PINT
CRAFT BEER AND WHY IT'S BETTER
“ BEER IS THE UNIVERSAL BEVERAGE” RANDY MOSHER
Beer is one of the oldest beverages known to man, it has been produced in one form or another for millennia. Dating back as far as the time of the ancient Sumerians and even further. Beer predates civilisation itself. There are countless different beer styles and many methods of making beer. From the ancient archaic techniques, through monastic traditions, Belgian niche styles, spontaneous fermentation, chilli beers, all the way to the obscure oyster stout. However, recently there has been a real influx in great beer being produced by breweries and brewers that veer away from and forge against the market dominating pilsner producing mega breweries. There is a focus on quality and flavour with these breweries and a new wave of beer, dubbed ‘Craft Beer’ is gaining popularity worldwide, making itself a major player in the beer industry. These breweries and the beers that they produce will be the focus of Pint.
Randy Mosher is an internationally recognised author and expert in the field of beer and brewing. He writes for beer and brewing related periodicals, has lectured to audiences across the USA, and has taught beer style courses at the Siebel Institute.
A Hymn To Ninkasi Beer is ancient. Consider this poem before anything else written after. This is where beer originates, this is the care that has gone in to beer for millenia. This is its importance. Beer has lost its way. Craft beer is new. Craft beer wants good beer back.
In the time of the ancient Sumerians, women were the brewers as well as the retailers of beer. It's not surprising, then, that the Sumerian deity of beer, Ninkasi, was also a female. She was a daughter of Ninhursad, the Mother Goddess. ‘Hymn to Ninkasi’ is a Sumerian poem translated from an ancient tablet describes the brewing of beer. This is one of the earliest recorded instances of beer brewing and the very first recorded beer recipe.
Borne of the flowing water, Tenderly cared for by the Ninhursag, Borne of the flowing water, Tenderly cared for by the Ninhursag
You are the one who soaks the malt in a jar, The waves rise, the waves fall. Ninkasi, you are the one who soaks the malt in a jar, The waves rise, the waves fall
Having founded your town by the sacred lake, She finished its great walls for you, Ninkasi, having founded your town by the sacred lake, She finished it's walls for you
You are the one who spreads the cooked mash on large reed mats, Coolness overcomes, Ninkasi, you are the one who spreads the cooked mash on large reed mats, Coolness overcomes
Your father is Enki, Lord Nidimmud, Your mother is Ninti, the queen of the sacred lake. Ninkasi, your father is Enki, Lord Nidimmud, Your mother is Ninti, the queen of the sacred lake You are the one who handles the dough with a big shovel, Mixing in a pit, the bappir with sweet aromatics, Ninkasi, you are the one who handles the dough with a big shovel, Mixing in a pit, the bappir with honey You are the one who bakes the bappir in the big oven, Puts in order the piles of hulled grains, Ninkasi, you are the one who bakes the bappir in the big oven, Puts in order the piles of hulled grains, You are the one who waters the malt set on the ground, The noble dogs keep away even the potentates, Ninkasi, you are the one who waters the malt set on the ground, The noble dogs keep away even the potentates
You are the one who holds with both hands the great sweet wort, Brewing it with honey and wine You the sweet wort to the vessel Ninkasi... You the sweet wort to the vessel The filtering vat, which makes a pleasant sound, You place appropriately on a large collector vat. Ninkasi, the filtering vat, which makes a pleasant sound, You place appropriately on a large collector vat When you pour out the filtered beer of the collector vat, It is like the onrush of Tigris and Euphrates. Ninkasi, you are the one who pours out the filtered beer of the collector vat, It is like the onrush of Tigris and Euphrates
CONTENTS
An Introduction to Craft Beer 7 What is a craft brewery? 8 The Brewing Process 9 Mashing Boiling Fermentation Conditioning
10 11 12 13
Beer Style Guide 14 British 15 American European Belgian
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A Brief History of Craft Beer
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What is Craft Beer Really?
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Wylam Brewery BrewDog Stephen Allerton John Allen Charlotte Cook
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A Final Word
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Glossary of Terms
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AN INTRODUCTION TO CRAFT BEER Beer
Noun An alcoholic drink made from yeast-fermented malt, flavoured with hops: a pint of beer
Craft beer is essentially this; as is all, real beer. Let's find out what makes a craft brewery different.
What is a Craft Brewery? The Brewers Association describes an American craft brewery as:
Small
A craft brewery must produce 6 million barrels of beer or less annually. This rules out the mega breweries that may try to masquerade as a craft brewery with beers that are similar to those of craft brewers.
Independent
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A craft brewery must have less than 25% of the craft brewery being owned or controlled by an alcoholic beverage industry member who is not themselves a craft brewer.
Traditional
A craft brewer must have 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 (ingredients that are not malt, hops, yeast or water) to enhance rather than lighten flavour.
