Clearly the haze craze is here to stay

Here’s this week’s On Tap column for The Advocate originally published here.

A decade ago, just about the only cloudy looking beer you could find was a classic German hefeweizen. My how times have changed.

Beers once thought of as flawed if they were the least bit cloudy are now purposely unfiltered, hazy and downright opaque. Why the change? Well, it’s a long story.

Crystal clear beer has long been a goal for many beer styles. Sure, it doesn’t matter in darker beers like brown ales, porters and stouts. But that pilsner you’re drinking will be crystal clear. Until recently, pale ales and IPAs were also expected to be seen through in the glass and lambasted if they were cloudy.

In the past, pale ales and IPAs were brewed using grains that didn’t leave proteins in the finished product. West Coast-style IPAs are famous for their clarity, with breweries like Sierra Nevada and Stone leading the charge years ago. East Coast breweries, such as Dogfish Head, also made clear IPAs that were som

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