The Five Hottest Beer Trends of the Season

Summer guzzlin’

Andrew Koczian

Pineapple beer and cider

Fruit beers have been heating up since 2014, but the trend has switched from citrus to tropical fruits, with pineapple leading the charge, since it is easily available to brewers in juice or puree.

Zoiglhaus Brewery is releasing a Pineapple Basil Gose this year that boasts "a crisp acidity with a juicy mouthfeel unlike pretty much any other fruit," according to sales manager Katrina Matthews.

Other pineapple beers likely to be huge this summer are Sunriver Pineapple Haze IPA and Gigantic Brewing's Gigantic & Juice. On the cider front, check for 2 Towns Pacific Pineapple, Rev. Nat's Tepache and Portland Cider Pineapple.

Brut IPA

Champagne beers are coming—and I don't mean Miller High Life.

In brut IPAs, the enzyme alpha-amylase is added to break down starches into fermentable sugars for the yeast. The result is an unusually dry beer with added clarity—the antibody to today's hazy/milkshake IPA trend.

And it's catching on even with breweries known for their milkshake IPAs, like Great Notion.

"When it's hot and the sun is shining," says James Dugan, Great Notion's head brewer, "I'm gonna set the milkshake IPA aside and go for something dry, bright and bubbly."

Great Notion's Bubbly Brut IPA and Baerlic Brewing's Hi-Li are available now, and Hopworks Champaign Wishes is coming later in June.

Mexican-style lagers

Not much is Mexican about a Mexican-style lager. It's a crisp, malty lager flavored with corn, which adds a lightly sweet cereal flavor. This trend started a few years ago during Cinco de Mayo but is still gaining steam, with brewers creating new takes like the "negra," a darker, maltier, Munich-style version, or adding untraditional lime juice for citrus flavor.

Some prime examples are Ecliptic Brewing Espacio, Ex Novo's Most Interesting Lager in the World, Pelican's Pelicano Extra, Breakside's Domestico and Full Sail's Negra.

Strawberry beer

Despite allergies and potential weird flavors, strawberries are a hot addition to beer this year. Not everyone is down—Baerlic Brewing's Ben Parsons says, "No strawberry beer, ever." But there's no denying the popularity of Little Beast's strawberry sour ale Dream State, or Breakside's yearly strawberry beers.

Breakside is working on a new one with Asheville's Burial Beer. This June, look for Widmer's Strawbarbaric, a strawberry- and rhubarb-infused India red ale, and Hopworks' Strawberry Milkshake IPA.

Rosé beer and cider

Pink rosé wine exploded in 2017, with a 53 percent growth in sales. Studies also show 20 percent of wine drinkers prefer rosé in the summer, and nearly 40 percent of its fans are women aged 21 to 34. Given that coveted demographic, hard cider and beer makers are jumping all over the trend.

An early example is Firestone Walker Brewing's Bretta Rosé. And this June, we are getting BridgePort's Rosé IPA and a lager take from Culmination Brewing.

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