“To me, craft beer is art. This means that the ideas and recipes for the beers must come from the brewers, not from the marketing department. It takes a passionate and often highly personal point of view to create something unique, memorable, and meaningful” Randy Mosher The 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. Craft beer is generally made with traditional ingredients like malted barley; interesting and sometimes non-traditional ingredients are often added for distinctiveness. The brewers tend to be very involved in their communities through philanthropy, product donations, volunteerism, and sponsorship of events. They have distinctive, individualistic approaches to connecting with their customers. Craft brewers maintain integrity by what they brew and their general independence, free from a substantial interest by a non-craft brewer.
MASHING
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At the core of brewing is a magical porridge making process called ‘mashing.’ Crushed malt is mixed with hot liquor and this mash is allowed to stand. In just a few minutes, enzymes present in the malt covert starch from the grains in to sugars. The resulting sweet liquid, called wort, can then be drained off. The main event in this process is the conversion of starch in to sugar. Starches are polymers of sugars meaning they are large molecules strung together from a number of smaller molecules of glucose. In the mash, enzymes liberate maltose, a two-unit sugar, plus some longer ones of varying degrees of fermentability. The genius of the enzyme system in malt is that there are two enzymes working at slightly different temperatures. One enzyme creates highly fermentable sugars, the other, less so. The beauty of this is that the brewer can adjust the fermentability of the wort by varying the mash temperature. Once the mash has done its work, the temperature is raised, ending enzyme activity and locking the ratio of fermentable to unfermentable sugars, a step called ‘mashing-out.’
At the end of the mashing process, you need to separate the sweet wort from the matrix of husks and chunks known as ‘spent grain.’ Most breweries use a lauter tun, a vessel with a perforated bottom, although sometimes the mash tun itself also serves this purpose. As the sweet wort is run off into the kettle, more hot water is added to the top of the mash, a process called ‘lautering.’ When enough wort is collected it is run off into the kettle.
Boiling
Once in the brew kettle, the wort is brought quickly up to a boil and the first load of hops is added. Hops are usually added in stages. In order to extract bitter substances, a vigorous boil is essential. In a process called ‘isomerisation,’ alpha acids are rearranged chemically into form that is more bitter and more soluble in wort. The longer the boil time, the more bitterness, but after about 2 hours this is subject to diminishing returns and may cause other problems. Vigorous boiling drives off volatile oils, so if hop aroma is desired, more hops must be added towards the end of the boil. Brewers may also make one or more ‘flavoured additions’ of 15 or 30 minute boil times, which add both bitterness and aroma. Hops may also be added after the boil has ended. Special devices called ‘hop backs’ or ‘hop percolators’ can be loaded with hops and the hot wort run through them on its way to the chiller. Hops may also be used after fermentation, in conditioning tanks or even in serving casks, a technique called ‘dry-hopping’ and often used in American craft beers in which hops are front and centre.
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Fermentation
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Brewers make wort, not beer. Yeast makes beer. The specific biochemical pathways are amazingly complex, but here are the basics: yeast metabolises sugars and creates ethanol, carbondioxide, and many other chemicals in much smaller amounts. Yeast is a single-celled fungus that has been cultivated since ancient times for both brewing and baking. In the brewing world, there are two main families of yeast responsible for ale and lager fermentations. Ale, or top-fermenting, yeast is a species called ‘Saccharomyces Cerevisiae.’ Recent evidence conclusively shoes that lager yeast is a second, closerelated species, ‘Saccharomyces Pastorianus.’ There is considerably more genetic variation among the ale yeast strains, as you can easily detect even in a cursory survey of ales. Other yeast and even bacteria are involved in some speciality beer, but the vast majority of beers are fermented with these two species. A measured amount of healthy yeast is added to the oxygenated wort in a carefully sanitised fermenting vessel. The yeast takes in the oxygen and begins to make more yeast by ‘budding’ off new cells. This takes several hours, and during this time there is very little actual fermenting going on. But at a point, all the available oxygen
is used up and the yeast turns its attention to the sweet wort. First because its easier, the yeast eats the small amount of available glucose, and then it begins to metabolise the maltose. This yeast can throw a thick rocky head on the surface of the fermenting beer more than a foot high and generate enough heat that tanks need to be cooled to avoid runaway temperatures. This violent process takes between a day and a week, depending on the temperature, wort strength, yeast vigour, and other factors. Although it's a somewhat questionable term, many call this ‘primary fermentation.’ When the maltose is used up, the yeast will turn to the next longest sugar, maltotriose. At this point, things slow way down.
CONDITIONING
After the early stages of fermentation, the beer begins a process of maturation called conditioning. During this time, raw ‘green’ flavours are mellowed by the yeast's continued metabolic activities. Errant molecules are roped back into the cell and changed back in to something less obnoxious. During this time, yeast and other particles in the beer slowly settle out. Stronger beers take much longer to condition than every day ones. Normal English style ales might not need even two weeks until they're ready to drink, while a barley wine might take six months or more. Because everything is moving in slow motion at near freezing temperatures, conditioning a lager takes much longer. In many beers, yeast is not removed from the beer. If some yeast is left in the beer when it is put into the bottle or cask along with a small amount of sugar and left to ferment, the additional carbon dioxide produced will be trapped, providing natural carbonation. Live yeast in the bottle or cask actually scavenges oxygen and provides a protective effect. Many craft beers are ‘bottle-conditioned,’ using this process.
