Category Archives: Beery Thoughts

Random musings on my favorite topic…beer.

Van Rompuy ESC – An Emerging Style?

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The Eurovision Song Contest was first broadcast in 1956. In the age before satellites, the simultaneous linking of television outlets across all of Europe was a stunning technological achievement that foretold the future of the broadcast industry. It was also the beginning of a wonderfully peculiar and uniquely European institution.

The pan-European celebration of musical nationalism that is the Eurovision Song Contest happens yearly, an annual display of fabulous frippery.  The finals, now beamed across the globe, get music fans everywhere tapping their feet and singing along to a blend of cheesy europop, fantastic costumes, and bizarrely over-the-top staging. While we in the US have our own quirky cultural phenomena (anyone seen Americas Got Talent?), it is hard for me to imagine oddball extravagance on the scale of the Eurovision Song Contest happening here. Lady Gaga’s got nothing on these folks.

So what does the Eurovision Song Contest have to do with beer you ask? Van Rompuy is the answer.  (Read More…)

Does Size Matter – Contemplating the Growth of Sam Adams

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A recent article in the New York Times about the growth of Sam Adams has got me thinking. What is a craft brewer? And does size matter?

As the article states, Sam Adams is on the verge of growing beyond the legal and industry definitions of “craft brewer.” The federal government defines a small brewery as one that produces less than two-million barrels annually. A lower excise tax is levied on brewers who meet this criterion. Similarly, the two-million barrel limit is part of the Brewers Association (BA) definition of “craft brewer.” Sam Adams is set to exceed this mark by 2012.

But there is much more to the Brewers Association definition than annual output volumes. Besides being small, says the BA website, a craft brewer is “traditional” and “independent.” What is meant by these labels? According to the BA, a traditional brewer is one that “has either an all malt flagship (the beer which represents the greatest volume among that brewers brands) or has at least 50% of its volume in either all malt beers or in beers which use adjuncts to enhance rather than lighten flavor.” This is clearly an attempt to differentiate craft brewers from the large brewing concerns that use high percentages of corn and rice adjuncts in the production of light lagers. Sam Adams certainly meets this standard.

An independent brewery, the site states, has less than twenty-five percent ownership in the hands of an alcoholic beverage industry member who is not themselves a craft brewer.  As a publicly owned company with 71% of shares held by institutions according to Yahoo, it is conceivable to me that Sam Adams would not be considered independent. But the BA limits this ownership restriction to alcoholic beverage industry members. Sam Adams can slip by on this one. But does the recent sale of the Anchor Brewery to the Griffin Group, an investment and consulting firm focused on alcoholic beverages, defy the restriction? Is Anchor no longer independent and therefore no longer craft? And what of the other once small and independent breweries that have been bought by the big boys. I’m thinking of breweries like Red Hook. Making no claims about Red Hook beers, assuming that these breweries’ beers retains their quality, have they stopped being craft brewers?

There is more to the Brewers Association definition. The website states that a “hallmark of craft beer and craft brewers is innovation. Craft brewers interpret historic styles with unique twists and develop new styles that have no precedent.” By my count, Sam Adams currently has thirty-three beers in their repertoire. These include unique interpretations of traditional styles, barrel-aged, sour, and imperialized beers. They invented the extreme beer genre in the 1990s with Triple Bock and have continued to push boundaries with Utopias. By the standard of innovation, Sam Adams is clearly craft.

The BA also says of craft brewers that they “tend to be very involved in their communities through philanthropy, product donations, volunteerism, and sponsorship of events.” How does Sam Adams stack up? They sponsor the Brewing the American Dream program to provide lower income entrepreneurs with support and advice in getting fledgling business off the ground. They sponsor the annual Longshot Competition that gives homebrewers a chance to have their creations produced and sold commercially by Sam Adams. Then there is the famous story of them selling hops at cost to struggling small breweries during the recent worldwide hop shortage. Other efforts listed on the Sam Adams website include work with the Leary Firefighters Foundation, the Hands on Network, the Sean McDonough Foundation, and the Neely Foundation. I would say this shows significant community involvement. Does this make Sam Adams craft?

