Big trends & breweries in 2022 | The Craft Beer Channel 

I'm really liking the come back of well balanced, fresh, floral west coast IPAs that are 6 - 7% and not overly bitter. Too many mediocre to bad, chunky double/triple NE IPAs at the moment.

I’ve got tired of New England ipas so I hope the west coast revival continues. I hope you are right with brown ales and I think the pastry sours is a given. Also hoping this is the year we see less milkshake ipas.

I’m in the US but I pray to the beer gods that your work on elevating cask ales catches on here in a more serious way.

Fun thing about 2021 is that I've had a fair share of Urquell, Staropramen and a healthy mix of interesting lagers from quite a few danish (local) craft breweries. Oh and please do a tour of that awesome beer shop. Have a chat with the owner too. I wish for a 2022 with less pastry, but more malt.

I'm hoping for a big cask comeback. It's perfect hipster beer because it takes real skill to make, keg and then serve well in a pub. If a pub gets it right, you know the chain involved has worked well, and the beer tastes amazing and highly sessionable.

Craft lager here in the US is definitely undergoing something of a renaissance. Breweries like Olde Mecklenburg, Von Trapp (yes, that von Trapp family), Utepils, Schilling, and Port City all make excellent examples of German and Czech lagers. Having lived in Czechia for 10 years before moving to the US, it is great to be able to get examples of polotmavé and tmavé pivo as well as the more ubiquitous světlý ležák. Most of these beers though are brewed to 13­° Plato and above, so it would be great to see more examples of lower gravity lagers, in particular in the 8-11° Plato range. Thank goodness for Notch's superb 10° Session Pils, which is on par with almost anything brewed in Czechia.

I think West Coast IPA definitely had a return in the back end of 2021 which only bodes well for 2022. Saw and drank some great west coasts in the last few months - Elusive and Rock Leopard stand out in my mind! Also, bring back American Red! Gimme that amber, biscuity, malty beer with the resiny grapefruit underneath.

So here's my hot take on what's going on with the beer scene in China in 2022 as reflected by local breweries and imports: Lagers and particularly Czech pilsner are blowing up, in no small part powered by the Asahi distributors suddenly getting every craft bar a side pour Pilsner Urquell tap. Domestically lagers have been ignored with the exception of guys like Fat Fat Beer Horse in Xiamen, who have been quietly doing the best stuff in China for a minute, and definitely not getting enough love for it. Jacks Abbey is an import can that is popping up in every decent bottle shop. The slushy fruited stuff is reaching a stage of fatigue, with Mahanine, who jumped on that style and made it big in a huge way the past couple of years, suddenly drastically dropping the fruit sludge and starting to try and make regular wheat and hazies. The regular beers aren't particularly great cause I guess you don't need to pay attention to how good your beer is when you are dumping 40% fruit puree in post (meow). Pastry stouts aren't going to go away, because when the weather gets colder here people want a stout, they just don't want it to taste like a stout. FINALLY, people are getting irritated by the poor quality of an imported 200+kuai (like 25gbp?) can of hazy from the US/UK and turning towards domestically brewed hazies. The problem isn't Treehouse or whatever, but that hazies weren't designed to be transported across oceans in hot containers then kept in a distributor's warm warehouse for months at a time. So more locals drinking local is awesome: better for the environment, better for freshness, better quality hop products getting imported into China. To counter the arsehole below me who commented, I'm really happy to see that beer is becoming a more inclusive space in the UK and US and that people are calling out all the insecure-masculinity-toxic-bullshit. I don't need beers with misogynistic names, I don't want people to be dreading the next time the frat boyish cliques are going to say something that is, at best tone-deaf and at worst deeply offensive. If people want to call us woke-beta-cuck-soyboy-whatevers for not being hateful bigots, I will gladly wear the tag.

Last year I didn't pay much attention to this video. And then I found myself buying & loving the things from breweries Jonny and Brad recommended... so I'm going to pay attention this time!

I know I'm happy to see that a lot of microbreweries are starting to back off the IPA train a little bit here in the U.S. and go back to a more diverse selection. Don't get me wrong I like a good IPA, but I've noticed over the last few months when I go out I'm searching out things like brown ales, porters, and pilsners because I miss them as you said.

Here's hoping for some really strong flavor profiles making a comeback. I love scotch ales, barrel aged stouts, belgium tripels etc.

Yes please on the malt forward sessionable well-rounded traditional beers!

Beer "bringing comfort to People during hard times".. I like that, cheers Fellas! And your wardrobe seems fine to me Brad 😁🤙🍻🍻 cheers Mike.