At the other end of the spectrum is pasteurisation. In this process, the finished beer is heated for a short time temperatires high enough to kill any remaining yeast and bacteria, typically 2 to 3 minutes at 60°C. Flash pasteurisation before packaging is generally regarded as being kinder to beer flavour. In this method, the beer is heated to 71.5–74°C for 15–30 seconds. Either method will produce a greatly improved shelf life over filtered, unpasteurised beer. Almost all keg beer sold in the US and most craft beer overall is unpasteurised, which is the reason it should always be kept below 3°C. In most breweries, carbon dioxide is dissolved in beer, either in-tank during conditioning or post filtration just before bottling. Or the tanks can simply be closed toward the end of fermentation and fitted with a bleeder valve that allows carbonation to safely build to the desired level.
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BRITISH
Classic Bitter
Developed 1850 –1950 as draft pale ale, this grew lighter in gravity and body over time. It comes in a range of imprecise substyles. Usually these are brewed with adjuncts in addition to the malt to lighten the body and improve drinkability. Despite their low gravity and adjunct recipes, the best of these beers can be complex and appealing.
Pale Ale
An old, British style of ale. The ‘Pale Ale’ name is typically applied to bottled beer representing the strong end of the range but there are plenty of draft versions. ‘Bitter’ may encompass all strengths, and while the term usually refers to draft beer, packaged versions exist. On the whole, pale ale is a more substantial beer than bitter but there is much overlap. You are more likely to find an all-malt version of a pale ale than a bitter. American brewers love this style and have made it their own.
India Pale Ale
Very much a part of the broader pale ale family, and in fact the style may overlap a little. In any given brewer's portfolio, the IPA is just about guaranteed to be just a little paler, stronger, and more bitter than their pale, which is in keeping with the history of the style. They can be tricky to recognise; one brewer's pale is another's IPA. As with pale ale, the American style is a much lustier version that call on the racy, piney, grapefruity aromas of American hops.
Scotch Ale Evolved slowly as top of the range of Scottish ale family. Rich, sweet and malty, huge complexity in the aroma.
English Brown Ale A beer style with an ambiguous
history, but picking up the story in 1700, when the descendant of the old unhopped English ale, the amber or two-penny beer, was kicking around London. At the time there were other, more bitter brown beers on the scene that later became the porter. Despite the huge success of porter, lightly hopped dark beers managed to survive. The terms brown and nut brown had been passed around for centuries, but it appears that the word didn't become anything like a style description until the end of the nineteenth century.
English Old/Strong Ale
This term has two meanings. The ‘old’ properly refers to a beer that has been aged in wooden vessels for a year or so, during which time it picks a piquant acidity and a rich set of aromatics. Beers treated in this manner were called ‘stale’ and were usually blended with fresher beers when sold. There are few beers made this way in England nowadays but the style lives on in Flanders.
English Barley Wine Descended from strong ‘October’ ales brewed on country estates. Bass first applied the term in 1903 to its No.1 strong ale. There is much variety within this style.
Britain is the birthplace of many of the styles that are common in craft brewing today, whether these are direct nods to the old world style of brewing or contemporary takes on a classic style. Britain's beer history is rich, and has produced some of the most popular and famous beer styles in history.
Porter A dark and malty beer with a rich and confusing history. Porters can be a range of darker colours and the flavour can vary quite dramatically. In reality, Porters represent a fairly wide range of dark brown beers without any well-defined substyles. Some even encroach on stout territory.
Baltic Porter This type of porter is based on
beers exported from England up to Russia in the eighteenth century. Modern versions are lagers rather than ales. Creamy roasty flavours, quite sweet.
Stout The word Stout, meaning a
strong black beer, goes back to at least 1630. The term was applied to the ‘stout butt beers’ that would eventually go on to be named ‘porter.’ So all the history that applies to porter is also part of the stout story. Stout forms a widespread and carried family of beers whose members all share a deep, dark, roasty character.
Sweet/ Milk Stout A stout that has been
sweetened with the addition of unfermentable milk sugar, lactose.
Oatmeal Stout
A stout with added raw or malted oats. The oats add a soft, rich creaminess and a hint of nuttiness.
(Russian) Imperial Stout Imperial is a term normally
applied to beers that were brewed in Britain, then shipped to the imperial court of the Russian Empire during the nineteenth century. ‘Imperial’ was also used in late nineteenthcentury America as a designation for the top of a brewer's range, typically a pale ‘stock’ ale of fairly high strength. The term was occasionally used in England around the turn of the twentieth century. Of late, craft brewers have embraced the term and applied it to anything that moved: stout, porter, brown pale, blond, Pilsner, and more. These Imperial beers are always stronger than their non-imperial counterparts, reaching 8% ABV or higher. This style is the original Imperial exported to Russia in the nineteenth century. Richer, stronger and a fuller body than an average stout.