Perhaps the most important part of the BA definition of craft brewer is integrity. The website states that craft brewers “maintain integrity in what they brew.” Despite their size, and despite brewing in multiple locations, Sam Adams brews to high standards.  Boston Lager is the same flavorful beer it was when it was a groundbreaker in the microbrew revolution during the 1980s. With some hits and misses, their beers stand up in terms of flavor and quality to most other craft breweries, though some will dispute this. Sam Adams has been slammed by some for selling-out with Sam Adams Light, but even this beer, when tasted side-by-side with the light products of the behemoth brewers, is brewed with greater care and character. And as a publicly owned company they do have an obligation to shareholders to maintain and grow the bottom line. Does providing for shareholders rob Sam Adams of too much integrity for them to remain craft? If so shouldn’t we hold the entirety of our publicly owned corporations to the same standards?

All of this leads me to one thought. As the craft beer industry grows, our beloved small breweries will unavoidably grow with it. It’s already happening. Once tiny businesses like Sam Adams and New Belgium have expanded to become regional and even national powerhouses. Stone Brewing is actively seeking a location in Europe, making them perhaps the first multinational American craft brewer. In the face of this growth how will craft beer drinkers respond? Will be embrace and encourage it? Will we rejoice in the success of our favorite brewers and commend them for spreading great beer to ever wider audiences? Or will our desire to retain the boutique mystique of the small lead us to reject them for becoming “like the macros”, an argument that I have already heard levied against Sam Adams and New Belgium.

How do we want to define “craft?” Is it a matter of numbers of barrels produced in a year? Or does it have more to do with the quality of the product. When the macro brewers start making good beer, which they are already doing, are these well-crafted beers somehow less craft than those made by smaller brewers? In short, does size matter?

Local Brewers’ Beers of Spring

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Spring arrived early this year. We lived through the first snowless March since records have been kept and April has been even better. Warmer weather and longer days call for a shift away from the heavy, dark beers of winter. Spring means lighter beers, but beers with enough body to tackle the lingering night time chill. Spring is when I begin to crave the bitter American Pale Ales, their citrusy hops flavor giving a bracing wake-up call to the senses. The traditional old-world beers of spring, German maibock and French biére de garde, have sturdy malt backbones supporting spicy hops and yeast character, contrasting flavors to match the seasonal temperature swings. Several of these springtime beer styles are crafted here in the metro by our great local brewers.

Minnesotans love hops, the source of bitterness in beer, and there are plenty of locally produced bitter brews to satisfy these springtime cravings. The most balanced of these is Sweet Child of Vine, the debut India pale ale (IPA) from newcomers Fulton Beer. Only available on draft, the floral hops flavor, moderate bitterness, and balancing caramel malt make this one of the easier drinking versions of the style. More bitter but still balanced, Lift Bridge Brewery’s Crosscut Pale Ale features subtle citrus notes from abundant Cascade hops and grapefruit zest added to the brew. St. Paul’s Flat Earth Brewing calls its Northwest Passage IPA the “bitterest beer in Minnesota.” A step up the ladder in bitterness, body, and alcohol content, Northwest Passage is bracing enough to snap one out of winter hibernation, but has enough warmth and comforting caramel to take the bite out of those sudden springtime temperature drops. Topping the list for hops intensity is Abrasive Ale (formerly 16 Grit), the double IPA from Surly Brewing Company. This nearly 9% alcohol bruiser of a beer is aptly named. The aggressive bitterness gives way to massive citrusy hops flavor that is supported by full-bodied sweet, grainy malt. This is one for hops lovers. Surly is making Abrasive Ale available in cans this year for the first time. The release date was April 12th, but don’t tarry, this one won’t last long.

For the traditional spring beers look no further than St. Paul for Summit Maibock and Flat Earth Ovni Ale biére de garde. Bavarians still celebrate the annual May release of maibock, a hoppier, lighter-colored version of the malty-rich bock style. Summit’s version is appropriately malt forward with grainy sweetness and a quiet toasty background. The sweetness is balanced by moderate bitterness and floral hops flavor.  Biére de garde, a traditional farmhouse ale from Northern France, was originally brewed in early spring and cold-cellared for consumption by farmhands as the weather warmed. Ovni Ale is another beer for malt lovers. On the sweet side for the style, it features rich caramel malt and hints of chocolate with low bitterness and only the lightest touch of spicy hops flavor.