I hope you all make it to the Western US this year! Colorado, Oregon, Washington, California are all amazing beer destinations!

I tasted a few french pastry sour, and the pastry aspect comes more from vanilla, tonka or other spices than from sweetness, so I'm glad we can have these kind of beer with them being too sweet. We could also mention "pastry mixed ferm" like the cantiloon magic lambic or other beers from Mikkeller baghaven or even Bokke

Hepcat by Gipsy Hill was my favourite canned beer in 2021. Had an enjoyable West Coast style iPA bottle from Bath Ales last weekend,

Fuller’s ESB was mentioned in this video. This is one of my favorite beers of all time. I wish is was more widely available here America.

Cask-in-Box has been a fun find over 2020-21. Not often seen in Canada but one Toronto brewer offered it and I regularly made a Friday trek down to get it. Love to see cask blossom here in 2022 - brewers like it but doubt there is the market. Learning the ins and outs of packaging homebrew in bags and cornies. Lots of sticky basement episodes. Smells great down there though.

I learn a lot of adjectives with you guys! Cheers from Bariloche (Argentina).

I want to see another US trip this year boys!

Really enjoyed this video. I have definitely begun to expand my horizons again when it comes to the styles that I drink. I was starting to become the “8 IPA, 1 stout and 1 lager” bar goer! Haha. Give me a brown ale any day now!

I'm also hoping for more west coasts and brown ales on tap this year. If you're wanting to showcase wonderfully balanced pastry sours, you've gotta give Brew York a look - their guava pastry sour is the best thing I've ever tasted... Cheers for all the amazing content, much love!

Welcome back guys. Hopefully we do see more Brown Ales this year. They always go down so well when they are done well. Variety is the spice of life. Love and Beer 🍻🍺

Got a mid roll ad about grainfather brewing systems and fermenters. Best ad ever!!!

Hoppy New Year!

And a Very Happy New Year to you Both as well, please keep up the great work in 2022👍🤞🙏😁

Jonny that is the greatest bottleshop I've ever seen. Wish we had something similar in East Lancs. We have to settle for mail order or Bargain Booze. Looking forward to another year of great content.

I always love it when you do beers for the year. Not sure what my favourite style will be this year. I definitely went saison crazy last year. The kernel had some absolutely stunning saisons. Looking forward to see what the brewers come up with this year. And I'm so pleased you mentioned brick brewery in the vid too. A very consistent brewery.

Great to see some Birmingham representation from Digbrew, there’s a great beer scene here - the pizza in the taproom is good as well

When I started drinking craft beer in California back in 1992, all breweries had the same menu: Pale Ale, Amber Ale, IPA, Stout, Brown, a fruited wheat (peach, raspberry, etc), and they might have a seasonal.

I’m excited to see what Deya will produce this year!!🍺they are my absolute favourite UK brewery!🐊steady rolling man is a classic🖤

I agree. Try to get some fresh Dutchess Ghost Beer (GB) shipped to you! Aromatic hop profile, some malt, with a dry somewhat bitter finish. Near perfect or truly perfect American Pale Ale

Arbor Ales in Bristol used to do an excellent American brown (rye) ale called Boomtown Brown. Not been over that way in a few years, so don't know if it's still available, but it singlehandedly made the style one of my favourites.

I want a west coast IPA now!!!

Nice one chaps. A good summary of all the wackyness going on :)

Great content as per usual! I am definitely feeling the shift back toward west-coast, personally. Also, I appreciate your commitment to fighting off mysogyny and exclusion in the industry. Sadly, it's not something I hear about much in Canada, but I would love for more brewers (and businesses in general) to be more vocal about their stance on diversity, equity, and inclusion. It is my hope that, and environmentally conscientious practices, are the biggest shifts of the year

As I've gotten older I've lost interest in stronger beers and have been going towards more light pale ales, ipa's and lagers... really hope to see more hoppy lagers and pilsners!

What was that very first brown ale you drank? I'd love to try it

Some of what you mentioned is happening in my own home brewing, I’m lowering my abv to under 5% some times under 4% for more sustainable consumption. i hope the classic British beer styles make a craft come back “beer flavoured beer”, a lot of the mainstream supermarket stuff is rubbish, I discovered some good brewers of British beers when I couldn’t home brew for a couple of months and I don’t have easy access to craft beer shops as I live in Surrey, classic British beer styles are easier to find bitters, gold ale, milds👌, my local brewery Pilgrim brewery make lovely British beer styles, Westraham brewery make great British beer, these styles go hand in hand with session/table beer thing, I often see more session beers in rural pubs as someone driving like me can have a pint of session beer and not feel bad. I also love the nostalgia and history behind British beer, I hope British hops are seen more too, I had a British hop “neipa” from wylam x Deya that was delicious.

