I used to hate the days of submitting formulas for beers and having the constant back and forth with TTB about saying "belgian STYLE ale brewed with spices" vs. just "belgian ale brewed with spices" and other such trivial points of proper grammar.
However, it almost always lead (eventually) to a reasonably proper description of the beer to put on the label. Now I kind of miss those days. Somewhere along the way in the past year in what I assume was an effort to speed up approvals the process changed such that no matter what you submit they automatically change it for you and approve. In the most bureaucratically boring way possible everything comes back as some variation of "malt beverage brewed with natural flavor".
Does anyone else take some minor offense to this? I'm not sure how "malt beverage brewed with natural flavor" is a better label description for what is actually in a beer than say "belgian style ale brewed with coriander and hibiscus". Also, "natural flavor" reminds me of the stuff they put in soda to make it taste like "something" and seems like a very unnatural way to describe a beer.
Am I out of my element here? When did this change and what (if anything) is a good recourse for this? I REALLY don't want to have to start labelling beers this way. It makes it sound like I am making a shitty flavored malt beverage instead of a flavorful beer....
However, it almost always lead (eventually) to a reasonably proper description of the beer to put on the label. Now I kind of miss those days. Somewhere along the way in the past year in what I assume was an effort to speed up approvals the process changed such that no matter what you submit they automatically change it for you and approve. In the most bureaucratically boring way possible everything comes back as some variation of "malt beverage brewed with natural flavor".
Does anyone else take some minor offense to this? I'm not sure how "malt beverage brewed with natural flavor" is a better label description for what is actually in a beer than say "belgian style ale brewed with coriander and hibiscus". Also, "natural flavor" reminds me of the stuff they put in soda to make it taste like "something" and seems like a very unnatural way to describe a beer.
Am I out of my element here? When did this change and what (if anything) is a good recourse for this? I REALLY don't want to have to start labelling beers this way. It makes it sound like I am making a shitty flavored malt beverage instead of a flavorful beer....
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