Some thoughts about hops

[S. St. Jeb]

Many among us are raised with a 2-liter bottle of Coke on the dinner table

[sprague11]

That whole twitter exchange is just painful to read. it's a shame some idiots get to use the same Internet as the rest of us.

[sprague11]

That whole twitter exchange is just painful to read.

[J343MY]

This guy has some good and well-considered thoughts on hoppy beers...

https://twitter.com/davidmarzek

Now this is getting entertaining.
*eats bag of hops like potato chips*

[boney]

Many among us are raised with a 2-liter bottle of Coke on the dinner table, so we grow up into adults who still crave sweet gooey tastes - like an extremely round, ripe tasting Australian Shiraz, for example. Those consumers aren't going to enjoy the more dry, tannic wines from the classical Europe tradition, wines with layers and dimensions so why would they enjoy a good IPA, a big roasty Stout or a funky earthy Saison? Their taste has been irretrievably spoiled by pablum. They eat and drink like babies, and don't even like the natural taste of vegetables and herbs which - getting back to my point - are often the 'bitter' flavors of natural foods that can make us healthy. High fructose corn syrup is the scourge of our diet, not the hop in our ale... speaking of 'addictive' substances.

Ah, but it is only in the land of 2 litre Coke bottles at the table and high fructose corn syrup that overhopped IPAs have taken off.

It's a miracle hops have taken off they way they have. In evolutionary terms, bitter means "don't eat me, I'm poison!" not "Eat me! I'm tasty and healthy!". Because of that, hoppy beers will always require a bit of time to become accustomed to. There's a reason IIPA's aren't gateway beers.

In a similar vein, people, on average, will always gravitate towards sugary foods and beverages. Again, it's evolutionary. Food wasn't always plentiful in our early evolutionary environment. Because we spent at least a portion of our evolutionary time in a calorie restricted environment, when we taste a high density caloric, sugary food, our brain goes "yes, this is great! Eat as much as this as you can. We don't know where our next meal is coming from". Unfortunately, you can't turn off your genes. Now, in the era of readily available high fructose corn syrup, our past genetically selected behavioral tendancies have become maladaptive. The result? Diabetes. Dinger.

[Belgian]

^ true, but would you not also agree our food industries - much like our cigarette manufacturers - have devised ways to make sugary and 'junk' and 'fast' foods a great more addictive than any source in nature? I'd say they have perverted and exploited the evolved human weakness for three taste cravings - sweet, fatty and salty.

In biological terms, an excess of those three things will kill a person, not lead to healthy lives and offspring. The craving for high-calorie and salty food sources, when twisted in the interests of commerce, ceases to be a survival instinct and becomes a deadly liability. That turns 180º against the interests of evolution and reproduction of our genes.

And can it be 'switched off?' We do have these large, adaptive brains, and given the correct choices many people do eat properly. I think that when all is in balance, we do crave healthy foods - including bitter foods like broccoli arugala and parsley - if we're used to them and they make us feel healthy - ie. assuming we have ever felt healthy in the first place and were not raised on McDonald's takeout and Pop Tarts breakfasts.

So - broccoli arugula and parsley - poisons? Maybe to a pablum palate, an artificially-created 'craving-based' consumer. Probably not to a Paleolithic man, I would guess - who can say, I wasn't there. I suggest we innately know what food is healthy for our survival IF we are able to contrast data of experience. When did we feel worse or better? What did we consume? Basis of comparison allows us to re-wire our brains and our eating habits.

[boney]

^ true, but would you not also agree our food industries - much like our cigarette manufacturers - have devised ways to make sugary and 'junk' and 'fast' foods a great more addictive than any source in nature? I'd say they have perverted and exploited the evolved human weakness for three taste cravings - sweet, fatty and salty.

In biological terms, an excess of those three things will kill a person, not lead to healthy lives and offspring. The craving for high-calorie and salty food sources, when twisted in the interests of commerce, ceases to be a survival instinct and becomes a deadly liability. That turns 180º against the interests of evolution and reproduction of our genes.

Absolutely true. Industry exploits the public’s biologically programmed weakness for junk food. No doubt about it. True as well about selective pressures changing. What was once adaptive in the past in terms of seeking the most readily available, high density caloric food is now becoming maladaptive. Gene frequencies will change to favor those predisposed to not eating those kinds of diets, but that shift will happen over hundreds of generations, given that selective pressures do not change further (who knows if they will or not).

And can it be 'switched off?' We do have these large, adaptive brains, and given the correct choices many people do eat properly. I think that when all is in balance, we do crave healthy foods - including bitter foods like broccoli arugala and parsley - if we're used to them and they make us feel healthy - ie. assuming we have ever felt healthy in the first place and were not raised on McDonald's takeout and Pop Tarts breakfasts.

So - broccoli arugula and parsley - poisons? Maybe to a pablum palate, an artificially-created 'craving-based' consumer. Probably not to a Paleolithic man, I would guess - who can say, I wasn't there. I suggest we innately know what food is healthy for our survival IF we are able to contrast data of experience. When did we feel worse or better? What did we consume? Basis of comparison allows us to re-wire our brains and our eating habits.