The long-term forecast looks good, so grab one of these great local beers and celebrate spring’s return before summer creeps in.

Malty vs. Hoppy Flavors in Beer

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When doing Perfect Pint beer tasting events I am frequently asked to clarify the difference between “malty” flavors and “hoppy” flavors in beer. Nearly every day someone stumbles upon this blog with the search query “malty beers vs. hoppy beers.” I find that people can often describe the flavors they taste, but aren’t necessarily able to attribute those tastes to one or the other source ingredient. As malt and hops form the base of the beer flavor triangle (yeast being the third point), it seems to me that some attempt at clarification would be useful. We should begin with a basic description of what each of these ingredients actually is.

Malt – Malted cereal grains are the meat and potatoes of beer. They provide the sugars that are fermented by the yeast to create alcohol and CO2. They are the primary source of beer color and contribute significantly to flavor and mouthfeel. The most common of the malted grains is barley malt. Others include wheat, rye, and oats. In addition to the malted grains, some unmalted cereal grains are used in brewing including corn, rice, wheat, rye, oats, and sorghum. Malting is a process of controlled sprouting and kilning of the grains. The sprouting activates enzymes within the grain that begin to break down the hard, starchy insides into simpler carbohydrates, making them accessible to the brewer. Kilning gives the grains differing degrees of color and flavor. There are four categories of brewing malt. Base malts receive the least kilning. They are the lightest malts and make up the bulk of any beer recipe. Crystal or caramel malts are made by allowing enzymes in the grain to convert complex carbohydrates into simple sugars before kilning. Kilning then caramelizes the sugars in the grain. Crystal malts range in color from light to dark with correspondingly intense flavors. Toasted or kilned malts are dry-kilned to a range of colors and flavors. Roasted Malts are kilned at the highest temperatures until they are very dark brown or even black.

Hops – Hops are the spice of beer. They provide bitterness to balance the sweetness of the malt, as well as flavors and aromas ranging from citrus and pine to earthy and spicy. Hops are the cone-like flower of a rapidly growing vine (a bine actually) in the cannabis family. Waxy yellow lupulin glands hidden within the leaves of the flower contain the acids and essential oils that give hops their character. Bitterness comes from alpha acids that must be chemically altered through boiling in order to be utilized. Hop flavors and aromas come from essential oils that are easily dissolved into hot wort, but are also highly volatile. Flavor and aroma hops must be added late in the boil or these properties will be lost with the steam. Hops more than any other brewing ingredient are subject to the phenomenon of terroir, as different growing regions produce hops with different flavor and aroma characteristics. The chief hop growing regions are the Northwestern US, Southern England, Germany, Czech Republic, and China.

So what is the flavor of malt? To begin with, it is helpful to repeat that malt is the source of fermentable sugars in beer. But not all malt sugars are fermentable, some are left behind. Thus any sweetness perceived in beer is the product of the malt. It is also helpful to remember that malt is grain. Think of other products that are made with grain, like bread, crackers, pasta, or polenta. The grainy flavors found in those foods are also found in beer and come from the malt.

Beyond these basic flavors, each type of malt brings its own particular set of flavors. Base malts are logically the most basic and give beer the most basic and grain-like flavors. Common descriptors would include grainy, corn, bready, saltine cracker, and husky. The crystal or caramel malts bring a range of caramelized sugar flavors. Common descriptors for these flavors include caramel, toffee, brown sugar, molasses, and burnt sugar. The darkest of these malts can impart rich dark fruit flavors like plum and prune. When maltsters toast malt the same chemical reactions occur as when you toast bread. The flavors of the toasted malts are correspondingly similar to those of toasted bread and include toast, biscuit, nutty, graham cracker and bread crust. The roasted malts are the darkest of the brewing grains and are responsible for the flavors associated with stouts and porters. They are kilned nearly to the point of becoming charred and have strong roasty and char flavors. Descriptors for these grains include roasted, burnt, smoky, chocolate, and coffee. The roasted grains also give beer bitterness like that found in a cup of espresso.

Aside from the espresso-like, roasted grain bitterness mentioned above, bitterness in beer comes from hops. For people who say they don’t like beer, hop bitterness is the most commonly identified reason. The level of bitterness depends on the alpha acid content of the hops, the amount of hops used, and the length of time the hops were boiled. Bitterness can range from very light, as in Scottish ales and German wheat beers, to aggressive as in American double IPAs.