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AMERICAN
America is the birthplace of craft beer, there are only a few true American styles. However, with the USA being quite a new country compared to other beer producing nations a lot of their styles are variations on pre-existing styles. We'll touch upon a few here.
Steam Beer
Also known as ‘California Common’, is a true American beer style. The unique feature of steam beer is that it was an attempt to brew a lager without access to ice or refridgeration. This gives a fruity esthery profile, compared to a pure lager. Anchor's, Anchor Steam is the most famous steam beer available.
American IPA
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An American IPA is just a paler, stronger, hoppier style of pale ale. American versions showcase American hop varieties. More recently there is a lot of crossover and most American IPAs can be classified simply as an IPA.
Amber & Red Ale
A beefy session beer. Good drinkability. Hoppy without being tiring, with a malt base that is profound but not overpowering. Emphasis on bitterness in flavour and maltiness in aroma.
American Barley Wine
T his style is differentiated from its British counterpart by an enthusiastic use of hops, especially piney, citrusy hops. Very high ABV, reaching upwards of 10%.
Double (Imperial) IPA
Similar to the Imperial Stout, a double, or imperial IPA is stronger, richer, hoppier and fuller bodied than an IPA. The rise of craft beer in the USA contributed greatly to the success of this style.
European
European beers tend to be lighter, making use of lager yeasts and having an emphasis on drinkability. Europe has spawned some of the absolute classic beer styles, including the Bohemian Pilsner, the most popular and successful beer style in history.
Lager
A cool fermented, cold conditioned beer that is often very crisp, pale and refreshing with slightly fruity notes. However, there are also darker lagers with more malty flavours.
Bohemian Pilsner
This is the original source Pilsner, which spawned thousands of imitators. It was invented in the town of Plzeň, in response to pale ale's popularity. Golden in colour, complex caramel bouquet and a fresh, spicy Saaz hop aroma.
Munich Dunkel
D escended from ancient ‘red’ beers in southern Germany. Dunkel was the first lager style, developing around the sixteenth century.
Maibock/Heller Bock
Einbeck, southern Germany, claims to be the origin point for this strong lager style. Rich creamy malt, soft bitter finish.
Doppelbock
Created in 1692 as ‘Salvator’ by the monastic Paulaner brewery in Munich. This is still a big beer, but was once much heavier. Over time it has become drier, less sweet and more alcoholic.
Wheat Beer
Wheat beer is an umbrella term for the many styles of beer, predominantly Bavarian or Bavarian in origin that use wheat as an ingredient in the brewing process. These beers are often pale and hazy with fruity, banana notes.
Weissbier/Hefeweizen
A light grainy flavoured wheat beer with a high level of carbonation and hints of banana, a very refreshing beer. Brewed with 50 – 60% malted wheat, lightly hopped. Fruity, bubblegum and spicy clove aroma.
Weizenbock & Weizen Doppelbock
T he same fruit-bowl aroma as a wheat beer but with a deep caramelised malt aroma and hints of toast. A strong but very drinkable beer.
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Belgian
Saison
A light, fruity, spicy summer beer. Defined by the yeast used, believed to be related to red wine yeast. Spices are sometimes added e.g. grains of paradise, black pepper, to compliment the spicey flavours of the yeast.
Lambic
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An ancient beer brewed in the region surrounding Brussels. It's as weird as beer gets. Lambic is ‘spontaneously fermented.’ The classic method is to expose the cooling wort to the night air, upon which drifts a whole zoo of microorganisms that perform various roles in fermenting and souring the beer. Long barrel ageing is required for the acidic flavours to mellow. Blending is essential to achieve any level of consistency.
Trappist
A speciality ale that can only be legally brewed by certain breweries set up in monasteries. Trappists can vary in flavour but usually possess fruity notes like most Belgian beers; however are usually very complex in taste.
Abbey
Very similar to the Trappist style, however an Abbey beer can be brewed by any brewery.
The Belgians prefer an artisanal approach to brewing, meaning the brewer is considered an artist and has no sense of duty to conform to pre-existing styles. More than half of all Belgian beers do not fit into any style, and the styles they do have tend to be interpreted rather casually. There is a huge variety of strengths, colours, textures and brewing methods. Hundreds of distinctive yeasts, other microorganisms and a plethora of added ingredients contribute flavour. One thing that unites all of this chaos is the use of highly distinctive yeast. The yeast in Belgium is very diverse, and the strain employed in beer definitely put it's unique stamp on the finished product. You can, in fact, take any wort, ferment it with Belgian yeast and the result will be a Belgian-tasting beer. Belgium's beers are extremely expansive, therefore the following beers are only a very brief overview of what Belgium really has to offer.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF CRAFT BEER Beer is the great family of starch-based alcoholic beverages produced without distillation. Today in the industrialised world, beer is usually brewed from barley malt, with other grains such as rice, corn, wheat or oats thrown in for reasons of cost, texture, or tradition, and seasoned with hops.
This is the short story of craft beer's history.
