Fireside Chat Video: Setting the Record Straight on How IPAs Came to Be

On Wednesday, we had a fantastic conversation about IPAs in our second episode of Fireside Chats. Our goal to to rewrite the history of IPAs so that it more fully accounts for the interactions and communications among brewers across the country. In its crudest form, a version of IPAs history goes like this: first there were IPAs on the West Coast that were extremely bitter, dry, and piney, and they didn’t really change until New England breweries created ultra-juicy, low-bitterness, sweet IPAs. But that was never true—IPAs were evolving around the country at the same time, and the brewers listened to what customers wanted and talked to each other. In this conversation, we go through that history and begin to paint a more cohesive, integrated portrait, calling on brewers from around the country.

Unfortunately Alexandra Nowell, the former Three Weavers brewer currently working at CLS farms (you’ll notice one of our members wearing a CLS hat as a nod to that farm) was unable to attend. She got sick and went so far as to ask her doctor if she could join, despite a bad sore throat and a voice that was quickly fading, but he said no. Nevertheless, we were left with three folks who know a thing or two about IPAs:

• Noah Bissell, Co-founder of Bissell Brothers Brewing (Portland, ME)

• Vinnie Cilurzo, Co-founder and Brewmaster, Russian River Brewing (Santa Rosa, CA)

• Mitch Steele, Co-owner and Brewmaster of New Realm (Atlanta), former Brewmaster of Stone Brewing and author of IPA.

I will post the audio portion of this conversation at a pod extra next week, but here’s the video now. (Please ignore the trolls who crashed the party early on.)