Beers with more alcohol gain market share

"To me, beer is just fun," he said. "Drink it. Enjoy it."

Lynn and Rich Hughes, a local retired couple still primarily interested in wine, have been showing up at the tastings to explore beers, which they became interested in after their daughter worked at a brew pub.

"It is amazing how many varieties you have, tastewise," said Rich Hughes. "You can find whatever you want, that's for sure."

At Russian River, whose brands include Temptation, Damnation and Redemption among others, Natalie Cilurzo said beer drinkers are working through the easier-to-drink brews to the more demanding ones, the same way people did with wine.

"I would liken it to the wine industry, where people started out liking white zinfandels," she said. "Then they were ready to move on to things with more flavor, like sauvignon blanc. Then pinot noirs, cabernets and other interesting wines."

Greg Koch, CEO of Stone Brewing Co. in San Diego, holds dinners that pit beers against wines with fine food. At the last one, beer won by a nose.

"I willfully admit I've got a little bit of an agenda," he said. "We are saddled with the same four-letter word to describe what we do as what the big brewers do, which is B-E-E-R, yet it fails to even come close."

Deschutes advises people to drink the Black Butte XX with flank steak and chimichurri sauce, creme brulee, cherries jubilee and strong blue cheese. Rogue Ales, which makes Brutal Bitter, Dead Guy Ale and Dad's Little Helper among many brands, suggests drinking its XS Imperial Stout close to room temperature with a bowl of cherry-vanilla ice cream.

Jason Alstrom of the BeerAdvocate.com Web site in Boston is not happy about the direction.

"What we don't want to see is this go down the same road as wine," he said in an e-mail. "Beer is beer no matter how expensive the bottle is or what kind of vessel it is served in.

"In the end it is still beer, it's just not the beer from 20-30 years ago."

Brewers have yet to map craft beers' precise limits, however.

Calagione has pushed his IPAs from 6 percent alcohol to 20 percent.

Boston Brewing's Koch said his company made 10,000 bottles of pricey Utopias last year and sold every one within months.

"People bought them and began scalping them on eBay," he said.

Fish said he is asked all the time where the saturation point comes.

"My response is, `I don't know: How many wineries can we handle?'" said Fish. "There are 80 breweries in Oregon and 350 wineries."

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