FOOD & DRINK

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Bohemian pilsner from Wiedemann’s Fine Beer

PHOTO: PROVIDED

Local Lagers Make Summer a Beer-eze

Cincinnati brewers have a longstanding history with this quaffable German-style beer. Here are some favorites to try.

BY SEAN M. PETERS

Lager is a very important style of beer in Cincinnati, both today and more than 150 years ago.

Go to a barbecue this summer and you’ll likely see an abundance of lagers in the cooler thanks to this beer’s lightbodied quaffability and often modest alcohol content.

There are many variations of lager, but the brew’s defining feature is the fact that it spends more time in chilly fermentation than, say, an ale: while an ale needs three to five weeks to ferment, a lager is best after six to eight weeks. That, in part, is one reason Cincinnati distinguished itself as a lager city in the mid-19th century. The Queen City is rife with lagering cellars constructed during that time and used to cool beer before the advent of refrigeration.

These underground tunnels and other historic beer sites can be viewed on guided tours of Cincinnati’s Brewing Heritage Trail, curated by local beer historian and author Michael Morgan. His most recent book Cincinnati Beer is a historical love letter to the city’s ongoing reputation for producing some of the best beer in the country.

Morgan points to two reasons lager flowed more heartily from Cincinnati than from other beer hubs: first, a large influx of German immigrants (lager is a German beer), and, subsequently, their brewers’ adherence to traditional German brewing practices.

“Immigration brought both consumer demand for German-style lagers as well as skilled brewers who knew how to produce it,” Morgan says. “Cincinnati was the first point on the ‘German Triangle’ that was composed of the cities of Cincinnati, St. Louis and Milwaukee.”

Morgan says Cincinnati brewers tended to remain more true to the Reinheitsgebot brewing purity law than other cities.

“This meant brewing with nothing but barley malt, yeast, hops and water,” he says. “Many consumers, particularly Germans, looked down on the use of rice, corn or other adjuncts as an adulteration of the beer. Cincinnati lagers were seen as more traditional, more

pure, and enjoyed a good, global reputation as a result.”

Despite German connoisseurs’ purist opinions, one of the most prevalent pale lagers on the market, Bud Light, proudly advertises its use of rice in the brew to set it apart from the pack. If you typically drink Bud Light, there’s no shame in that, but there’s also no better time to try a few lagers from around town; there are now more options than ever.

“Just a few years ago, local craft lagers were a rarity,” Morgan says. “Every brewery made some form of light-bodied blonde ale because they had to make a beer to serve Bud Lightdrinkers, but they usually did it begrudgingly, and those beers were made with ale yeast because it requires less fermentation time.”

“Wiedemann was one of the first locals to put a lot of effort and pride into making a great Bohemian pilsner,” he continues. “They succeeded, and I drink it a lot; but there has been a recent explosion in the number of breweries that are taking golden lagers seriously.”

Morgan also calls out West Side Brewing’s seasonal pilsner and Northern Row’s helles as being excellent examples (note: pilsners are lagers but not all lagers are pilsners).

If all this lager talk gave you a thirst, try these local favorites:

Wiedemann’s Fine Beer: Bohemian Special Brew

The original Wiedemann recipes did not come with the trademark acquisition, meaning new owners Jon and Betsy Newberry had to work out their own approach to the brand’s beer when they opened their brewpub in 2018.

“I really wasn’t all that interested in the old recipes because people’s taste in beer has changed so much in the past 15 or 20 years. It’s a whole new ballgame and I didn’t want to just bring back the old Wiedemann,” says Jon. “It’s completely different, our recipe. The ingredients are much better. I’m not sure how they made it and what they put into it, although I drank plenty of the old stuff, no complaints there. I’d like to think that what we’ve got now is much more authentic to what George Wiedemann would have been making back around 1870.” 4811 Vine St., Saint Bernard, wiedemannsfinebeer.com.

Northern Row Brewery and Distillery: Hustler Helles

Head brewer Greg Larsen has been in the business for 27 years, starting right around the same time craft beer became a talking point in the industry. Now brewing in Northern Row’s recently opened taproom located in Christian Moerlein’s historic OTR icehouse and storage space on McMicken Avenue, Larsen’s helles is the brewery’s most prized commodity.