The history of beer spans millenia and is an integral part of the development of civilisation as a whole. Craft beer on the other hand is a modern concept in comparison, it has humble beginnings in the mid 20th century and is still developing today.
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WHAT HAPPENED?
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Post prohibition America was awash with Pilsner. Beer was seen to be the inferior choice to the cocktail and pale beers reigned. This trend towards pale beers grew and changed, introducing more and lighter beers, reducing flavour and adding adjuncts to tone down an already clean and crisp style with no overtly intense flavours. The endeavour for maximum drinkability produced watery beers with barely any real flavour. The trend towards light pale beer reached its low point with the introduction of Miller Clear in 1993. This water-clear beer stripped of all colour and much of its flavour by a carbon filtration process, was, thankfully, a step too far. It quietly slipped into obscurity. This part of American brewing is what craft brewing forges against. This light beer dominated, faux-pilsner market run by mega breweries such as Miller is what craft breweries and brewers pull away from. Unfortunately, this is still what rules over the beer market worldwide.
Craft brews sprang from a passionate desire to save our palates from bland, industrialised products, to salvage the authentic flavours of the world's great beers, and restore the artist's hand in the making of this beloved beverage. Like so many of the social movements brought on by changes in attitudes during the 1960s, it had audacious and maybe even naive goals. Whether it has succeeded will have to be judged by history, but right now, the beer landscape is richer and deeper than ever and this is down to craft beer. The United States in 1975 was a pretty barren place for good beer; American breweries large and small had been battling it out over price in the decades since World War II, with the result that unbranded generic beer was being sold in supermarkets and the number of genuine specialty beers could be counted on one hand, with fingers to spare. A number of factors came together to make craft beer a reality. First were the European experiences of military personnel and college students on backpacking adventures. In Britain they found beers with and intimate, personal sensibility; in Germany, a sense of order and righteousness; and in Belgium, an unlimited fountain of ideas and ancient taproots. These were profoundly great places to start.
In Boulder, Colorado, Charlie Papazian was leading a merry band of homebrewers that eventually coalesced into the American Homebrewers Association, which spread a fun, subversive message of self-reliance. Homebrewing was legalised in 1979, ushering in a real boom for the hobby brewers and homebrewers, who started to dream of bigger things. To this day, homebrewing provides the reservoir of energy, ideas, and manpower from which commercial craft beer springs. The first brewpub, Yakima Brewing and Malting, was opened in 1982 by a retired hop consultant named Bert Grant. While the restaurant business is a difficult one, brewpubs managed to thrive. Over the years they have been a highly visible manifestation of craft beer, introducing millions to its charms.
As of November 2007 there were 967 brewpubs operating in the United States. What is really impressive about craft brewing is that a bunch of people who started in their basements with improvised breweries and family financing have managed to take over the conceptual helm of beer in the United States. For well over a century, the biggest players determined the future of beer, be it pale, cold, fizzy, light, canned, cheap, dry, ice, or clear. The large public companies still wield an enormous amount of power and are by no means fading out of the picture, but the fact that they are now following the lead of the craft brewers and churning out ‘me-too,’ craft-esque brews shows where the creative energy lies. It's hard to point to another industry that has flip-flopped so dramatically.
“Let's all work to get people to drink more good beer. so if someone walks into your office and says he drinks Corona, don't immediately call him a dickhead.” Michael Jackson*
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*27 March 1942–30 August 2007 English writer and journalist. Author of several influential books about beer and whisky. He was a regular contributor to a number of British broadsheets, particularly The Independent and The Observer. Jackson's books have sold over three million copies worldwide and have been translated into eighteen different languages. He is credited with helping to start a renaissance of interest in beer and breweries worldwide in the 1970's, particularly in the United States. He is also widely credited with popularising the idea of beer styles. So no, not that Michael Jackson
“ Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy” Benjamin Franklin
This popular beer related quote is in fact a misquote. The original, although still relating to alcohol, spoke about wine. It sounds far more interesting the innacurate way.
IN REALITY, WHAT IS CRAFT BEER? The definition of craft beer, although set by the brewers association in America, is up for debate currently in the UK. The definition is often debated even by American brewers as there is a lot of differing opinions on what craft beer really is.
Craft beer and its definition is very much a contemporary issue and so we spoke to contemporary brewers at successful craft breweries to find out. What is craft beer really?
We put the same three questions to each brewer: • The definition of craft beer is up for debate in the UK currently, what, in your opinion, is craft beer? • What is your opinion on craft beer and the industry as a whole as it is today? • How do you feel about craft beer? What is it to you?
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WYLAM BREWERY
Wylam Brewery was established in May 2000 by Robin Leighton and John Boyle who shared a mutual passion for real ale, quality product and a desire to see proper beer served in their local ale house. Wylam is at the cutting edge of the craft beer movement in the North East of England. Ben Wilkinson talks to Pint about craft beer and the importance of looking back as well as forward.