The hop flowers added to beer contain a large amount of leafy vegetative matter. The flavors associated with hops tend to be correspondingly plant-like. The particular flavors of hops vary with variety and growing region. Hop flavors and aromas tend to fall into one of seven broad categories, Floral, fruity, citrus, herbal, earthy, piney and spicy. More specific descriptors include perfume, rose-like, geranium, current, berry, grapefruit, orange, minty, grassy, woody, resinous, spruce, licorice and pepper.

One great way to help yourself better identify the flavor contributions of malt and hops is to smell and taste the raw ingredients. If you live near a homebrew store or brewery, stop in and taste some grains. The flavors released as you chew are the same ones that will show up in beer. While I wouldn’t recommend chewing on raw hops, you can smell them. Rubbing a hop flower between your fingers releases the essential oils. What you smell is what you get. Some malt-forward beer styles to try are Scottish ale, doppelbock, Vienna lager, and English barleywine. Some hop-forward styles are pilsner, American pale ale, India pale ale, and Double IPA.

Session #37: When to Drink the Good Stuff

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This is my first time participating in The Session, a first-Friday event in which a number of beer bloggers all post on the same theme. I’m a day late. So what. It’s just a beer blog. Next month I’ll try to be timelier. This month’s Session was hosted by The Ferm, with the theme of The Display Shelf – When to Drink the Good stuff.

Last summer I attended a BBQ at the home of the owner of my favorite local beer store. Of the actual party, no more will be spoken. Trust me, it’s for the best. However, I DO remember that we made several trips into the basement of his humble abode to survey and sample from the beer cellar. Atop what should have been a workbench were a collection of small refrigerators filled with beer, a fact that apparently caused his spouse some consternation. (Who hasn’t experienced that?) But I think my friend’s explanation to his wife perfectly sums up the rationale for the beer geek’s beer cellar. “The beers upstairs are the beers you drink. These are the beers you don’t drink.” I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Anyone who is at all serious about beer has a collection of “beers you don’t drink.” I myself have a good supply of saving beers stashed safely in the basement. There’s the vertical collection of Lee’s Harvest Ale from 1997 through 2009, the miscellaneous crusty bottles of Samuel Adams Triple Bock, and a couple of 1999 Thomas Hardy Ales to name just a few. And that doesn’t even count the cases of homebrewed barleywine, bretty imperial stout, and sour beers that I intentionally drink only very slowly.

My problem is not the “beers you don’t drink.” I’m fine with those. I don’t even worry particularly about finding the right occasion to open one. They are after all the “beers you don’t drink.” My problem is the sizeable collection of beers in my cellar that I never really meant to save. These are beers that I bought fully intending to drink that instead found their way to the basement only to be forgotten in the stacks of cases on the shelves. Some of these beers will age just fine. There are barleywines, imperial stouts, and a full case of sours among them. Some of them though were never intended for aging and won’t necessarily benefit from the passage of time. I’m talking about saisons, hop-heavy double IPAs, and the bottle of 2007 Left Hand Goosinator Smoked Doppelbock with the quarter inch of sediment on the bottom. With these beers it isn’t a question of finding the right occasion to drink them; it’s more a matter of finding any occasion. I simply have too much beer in the cellar and I’m constantly buying or being given more beer. I periodically impose beer-buying moratoriums on myself, but they never last. What am I thinking? I can only drink so much and the beers are piling up. I’m being buried in beer.

I realize that to some this might not seem like a problem. Perhaps I shouldn’t see it as one either. Perhaps I should start viewing these beers as experiments, controlled (or maybe not so controlled) explorations into the effects of ageing on beer. How long will a bottled hefeweizen last before it becomes undrinkable? What is the half-life of hop flavor? Can oxidation ever benefit a Belgian wit? Perhaps my cellar can yield valuable information that will forever change the way craft beer is packaged and stored. Perhaps I’ll go down in history as the one who finally cracked the code on this recently rediscovered practice of cellaring beer…

Or maybe not. While waiting for future beer writers to define my legacy I guess I’ll just have to keep plugging away. I think I’ll start bringing one beer a week up from the archives to be consumed and enjoyed. As someone said (I no longer remember who it was), “A beer not consumed is a beer wasted.” I don’t like to waste beer.