“I’ve been making lagers ever since I had my first craft lager, it’s been my love,” he says. “Helles is our best-selling beer, hands down. It’s approachable for everybody. The only thing not German is the water.” 111 W. McMicken Ave., Over-the-Rhine, northernrow.com.

West Side Brewing: Pilsner

West Side’s seasonal summer pilsner is brewed with one malt variety and two kinds of hops. “A bright, strawyellow lager with a big white head, the delicately floral and spicy aroma of Hallertau Mittelfrueh hops combines with a light, crackery malt flavor to make an incredibly crisp, quaffable brew,” says the brewery. 3044 Harrison Ave., Westwood, westsidebrewing.com.

A case of Fifty West Brewing Company’s American Lager

PHOTO: PROVIDED BY FIFTY WEST BREWING COMPANY

Fifty West Brewing Company: American Lager

In one of the most exciting local lager developments, Fifty West now sells 15-packs of American Lager for $14.99.

“Brewed with all German malts and cold fermenting lager yeast, this beer is a certified crispy-boy,” says Max Fram, vice president of strategy and operations at Fifty West. “Comes in at 4.5% ABV for a familiar weight to domestic light beer, but with a more pronounced cereal grain flavor. The big boys take shortcuts by using rice or corn syrups and lose some authentic beer flavor.”

At this price you can’t justify the purchase of Bud Light or any other “big boy” solely on financial grounds; this is a steal in comparison. 7605 Wooster Pike, Columbia Township, fiftywestbrew. com.

Rhinegeist Brewery: Cheetah

This incredibly crushable, slightly hoppy lager is well named, because a cheetah will soon run out. That is to say, a six-pack of Cheetah goes down real easy.

“Cheetah is pilsner malt, with some sugar to lighten the body, and a touch of Cascade and Crystal hops for a very restrained amount of hop bitterness and aroma,” says Rom Wells, Rhinegeist’s social media rep. “We love the delicate citrus note provided by the Cascade hops paired with the more traditional hop contribution from Crystal. Our Mexican lager yeast strain produces a nice lager character while letting the beauty of the pilsner malt shine bright in the beer.” 1910 Elm St., Over-the-Rhine, rhinegeist.com.

Braxton Brewing Co.: Garage Beer

Braxton Brewing Co. started in a garage, so it’s fitting that its crowdpleasing lager wears that history on its can. While some garages might need to declutter this summer, Braxton’s Garage Beer is neat, clean and bubbly.

“By brewing it with only pilsner malt and Magnum hops, we’re able to bring it a crisp dry finish with medium-light body and moderate carbonation,” says Braxton’s co-founder and CEO Jake Rouse. “A light bitterness from the single Magnum hop addition makes this beer perfect for every occasion.” Multiple locations including 27 W. Seventh St., Covington, braxtonbrewing.com.

There’s nothing wrong with enjoying a domestic beer brewed by AnheuserBusch or any other major player in the industry, but it’s a shame to waste your immediate proximity to some of the best beer in the world right here in Cincinnati. Do yourself a favor and visit a local brewery, or pick up a six-pack (or 15-pack in Fifty West’s case, pun intended) from the grocery or liquor store. We live in a sea of hops and barley, so it’s best to swim hard and drink deep.

THE DISH CinSoy Ferments Small-Batch, Local Soy Sauce on Cincinnati’s Brewing Heritage Trail

BY SEAN M. PETERS

Have you ever tasted local soy sauce? Until CinSoy launched in 2020, chances are high you’d never seen any on store shelves.

That’s why CinSoy’s small-batch soy sauce caught my eye while I was shopping at Morsel & Nosh deli in Northside. It’s a simple little glass bottle with a minimalist black-and-white screen print of seven hills — like Cincinnati’s — but the design evokes traditional Japanese woodblock prints. The bottle stood out because other types of local condiments are available all over town, but until now, soy sauce hadn’t been among them (based on my googling of “Ohio soy sauce”).

According to the United States Department of Agriculture’s 2020 Annual Bulletin, Ohio grows more soybeans than any other crop, with 4.87 million acres harvested in the state last year. Comparatively, corn, our state’s second-most prominent crop, saw only 3.55 million acres harvested.

There’s obviously a lot of soy around, although much of it is used as livestock feed and to replenish nitrogen levels in soil as a cover crop — not to make soy sauce.