Ben Wilkinson
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The term ‘craft beer’ essentially is the name given to any ale or beer which has been brewed to a certain standard within the confines of a Nano, Micro or Craft brewery. ‘Craft brewing’ is a more refined Americanised term for developments in the industry succeeding the microbrewing movement of the late 20th century. An amalgam of high grade traditional brewing ingredients such as malted barley, whole leaf hops, brewers yeast and water can be combined with interesting and sometimes non-traditional ingredients resulting in a unique and individualistic finished product. The nano, micro or craft brewery is a brewery that produces a limited amount of beer, typically independently owned and run by innovative, passionate, dedicated martyrs willing to sacrifice almost anything in exchange for flavour, quality and style! The current craft beer culture/craze has snowballed with great intensity over the past 4 or 5 years resulting in beer reaching the most unlikely of palates. A massive American influence has transformed a new breed of craft beer drinkers into extreme hop-heads hungry for their next high alpha, hybrid hop hit and in desperate need of something new, new, new! Nothing wrong with this at all, but personally I feel that the term ‘craft beer’ is merely a ‘neu!’ phrase, an infantile terminology which has been given to an ancient ‘craft’ that has been with us for a very, very long time. Lest we forget the Pre-Christian herbal ales, Ancient Egyptian Kash, Celtic Curmi or the Scandinavian Gruit. The old English ‘Cock Ale’ (to which a freshly plucked cockerel was added to the boil as a very special adjunct!) The Farmhouse Table Beer, Rural Barley Wines and Bavarian Liquid Bread! John Barleycorn has been juicing the barley for as long as we care to remember, resulting in the current industry boom time which is blushing and blooming with positive, artistic creativity moving forward at a rapid pace. The modern day brewer is now comfortably smothered with a massive choice of raw ingredients as the modern day beer drinker is spoiled with an incredible range of cask, keg and bottled beers. I feel as a brewer that it is just as important to look back as it is to look forward. Historic brewing methods, traditional techniques and forgotten flavours need not be lost but cherished deeply and forged together with the modern brewing movement to create an infinite ‘craft beer’ future!
‘John Barleycorn’ is a British folksong. The character of John Barleycorn in the song is a personification of the important cereal crop barley and of the alcoholic beverages made from it, beer and whisky. In the song, John Barleycorn is represented as suffering attacks, death and indignities that correspond to the various stages of barley cultivation, such as reaping and malting.
HERE'S A HEALTH TO THE BARLEY MOW
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BrewDog
Stephen Allerston
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For me craft beer is simply a name put to show good beer from standard, average or poor beer. Good beer has been made in the UK for a very long time and as the science and technology behind brewing improves the people who make good beer will benefit by being able to improve methods of serving their well-made product in the best way with the best shelf life and the people who make mainstream beers will continue to cut corners with ingredients and production methods to make beer for as little as possible with nothing but profit in mind. I started drinking beer properly when I was about 17 and I was introduced to hand pulled real ales by my uncle when we went to gigs in Newcastle. The range of different ales in some bars always surprised me because all bars my school friends went to and local bars would all just have the same beers, crap tasteless lagers, a smooth amber like John Smiths and Guiness if you were lucky. I would ask my uncle, “why are there not as many cask ales around” and he would say it's because the big breweries don't want them and that the people on the whole want to drink “that” and would point at a glass of Carling or Foster's. I would ask “what's wrong with that and why don't you drink it?” He would say “because it's tasteless fizzy nats piss.” I look back now and see these early ales I tried, as craft beers, well produced ales made for the flavour and passion not for the profit. Now the industry of well-made beers has changed and it is all for the better as far as I can see. There are breweries popping up worldwide that are making beers, both ales and lagers in every form of serving; cask, keg and bottles large and small. I see it as a great opportunity for independent businesses to move forward and succeed as long as they keep in mind the product quality must always come first. I started making beer in my home when I lived in Canada. Influenced by the brilliant craft breweries, brewpubs and friends who made beer in Vancouver and British Columbia as a whole. I was amazed with the taste of the fresh beer I could produce in my own home. To me it became my passion, to tell as many people who would listen about the great beer that was out there and that you could make in your own home and you could find in most parts of the planet! I now make beer for one of the world's fastest growing craft breweries, I do my hobby as my day to day job and I find that the more people I meet working in the craft beer world the more I find my story told back to me. The beer that is being made is being made by people who love the beer and have a passion for providing the customer and their own taste buds with the best beer they can possibly make.
BrewDog was founded in 2007 by James Watt and Martin Dickie. BrewDog is renound for its hoppy and experimental craft beers. Since opening, BrewDog has grown exponentially and now has bars across the UK and overseas. BrewDog is one of the fastest growing craft beer breweries in the world and its beer is held in very high regard. Stephen Allerston, John Allen, and Charlotte Cook (Brewer, Senior Brewer and Small Batch Brewer) talk about craft beer, what it is to them and why you shouldn't be a beer snob.
