-enhanced ultra-dry IPAs become a thing in San Francisco.
- Early 2018: Glitter beer.
- Yesterday:
Please update your priors.