My local The Bull & Finch in Gypsy Hill London has 14 taps on and normally only one NEIPA. Lots of sours, Lambics, Stouts and everything else. It has to have the broadest range I know. Especially as the owner John now brews in the basement under the name of So What Brewing.

American fresh hopped ipa's in The Motherland?!? Amazing!!!

will keep an eye open for pastry sour

I see Brown Ale, I like.

I would say lager is having a moment in the states now: the variety of Pilsner styles that have emerged over the past year or two is astounding

Really hope the return of traditional British "old man ale" takes off this year. After watching your cask ale documentary I've spent this winter enjoying a healthy diet of British IPAs, bitters and ruby ales. Beers from traditional brewers such as Fullers, Adnams and Samuel Smith deserve to be just as fashionable as the hop soup put out by the more "craft" brewers. Cask and traditional brewing also encourages people to discover their local breweries, as regional brewers seems to be more common to local areas than the craft brewers, who tend to congregate in the big cities. In my area I've discovered Tring brewery, Chiltern Brewery and numerous others and it's always better for the environment when we consume local goods.

I hope this trend continues. Also wouldn't mind seeing black ipas come back

Nice beer glasses. Any pointers on what they are and where could I buy them? Tx

The Burning Sky American Brown Ale Snap Decision is so nice.

hope you are right about west coast ipa. used to love Great Divide's titan ipa havent seen it in the UK for ages. I have seen some UK brewers writing "west coast" on the can, but it still seems more like a NEIPA and i miss that super piney dankness

American Brown is my fav style at the moment

Yes. West Coast is the best coast. More WC IPA and less NE IPA is something to be celebrated if you ask me!

Hoping to see more balance in beer. Less adjuncts, sweetness, and haziness. More quality ingredients, creative thinking, and classic styles done well.

The raspberry sour from Denmark I had a few years ago was really nice and also looked like someone just bottled raspberry puree. But I think the brewery discontinued the beer a while ago so I'm happy if there will be more of it in this style on the continent.

I certainly welcome the return to greater diversity of styles on the bar in craft beer venues. I'm not the biggest lover of NEIPAs and it does feel like a trend that has got all too pervasive. I like having the odd one, but rarely drink them for a session. The return of west coast IPAs even if only a slight return is a good thing. Also the rise/return of norm-core as you put it suits me! As much as I enjoy a pastry stout now and again or other big, punchy and experimental styles, as time goes on, the thing I want most is simple done well. A refreshing pilsner. A beautifully balanced bitter. A delicious table beer. Avoiding the kind of homogeneity that craft beer was meant to counter has to be a good thing. I also welcome a focus on the ethics of beer and routing out discrimination, divisiveness and oppressive practices in the industry. I work in a completely different space (the charity sector), which like many has rightly had its own reckoning and continues to do so. I hope that this year the discussions that started around opposing oppression in beer go much further. Looking forward to seeing which predictions you guys get right and where beer goes in 2022!

Dark sours and normalising Brett. My hope for 2022

Ahhh ten taps and ten different styles; those were the days! I'd love to see a bit more variety in 2022; when was the last time you saw a good hoppy porter (Kernel aside)? Or a White IPA? Beer can be bold, adventurous and varied without being "zany"

One trend I’m seeing on the US east coast is using maple flavor in beer, either real maple or extract. Seems like there’s triple the number of maple beers today vs a few years ago.

Hopefully we see Elusive make thier way up north as I'm dying to try Oregan Trail and Level Up but they don't seem to appear up here

Noiseless in the south of France do amazing stuff!!!

I miss west coast beers, I live right next to one of the best neipa breweries bla.. Yes I aggree with everything at 13:10.

Boundary in Belfast had a table beer out in fall of 2020 "Love is Here" it was a great beer, than Imbognito in 2021. Defo would love more Table Beers. However still not sure if the abv was low enough to be a genuine table beer. Kinnegar do a excellent 1% pale ale but brewed in the Republic of Ireland the price tag is still too high that being said its one of the hardest beers to brew.

I’d love to see the west coast ipa make a comeback but unfortunately we’ll never see it like it was in the past. The modern westie will be a hybrid cross between a NEIPA and a west coast ipa according the the brewing trends here in the states.

Great vid guys… cheers to 2022!