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John Allen
Craft beer is beer that has been brewed with the intention of creating something interesting that gets people thinking about what they drink on a regular basis. Although I'm not a fan of big breweries buying craft breweries to tap the market, this does not necessarily lead to bad (non-craft) beer, but I would prefer to support an independent brewery over a multinational corporation. For me size is pretty irrelevant and to an extent and so are ingredients. A lot of the frowned upon ingredients are usually used to cut corners and costs but they can be used in good beer; from the point of view creating something unique that still tastes good. This I have no problem with. I suppose for me it all about intentions. If you make beer just to make money, it's not craft. If you make beer that you and other people enjoy and making money is an added bonus, craft! The craft industry on a global scale is very interesting as nearly every country is at a different stage from the advanced stages of the states to the new revolution happening in places like Ireland and Italy to the completely new beginnings in some Asian countries All in all it's a big shift in what people drink and understand beer to be. It's a very good change and hopefully moves people to enjoy drinking beer for the taste and work that goes into it and not just something to get pissed up on. The craft brewing world is a very co-operative and friendly world where people try to help one another out who they are in direct competition with. This is one of the best aspects as it creates a united we stand ethos that spans all across the world. Craft beer is a job where I get to get up every morning and produce something I enjoy drinking and sharing with friends and strangers alike.
Charlotte Cook
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In my opinion craft beer is defined by its integrity and the passion of those who make it. I'd say that even though BrewDog has a huge automated brewery it is still 100% craft because the brewers love what they do, love their product and really take care to make sure that what they send out is as good as it can be. Cynically, I think that smaller breweries which are producing inferior beer and aren't really in it for the right reasons don't belong under the craft definition. A prime example of this would be Brewmeister who are based in Keith in Northern Scotland, they produce poorly made beer and will freely admit that what you get in the pub is total pisswater. That says to me that they aren't in it for the right reasons, and I don't understand why you'd attach your name to something you thought was no good. That kind of attitude brings down craft beer as a whole, and we're still a tiny percentage of the UK beer market, so if people try a shit craft beer they will think it's all shit, and we might never win them over. Obviously not everyone will like everything, but what they try should be an objectively well made beer. I also think it's totally pointless trying to legally define craft beer, firstly craft beer is far too generic a term compared to say Champagne, Rioja or Cava. It's a growing industry which I don't think should be dictated by a legal regime, as the market and scene is going to keep changing, we need to change as brewers to keep people happy. So to me craft beer is well made, well thought out beer. Craft beer can be as huge as New Belgium or Sierra Nevada, or it can be as small as Brodies in London. If you care about your beer, if you don't skimp on ingredients or processes and you genuinely try your hardest to make the best beer that you can, then you're making craft beer. It's down to the integrity of the brewers, not the size of the brewery. I think that the craft beer industry is really positive at the moment, it's a very open, friendly and family like industry. Everyone knows everyone else, what they're doing and we all genuinely want each other to succeed even if we are technically in competition with each other. I was in America recently and met a brewer in a bar, who promptly invited me to his brewery the next day and let me have an open tab in the tap room! We only met briefly, but I would have done exactly the same for him if he was in the UK, even if I can't really swing open tabs at BrewDog! I also met another one who tried to help me solve a problem of getting hops into the heat exchanger and sent my photos by email of the way he stopped it. It's a hard industry to get into, and it's a hard job when you do actually get it. You need experience, education and a willingness to go in from the bottom at every new job. You might have been head brewer somewhere else, but that doesn't mean you wont be scrubbing the floors for 3 months before being allowed anywhere near the brewkit at your new job. No one minds this though, because it's such an integral part of the process, and you want to make sure someone is sound before letting them go wild on your expensive brewery!
It's also a very male dominated industry, and as a girl I sometimes feel a bit out of place, like I'll never fully be accepted and I'll always be a little bit odd and different. But it is changing, and women are getting more involved in the whole process, I'm still a bit of an anomaly, but there are loads of women in the bar and sales side of it, who love the beer as much as I do. I'd have to say I'm not a beer snob and I wouldn't really consider myself to be a beer geek. I know a lot about beer, the process and the ingredients, and I can usually detect different hops or ingredients used. But I wouldn't call myself a geek because to me a geek would be someone who didn't care about anything else other than beer, and I like to have a healthy range of extra curricular activities. I'm certainly not a snob and I fucking hate the cunts who stand at the bar, getting in the way and being condescending to people who want a fruit beer or a lager. Mostly because they actually know fuck all and just like to hear the sound of their own voice. Secondly I don't think it's up to anyone to try to define someone elses taste. Sure Carling isn't the best beer in the world, the people who make it know it's not the best beer in the world, but it does have a place, and people shouldn't disregard it just because they've been told that craft beer is better. I do spend a lot of time thinking about it though, my job is to make the one off brews, try any experimental techniques and to do the really unusual beers too. I have to spend lots of time experimenting with different combinations of factors to see how they influence haze, colour and flavour, so I am quite often thinking of recipes in the middle of the night. I also pretty much only drink craft beer, I'll occasionally have the odd pint of lager or Broon Ale, but mostly beer. I do enjoy talking to strangers about my job, because it's not very often people are genuinely interested in what you do. I also look nothing like you'd expect a brewer to look, which I think is a good thing!