A lot of interesting points there. What role does agency play in health conscious meal choice vs genetic predisposition? Despite enormous brains, genes that inform behavior may be pretty difficult (but not impossible) to override. Roughly 75% of people in the US are overweight or obese. Granted that many do not have the economic means or knowledge to make good dietary choices, but a large chunk do and still struggle with those choices. Genes and early environmental programming likely play a large role in those decisions. People definitely do crave healthy food from a physiological perspective. Some will even go as far to eat dirt when iron deficient and other sources are not available (Pica). People will also crave high sugar/starch, fatty foods from evolutionary selection. Those impulses likely co-exist in almost everyone. That said, the balance between the two varies between people for many reasons, one of which is that early environmental programming. There are some pretty interesting studies on palate development and long term food preference in children under 2. Those kids with little or no exposure to sugars don’t develop the same taste for them compared to kids that are exposed to those kinds of foods. There is likely some neural plasticity there. However, some of that that plasticity may be fairly immutable after a certain age. So, you’re totally right about not raising your kids on Poptarts and McD’s. Overall, I think making healthy choices based on experiential comparison definitely exists, as you say, but that there are plenty of factors that make those rational decisions difficult to make.

In relation to hops, I think the developing palate for them is fascinating. Studies in food psychology show that individuals have a relatively set range of flavors they prefer by early-to-mid childhood and that by adulthood, most people stick to approximately 30 or food items that they regularly consume in their diet. How then do bitter hops, something that should be excluded from our diet based on bitter foods being associated with poisonous foods (most of the time, there are always exceptions) get so sought out by some people in adulthood, especially when they weren’t part of early palate development? I wonder if it again could be a consequence of natural selection. For natural selection to occur, there have to be a mix of gene frequencies in a population to act on, given changing environmental pressures. In terms of hops and bitter foods, on one extreme, you will have people who will under no circumstances eat anything bitter, because most poisonous things are bitter. This is the safe evolutionary strategy and 9/10 times will result in good evolutionary success. On the other hand, you will have the other extreme who will buck the trend and take chances on new foods, including bitter foods. Some, maybe much of the time, these more exploratory personalities will get poisoned and die. However, in times of food scarcity, when you need to take chances on non-traditional foods to survive, those that discover a new dietary stable that is bitter but not poisonous, will preferentially survive, passing their genes on. Obviously hops don’t have enough calories or nutrients to offer a survival benefit, but they may fit into the category of being consumed by exploratory eaters.

I wonder then if hop heads are just one facet of genetically predisposed extreme risk takers in the species? Since many beer geeks are hopheads, are we distinct genetic sub-population? Do uber hoppy beers even have the possibility to appeal to a wider range of society or will they hit a ceiling in terms of mass appeal. I don’t have the answers, but interesting to think about.

Sorry for the long post. Kinda geeked out there.

[markaberrant]

Interesting to see where this discussion went.

I was discussing this on a Facebook forum, went in a much different direction.

Here is my take (not even sure if it has anything to do with the article at this point).

Craft beer was originally about reviving a variety of classic styles, as a backlash against the singular light lager market. it was about the variety of flavours available in beer, appreciating and discovering all of what beer could be.

Now it appears that craft beer is headed down the singular IPA/hoppy beer market. See: http://beerdorks.com/articles.php?article_id=213. I've witnessed many new comers to craft beer that want IPA, IPA, and more IPA. And nothing else.

It is clear that IPA is cool, which is fine, I love them too. But humans are creatures of habit, have a herd mentality, and love jumping on a bandwagon. Does it really matter that hipsters are now chugging IPAs instead of PBRs?

[Derek]

Lazy writers ruin everything...
http://www.bear-flavored.com/2013/05/la ... t.html?m=1

[Belgian]

I wonder then if hop heads are just one facet of genetically predisposed extreme risk takers in the species? Since many beer geeks are hopheads, are we distinct genetic sub-population? Do uber hoppy beers even have the possibility to appeal to a wider range of society or will they hit a ceiling in terms of mass appeal. I don’t have the answers, but interesting to think about.

Interesting. Maybe those of us who venture the broadest tastes can also then apply that experience to live longer, healthier lives from the best nutrition available. (I'm sure we'd still be averse to outright poisons.)

There have been control studies where young people are offered every type of food to eat - from empty-calorie desserts and snacks, all the way to healthy vegetables and proteins. They were then given free rein to self-regulate. They began by gorging on the junky and processed foods, but then very quickly settled into eating a perfectly balanced 'natural' healthy diet. So maybe our bodies can tell us exactly what to eat just so long as the options are made available to us.

We seem to have innate biological intelligence that governs health, a sharp sense gained from hundreds of thousands of years of evolution. Maybe sometimes this 'sense' needs a nudge to awaken from the dullness of bad daily eating habits, but it's still there and we feel better when we listen to it.

Clearly hoppy beers aren't bad for us, and they are often the most 'natural' and junk-free foods we can consume.