Names carry a lot of weight in anything to do with culture. Whether it’s fashion, food, music or art, there will always be stuff that’s considered mainstream, disposable, mass-produced and easily accessible.
And on the flip side, there will be other things that appear to elevate the genres by being more experimental and creative, and appealing to a smaller set of discerning customers.
Beer is just another example. We can all probably name twenty mainstream beer brands off the tops of our head, even if we never touch it. They sponsor sports competitions and advertise on primetime TV. The product is almost secondary to the name.
But in every country where beer is popular, there will be dozens if not hundreds of small brewers – from individuals in garages to microbreweries – doing something different. They’ll work on small batches to create novel beers in all manner of flavours, strengths and colours, from a diverse collection of ingredients.
In fact, they might never make exactly the same beer twice (not for want of trying). And if they do sell the beer, it’ll be to local pubs as guest ales or take it to fairs and markets.
To most aficionados of the industry, it’s that latter type that would qualify as being “craft” beer. But is it just to do with the substance itself, or is there more to it? Can a large brewer make craft beer?
So! What is Craft beer?
It also called microbrew, carbonated fermented malted alcoholic beverage created by small, independent breweries that produce a limited annual volume. Production runs are often modest, usually fewer than 1,000 barrels each year per brewery. With this narrow focus comes the freedom to experiment with styles and processes to produce distinctive craft beers, sometimes in batches as small as a single keg.
Craft beers offer consumers a variety of choices, flavors, and styles and stand in contrast to the consistent and mild lagers from major brewing corporations that dominate the roughly $800 billion commercial market worldwide.
Although beer brewing has a long history, especially in Europe, where many of the approximately 100 known styles of beer were created, small-scale craft brewing that targets local and regional consumers is a recent phenomenon, especially in the United States, where it has exploded in popularity since the late 1990s. As of the 2020s, there are about 10,000 craft breweries in the world, with the majority located in the United States and Europe. Despite the increase in the number of craft breweries, craft beer still accounts for only a small percentage of beer sales, however.
A few factors differentiate craft beers (microbrews) from bigger beer (macro-brew) producers. Some countries set annual production limits for craft brewers, However in India there is nothing as such. In US & Europe, craft brewers were once required to use malt as their main grain for brewing, but that restriction has been relaxed, and craft beer can now include both “traditional or innovative brewing ingredients.” This means that craft beer can include grains like corn, barley, and rye, which are often cheaper and used by bigger beer companies.
Most craft beer remains local and is not widely distributed, with the bulk of craft beer sales occurring in the taprooms of the breweries that produce them. Although the number of craft breweries has increased, the beer market is still dominated by macrobrews.
The history of beer brewing dates back thousands of years, to Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, and other places where fermentation was a part of daily life. Beer was an important supplement to a diet and oftentimes safer to drink than potentially contaminated, untreated water. Refinements to the brewing process about the 14th and 15th centuries popularized the use of hops, which could be grown in many climates. Hops eventually became the preferred brewing ingredient, in part because the antimicrobial properties they imparted could extend the shelf life of beers. The domestication of yeast strains also resulted in changes to the brewing process. In 1836 Saccharomyces cerevisiae (from Latin and Greek roots: “sugar fungus” “of beer”), now known as brewer’s yeast, was first classified by a scientist. It is now the most common yeast strain used in brewing.
Indian Top Craft Breweries.
There’s a storm brewing in the beer mug, and it shows no sign of abating. It’s been a decade (or thereabouts) since the first few microbreweries sprung up in India, and today we have more than 200 brewpubs and breweries around the country. While the pandemic and ensuing lockdowns resulted in a massive slowdown in business, craft breweries have found innovative ways to serve the home consumption market by offering doorstep deliveries, introducing takeaway growlers, opening beer filling stations, and more. Below are few of them.
Arbor Brewing Company
Goa Brewing Co.
Kati Patang
Bira 91
White Rhino
Simba
7 Rivers Brewing Co.
Maka Di
By Gaurav Dixit - 7th October 2023
Image Source - Internet
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