Around since ’90s, double brown ales quietly trending

There’s an old media axiom that three make a trend. By that standard, it’s safe to say that double brown ales are a trend. But amid a craft beer landscape in which there’s no shortage of any given style, double brown ales are relative rarities.

That’s surprising if you think about it. After all, like Beanie Babies and frosted tips, brown ales were cool in the ’90s. Just about every brewery that popped up had one.

But as the craft beer market came to focus on hops, big beers, barrel aging, sours and lagers, brown ales got lost in the shuffle.

“Browns have always been overshadowed by new styles that were trending,” says Tony Hansen, head brewer at Short’s Brewing Co., which brews a year-round brown ale, Bellaire Brown, as well as the double brown ale Good Humans that is its winter seasonal.

Yet few styles offer a better entry point than brown ales for people who say they don’t like beer but do like chocolate and coffee.

And double brown ales are high-alcohol beers for those who aren’t necessarily into big beers.

Just about any time of the year, a double brown ale is about as satisfying a beer as you can get. Not as bright and hoppy as an IPA and not as dark as a stout or porter, a beer like Good Humans, Firestone Walker’s Bravo, Port Brewing’s Board Meeting or the recent Half Acre Beer Co./Ska Brewing collaboration, Old Century Imperial Brown Ale, sits in a middle ground. They’re mediumbodied beers that are toasty and sweet, yet also hoppy. They’re big but not too big. And they’re typically balanced.

Those traits are what led Half Acre and Ska to choose a double brown ale when they decided to brew a beer using Ska’s original Century brewing system, which Half Acre bought from Ska in 2008.

“We didn’t want to do something too weird,” says Ska Brewing co-owner Dave Thibodeau.

Basing the beer on Ska’s Buster Nut Brown Ale, the brewers decided to make the beer bigger than Ska’s staple, with more caramel, coffee and chocolate notes. “It’s not crazy or ridiculous.” It’s just a nice, wellrounded beer.

MICHAEL TERCHA/CHICAGO TRIBUNE Brown ales, like Short’s Brewing Co.’s Bellaire Brown, can be an entry point for people who don’t like beer but like chocolate and coffee.