I'm gravitating towards 'normcore' too and generally 4-7% beers. Totally gone off big imperial stouts that are so sickly I struggle with a third. Can't do sours in any form though me, always get given one when I mention it so I've tried enough by now to know. I don't see it happening for brown ales!

pastry sours for the win, personal feeling for pastry stouts too, fully agree with IPA focus shifting

Kinnegar Brewers At Play 19 American Brown Ale was one of my favourite beers of 2021 then they released a Rauchbier which I think was better still. Love dark beers.

Are you guys going to Beaks beer festival this June?

Amazing lagers please!

Pastry sours are just plain silly really. They often don't even taste bad, but for me personally it's not longer beer. I would love more breweries going back to old ale, stock ale, wee heavies. More old school barleywines.

I had a few £5 plus last year, pretty good but none where as good as Sierra Nevada Torpedo which is much cheaper when available. Hope they will reach higher levels this years as the NEIPAs have

Love Westies making a comeback but we all know it's time for the #BIPAcomeback 😉

Are you limeys going to come to North Carolina this year???

Watching this after reading about James Watt haha

my trend is the same as the last 30 years of going to my local pub and drinking quality UK and local cask ale and avoiding anything American based

There is definitely a fart at 11:04 Bloke on the right looks guilty as hell when it happens too

OMG! Everything over here in Western NY, USA is Sour’s, & IPA’s! I hate them both! Or at least I’ve never had one I truly enjoyed. I’m an ale & Hefeweizen man myself but the styles are just so hard to find these days.

Can we just do away with lactose now? Is it, is it time yet? ...please?

So one thing you are suggesting that weaker brown ale is going to be big in 2022? Love the channel guys but really hope you are wrong on this as its everything I personally hate and got into big IPAs and impy stouts to get away from. Agree with you that West Coast IPA and sours will be more popular. Not my thing but I am seeing them popping up at Pollys, Cloudwater, Wander Beyond and my other fav breweries when I visit their online shops. Also you seem happy about Rishi Sunak's proposed changed to beer duty. But at the other end of the ABV scale, are we looking at the death of TIPAs and Impy Stouts in the UK?

Sixpoint brewery are some of best beers I have ever drank. ( I don't think you get it any more)

In South Korea, craft beer is slightly dominated with Korean women and foreign dudes (like myself but we are so inconsequential to the numbers. Foreigners make up 1% of the population here). Craft beer is seen as the new trendy wine clubs by groups of young women and there are (were) a lot of girl's night outs and craft pub crawls. Just an interesting factoid from Asia, everyone! I'm not here to argue.

To be totally honest.... I'm sick of every IPA in every shape or form the last two years or so.... this doesn't mean I don't like it but it was just simply too much... fully reverted to Belgium beers and classics!

I thought I'd heard of everything, but a sweet sour is another one to boggle the brain cells! But then, sweet & sour food is a thing, init?

I think the new hot trend for the US beer scene will be 'Cold IPA', not IPL, Cold IPA. Look it up🍻

Pastry Sour = Alco Pop

Citra and Mosaic aren't trends anymore; they're just modern classics.

A bit ray allen and lord charles

I tolerate the whole politics thing, but you didn't even talk about the beer itself... Just the agenda. that is why people don't like mixing politics with things, it takes away from the subject at hand. I would have loved to learn about the actual NEIPA you poured and drank.

RIP NEIPA

Was a lot of fun until you guys went woke! good stuff anyhow

"Beer is political statement..... Every sip you have has some element of politics to it." Powerful stuff! I really appreciate the truth in this strong and raw statement. Beers like "Black is Beautiful", "Brave Noise", and countless others look to deliberately devote resources to worthwhile causes and make the beer community more inclusive. ...while not at all the same situation, I wonder if the porter choice you made in the 18th Century was nearly as political.

Irish government must have seen your video and said “down that that sort of thing” and introduced the MUP. There will be no table beer here.

It now seems the biggest beer story of 2022 will be the rapid decline of brewdog ! My how the mighty have fallen

Clams

Midlands Mild is overdue a revival....just saying

Datey, raisiney, nuttey sounds to me like the worst brew ever

Lilly Potter? Harry's mum?

Big in 2022 - Don't be an arsehole! Well done gents in bringing ethics and being a good human in beer to the fore in 2022.

Being from Calgary, Canada it PAINS me to hear anybody pronounce Chinook as ‘chin-uck’ 😂 it’s ‘shin-uck’

I really loved that "beer politics" rant

So tired of New England IPAs. I want my IPA to smell like a nice bag of weed not fruit