A FINAL WORD When we started our craft beer journey, some 29 pages ago, we were searching for the true definition of craft beer. What we have arrived at is a complete deconstruction of the term. Craft beer to most, is something different from others. However, there is a common mindset, for those in the industry in particular.
Craft beer is more of a concept than a term. It's more than just a different type of beer; it's a mindset, an ethos, to produce the best that you can whilst truly remaining innovative and creative in the process.
It isn't the beer that's better, it's the brewers.
Brewing is a science. This section explains the scientific terms that accompany beer and the brewing process. Beer isn't totally as complicated as it might sound. We Promise.
A
B
D
I
ABV (alcohol by volume)
Barley Cereal grains, members of the
DMS Dimethyl sulphide, a powerful flavour chemical found in beer, with the aroma of cooked corn.
IBU (International Bitterness
The measurement used to show how much alcohol is present in any alcoholic drink in comparison to its total volume.
Adjunct
Any fermentable added to barley malt for brewing, especially rice, corn, and roasted unmalted wheat, roast barley, sugar, etc.
Alcohol A type of simple organic
compound containing one or more hydroxyl groups (OH) per molecule. Ethanol is the type found in fermented beverages. Other types occur in beer and other fermented products, but in small quantities.
Ale Any beer produced with top-
fermenting yeast. In the old days, a strong un-hopped beer.
Alpha Acid Complex of substances that are the bitter component of hop flavour.
Attenuation The degree to which residual
sugars have been fermented out of a finished beer.
genus Hordeum. When malted, the primary ingredient in beer.
Beer Broad term that describes any
fermented beverage made from barley malt or other cereal grains. Originally denoted products containing hops instead of other herbs.
Brewpub An establishment, typically one including a restaurant, selling beer brewed on the premises.
opposed to bottled beer. Generally unpasteurised.
Ethanol The (ethyl) alcohol found in beer; its intoxitcating component.
Carbonate • To add carbon dioxide gas to
Fermentation Biochemical process of yeast
dissolved in beer.
Conditioning The process of maturation
of beer, whether in bottles or in kegs. During this phase, complex sugars are slowly fermented, carbon dioxide is dissolved, and yeast settles to the bottom.
Conversion Occurs in the mash, of starch to sugar.
K Kettle Boiling vessel, also known as
E
F
Carbonation Fizz due to carbon dioxide (CO2)
expressing hop bitterness in beer. Ppm of dissolved iso-alpha acids present in beer.
Draft, draught Beer from a cask or a keg, as
C the beer. • Alkaline water mineral ion associated with limestone.
Unit) The accepted method of
involving the metabolism of sugars and the release of carbon dioxide and alcohol, along with many important by-products.
G Grist Ground grain ready for brewing.
H
Hop A climbing vine of the
Cannabacinae family, whose cones are used to give beer its bitterness and characteristic aroma.
Hydrolysis The enzyme reaction of the
break-down of proteins and carbohydrates.
a copper.
L
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Lager Beers made with bottom-
fermenting yeast and aged at near-freezing temperatures.
M Malt Barley or other grain that has been allowed to sprout then dried or roasted.
Mash The cooking procedure central to brewing, in which starch is converted into sugars. Various enzyme reactions occur between 43–74°C.
Milling Term for grain grinding or crushing.
Mouthfeel Sensory qualities of a beverage
other than flavour, such as body and carbonation.
O
S
Y
Original Gravity
Secondary fermentation Slow phase of yeast activity
Yeast Large class of microscopic fungi,
Measure of wort strength expressed as specific gravity; the weight of the wort relative to the weight of water.
P
Skunky
Pasteurisation The process of sterilising by
heat. Used in almost all massmarket canned or bottled beers.
Ppb Parts per billion. 1 microgram per litre.
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during which complex sugars are metabolised and ‘green beer’ flavours are reabsorbed. May take weeks or months.
Ppm Parts per million. 1 milligram
Faint rubbery aroma caused by overexposure of beer to light.
Sparge Moisten by sprinkling with water, especially in brewing.
SRM (Standard Reference
Method) Measurement of beer colour,
expressed as ten times the optical density. Absorbance of beer, as measured at 430nm in a spectrophotometer.
per litre.
Primary fermentation Initial rapid stage of yeast
activity when maltose and other simple sugars are metabolised. Lasts about one week.
T Top fermentation Ale fermentation. At warmer
temperatures yeast stays on top of the beer as it ferments.
R Runoff The draining or wort from the mash during sparging.
several species of which are used in brewing.
W Wild fermentation Fermentation that takes place
with yeast that is naturally present in the environment. A process used in the brewing of Belgian styles such as Lambic, creates a sour taste in the beer.
Designer & Editor Sean Edgar Copy Tasting Beer by Randy Mosher Sean Edgar Interview copy Ben Wilkinson Stephen Allerton John Allen Charlotte Cook Typefaces FontSmith: Blake Klim Type Foundry: Calibre House Industries: Neutraface Slab