CinSoy’s production facility is adjacent to the former Christian Moerlein Brewing Co. taproom in Over-theRhine, now occupied by the Cincinnati Beverage Company. On a recent visit, Sam Pellerito, CinSoy’s founder, welcomed me into the facility.

Warm air carried the fragrances of garlic, chili and caramel. “The Factory,” as Pellerito calls it, needs to stay warm; 78 degrees Fahrenheit is the ideal temperature to encourage healthy fermentation, which is the main process used in creating soy sauce.

“We’re on the Brewing Heritage Trail,” Pellerito says, referring to Over-theRhine’s series of guided tours and a free walking trail that explores, preserves and celebrates the city’s storied past as a beer-producing capital. “I just think it’s hilarious (because making soy sauce is one) of the oldest brewing processes in the world. I mean, brewing soy sauce is thousands of years old.”

On one side of the main room, there are plastic vats as large as hot tubs. Inside are soupy, bubbling mounds of soybeans. The mash foams with the life of fermentation as Pellerito stirs a vat, and an intoxicating perfume breathes out. If he had told me it was beer, I would have believed him.

“A lot of the procedures that homebrewers end up doing is pretty much what we live every day,” says Kendall Holmes, the other half of CinSoy, who merged his previous endeavor, Cloud Food Labs, with the company earlier this year. “Brew. Sanitize. Transfer. All the stuff you do to homebrew, we’re doing on a much larger scale.”

The turnaround isn’t nearly as quick as beer, though. CinSoy’s sauce takes half a year to reach the depth of flavor Pellerito and Holmes aim for.

“Some soy sauces (age) for three years. In Japan you’ve got four companies that are 450 to 500 years old and they’re still using the same equipment. They still have the same (cedar aging) barrels that they were using when their greatgreat-great-grandparents were making soy sauce,” Pellerito says. “It has a yeast, and that yeast is so super specific to soy sauce and the way that it makes soy sauce taste; they don’t add it to soy sauce, it’s just there.”

Holmes draws another beer comparison, saying that the flavor-imbued yeast in soy sauce is like the presence of Brettanomyces, a wild yeast that gives Belgian farmhouse ales, among others, an irreplaceable funkiness. It’s an ingredient that’s not always on the guest list, but is usually a welcome addition to the party.

Pellerito says he has that same yeast and that CinSoy is building its own yeast colony.

“Our latest batch of soy sauce has a piece of the very first soy sauce I ever made,” he says. “That’s how it lives. That’s how it gets better. It gets better over time, really, because you’re adding that legacy of flavor.”

Pellerito earned a culinary degree from Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island, and worked in esteemed kitchens in Australia and Wales. Later, he started making soy sauce in his basement as an experiment.

“As a small-batch producer, we’re still pretty consistent because we’re not changing a lot. We’re just using soybeans, koji (a starter substance made by combining a cultivated mold with rice and soybeans, which is vital to making soy sauce, sake and miso), wheat and salt water,” Pellerito says. “We’re not trying to recreate the wheel of soy sauce.”

CinSoy sources its beans from Covington, Ohio, a village about 90 minutes north of Cincinnati. The beans’ protein content is higher than average, which enables more flavor to be extracted during fermentation.

“When I go, there are trucks from Japan, trucks from China, trucks from Korea,” Pellerito says. “They’re all coming to get the soybeans because Ohio has the best soybeans in the world for making soy-based products.”

When it comes to soy-based products, sauce isn’t the only thing CinSoy offers. I also left The Factory with miso, tofu and a packet of soy sauce salt — a crystalized transformation of CinSoy’s small-batch sauce.

The company also produces koji mustard, a wildly delicious and unique invention from Holmes. For those who like it hot, there’s chili crisp oil. CinSoy also makes tamari, a cousin of soy sauce made from the liquid collected from the miso-making process — slightly thicker and less salty than conventional soy sauce, but capable of transforming dishes with its abundance of umami. For the DIYer, there’s even the “Make at Home Miso Kit,” which includes soybeans, CinSoy’s koji starter and everything needed to make your own batch of miso at home.

Learn more about CinSoy and find out where you can buy products locally at cinsoyfoods.com.

Bottles of CinSoy soy sauce

PHOTO: HAILEY BOLLINGER

Sam Pellerito (left) and Kendall Holmes of CinSoy

PHOTO: HAILEY BOLLINGER