Beer and Appellation

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I speak a lot in my beer tasting events about the differences between beer and wine, one of which is appellation. So much about wine is determined by the earth in which the grapes are grown and the climate of the growing region. This is true down to the micro level with grapes on one slope making different wine from grapes grown on a nearby slope. This so-called “terroir” doesn’t hold true for beer. While there are differences in malt and hops from different regions, even when the same hop varieties are grown in different countries, pretty much any brewing ingredient is available to any brewer anywhere in the world, even homebrewers. If a brewer wants to make a traditional English ale with all English ingredients, they can. They can even alter the chemistry of their brewing water to mimic that of a particular city.

The only beer where the idea of terroir might truly be important is Lambic. Spontaneously fermented with the natural airborne yeast and bacteria from the area around Brussels, a traditional Belgian lambic cannot be exactly recreated anywhere else in the world. However, a bevy of American craft brewers have begun making their own spontaneously fermented brews. The question now is whether these beers can rightfully be called “lambic” or should they instead be called “lambic style.” Is Lambic an appellation or a brewing process?

Beer writer Steven Beaumont posted an interesting article about this question yesterday on Blogging at World of Beer. Check it out.

Specialty Beer or Just Plain Beer?

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I was nearing the end of a long, snowy drive home from Kansas City the other day. I hit a spot where I couldn’t pick up NPR and clearly needed something to occupy my brain. I passed a billboard advertising a liquor store somewhere in southern Minnesota. The sign bore the proud declaration “Specialty Beer.” At that moment this sight filled me with mixed emotions. On the one hand I was happy to see a small town store advertising and selling better beer, although I have no idea what kind of selection they might actually have. On the other hand I found myself wondering how long the craft beer industry will be saddled with labels like “specialty” and “craft.”

Think about it. When you go into a liquor store they don’t have a separate section for wines that don’t come in a box. They don’t put a special label on the single malt scotch to suggest that it is anything other than scotch. I don’t believe I have ever seen a store, even those selling small artisanal labels, advertise “specialty vodka.” Wines and spirits may be organized by type, region, or even price, but seldom is the better stuff called “special.” Contrast this with beer where it is not uncommon to see the “beer” section brimming with twelve-packs of pale lagers and a physically separate “specialty beer” section with its rows of 22 oz and 750 ml bottles. I found myself wondering if this segregation was a good thing or a bad thing for the industry.

In the short term labels like “craft” or “specialty” draw attention to better beer and let consumers know that it isn’t the same old pale, tasteless brew that they may think of as beer. In the long term, however, I think it may serve to scare people off. Segregating craft beer from the rest of the beer universe makes it easier for those who haven’t yet stepped up to say, “Oh, that’s too dark for me” or “I don’t like that strong stuff.” It serves to alienate potential craft beer drinkers from a product that they may very well like. Or it might lead some to see it as something to be consumed only on special occasions. Separating it physically in the store from other beers certainly makes it easier for the casual beer drinker to overlook. I would bet that there is a whole set of beer customers at a store like Surdyk’s or Zipp’s in Minneapolis who are totally unaware that there is a special aisle for specialty beers.

If you think about it, the majority of craft beers available today are simply beer as it was up until about World War II when resource rationing and changing palates began the slide to the corn and rice lagers of today. In other words, it’s just beer. A pilsner or Munich dunkel in Germany is just beer. A bitter in England is just beer. Bottled versions of each would sit on store shelves alongside other beers without need of special categorization. I wonder how long it will take for Americans to see domestic craft beer and better imported beer as just “beer.” How long will it take for Lagunitas Pils to take its rightful place in the cooler somewhere in the vicinity of the other light-colored lagers instead of being relegated to the short-bus ghetto of the specialty aisle? When will we normalize the consumption of quality beer in the same way that we have normalized the consumption of fine wine and spirits?

Brewer Collaborations

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Collaborative brewing is the new big thing in the craft brewing world. American craft brewers are partnering with others both foreign and domestic to create some unique (and some not so unique) new beers. I talked to brewers here and abroad as well as consumers to get to the bottom of the trend. Read the results in my latest article at the Ratebeer.com Hoppress.