I'm not knocking Sierra Nevada-type beers here - they're well made and some folks have a taste for high doses of hops. Heck, I've got a friend whose email address is "ibu90" - and 90 International Bittering Units is about enough to pit glass.

But in commercial brewing, hops are cheap and malt is expensive. Taken down to a homebrewing level, 50 cents worth of hops will make a helluva difference in 5 gallons of beer, but it takes 5 bucks worth of malt to make much of a difference.

That's why 95% of specialty, microbrewery, and brewpub beers have extra hops but not extra malt. They keep the brews thin, then hop 'em up for flavor - 'cause that's real cheap to do. Michelob's new Marzen is kind of an extreme example of that kind of cost-cutting, but they're all doing it.

What's hard to find is commercial beer with higher gravity (malt content) and a reasonable price. There aren't many of those.