How Pale Is Pale?

When is pale not pale? When it refers to pale ale, of course! Below are some color ranges for a few selected styles, as suggested by the Beer Judge Certification Program’s (BJCP) 2008 guidelines. Not only are English and American pale ales generally several shades darker than blonde ale, cream ale, wit, and Kölsch, but they are often as dark as Vienna and Oktoberfest, both considered amber lagers.

It all comes down to context. Pale ale is, in fact, pale, but only in comparison to mild ales, brown ales, porters, and stouts. As I explain in “Pale by Comparison” (page 74), until pale malt became widely available, beer would have necessarily been some shade of brown or black. The term pale ale was coined when improved kilning technology enabled brewers to create ever-lighter malts, which led to ever-lighter beers. Compared to the porters of yore, the new beers were very pale, indeed.

But still today, the term can remain a bit of a stretch, even within the style category itself. Apparently different brewers have different ideas of what it means to be pale. Here are the approximate SRM values of a few commercial examples:

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Firestone Walker Pale 31 — 7 srm Mirror Pond Pale Ale — 9 srm Sierra Nevada Pale Ale — 10 srm Fort Collins Brewery 1020 Pale Ale — 12 srm Firestone Walker DBA — 13.5 srm Schlafly Pale Ale — 13.5 srm Ska Brewing Euphoria Pale Ale — 15 srm All of this is, of course, fairly inconsequential, particularly in light of such category-defying terms as black IPA and golden stout. As far as I’m concerned, you can call your beer whatever you like, as long as it tastes good!