Convergence
On one track we have lagers, clean and dry, with lean bodies and increasingly fruity and aromatic hop profiles. Instead of herbs and wildflowers, they waft the scents of American hops, and tinge the flavor profile with limes, tangerines, lychee, and cannabis. Sulfur plays no role. They are light and sunny, around 5% ABV, and slide down a throat with the ease of water.
On another track are pale ales, stripped of body and sparkling, redolent of American hops. Made with light malts and clean yeast, they are platforms for mid-intensity hopping, with lovely bouquets and flavors crackling with those same citrus, tropical fruits, and a hint of something savory for contrast. They are light and sunny, around 5% ABV, and slide down a throat with the ease of water.
Am I drinking a West Coast pilsner or a West Coast Pale ale? Does it matter?
Lagers and pale ales started in different places and would have been hard to confuse a decade or three ago—but functionally they inhabited similar terrain. Beers like Sierra Nevada Pale and Heater Allen Pils, to take two beers no one would confuse, are engineered to interest but not fatigue the palate and to quench thirst without clubbing the drinker with booze. They were definitely different, but they fit in that slot all session beers across the world have always inhabited.
Until I poured out a can of Pure Project’s Neon Bloom, however, it hadn’t occurred to me that pilsners and pales were converging. We’ve had a nice run of warm, sunny weather in Portland, and midway through the first can I enjoyed—thanks to a four-pack sent from San Diego—I realized I was having an experience shift. The beer smelled and tasted like a hoppy ale, but I was slugging it down like a lager. I paused to give it some attention and realize, purely from the sensory experience, that it drank very much like a WC pilsner.
This shouldn’t have been a surprise. We’ve seen the trend going the other direction since at least the debut of cold IPA, with lager yeast being used to make dry, crisp, pilsner-pale beers that present basically like IPAs. In a way, pale ales make more sense, too. West Coast pilsners are slightly disorienting, even though they have all the markers of European pilsners—those American hops trick the mind. With pales, one is more prepared for the experience. Neon Bloom is a classic Citramosaic beer, which seems natural enough in a pale ale. Yet there’s a sneaky element there that makes it pilsnery, too. The Mosaics, with their savory edge of cannabis, create a sensation—and the resulting drinkability—of a lager’s sulfur snap, and the herbs and spice of their European hops.
It’s also not the first time an ale has been called upon to do the work of a lager. When pilsners and Vienna lagers were encroaching on traditional ale regions in the 19th and 20th centuries, breweries used ale yeasts to create sparkling, crisp doppelgangers. I don’t know that Pure Project set out with West Coast pilsner as their benchmark with this beer. Now “West Coast” has a very specific, narrow meaning, and it’s pretty lagerlike. West Coast pilsners and IPAs are supposed to be very pale, very dry and crisp, and full of intense American hop aromatics and flavors. Even posing the idea of making a “West Coast pale ale” (as Pure Project describes Neon Bloom) means making a beer that has many of the qualities of lager, especially lagers that use American hops.
I don’t know if this “West Coast” thing will be around for the long run. But leave aside the style names and descriptions, and it merely describes an organic evolution that’s been happening for awhile. People are drawn to crisp, dry, effervescent beers, as well as beers with the saturated, fruity flavors of American hops. It was almost inevitable that we would see a convergence of lagers and hoppy ales—and I suspect it will be a durable one, even if the “West Coast” name drops away.