musing

Malt (and barley) matters: Part II

The SessionAnd now – taking a break from our swim in the pool of listmania – we return to our regularly scheduled conversation about what makes the beer we drink different.

So time for Barley Part II (you knew I had another old image I was itching to show you).

In his Great Beers of Belgium, Michael Jackson writes about how Brother Thomas – then the brewing director at Westmalle – favored malts from Beatrice-Gatinais in France because of their softness, but the varieties he chose each year varied. That would indicate he was more concerned with quality than consistency, but that is another conversation. The point would be that he recognized that not all two-row pilsner malt is created equal.

Jackson describes how important this was to Brother Thomas: “In discussing a malt from elsewhere, widely used by other brewers, I asked whether he thought it was perhaps a trifle harsh. ‘It’s brutal!’ he replied, thumping the table.”

Brother Thomas may have been a little harsh himself, but the fact is that two different varieties of barley – let’s say Optic and Scarlett – kilned to the same color and then used precisely the same way in a recipe may produce beers that taste noticeably different. One might showcase hop bitterness, another a richer malt character. One isn’t necessarily better (or the other “brutal”) but they are different.

Weyermann Malting® in Bavaria proved this to a panel of industry members, including many brewers, a few years ago. Weyermann brewed four pilsners on its pilot system, each with malt produced from a different barley, and in a blind tasting the panelists had no trouble telling them apart.

As a result, some breweries have since begun ordering pilsner malt made from a specific barley. This isn’t necessarily realistic for your average small brewery and certainly not for the local brewpub you should be stopping by tonight.

So maybe I don’t have a point, but it seems like information you should have.

Barley Part I (in cased you missed it).

Canadian craft brewing’s most influential

This just in from up North . . .

Stephen Beaumont gives us the Canadian Craft Brewing’s Influential Top Ten.

– John Mitchell
– Paul Hadfield
– Kevin Keefe
– Jim Brickman
– Charles McLean
– Alan Pugsley (I do have to inject he might be in my U.S. Top 10)
– John Sleeman
– Mitchell Taylor
– Ed McNally
– Andre Dion

I like comments, but they will make more sense there. Registration is easy (I’ve done it at least twice because the brain cells that remember passwords seem to be the first to go when I drink beer).

Another Top 10: Most influential people

Rick Sellers of Pacific Brew News Blog has taken our ’10 Most’ conversation another direction:

Ten People Who Shaped the US Beer Scene.

Certainly a conversation I plan to jump into in his comments section after I get a little work done. (OK, I had to leave one right off – Michael Jackson.)

Here’s his list:

1 – Fritz Maytag
2 – Jack McAuliffe
3 – Fred Eckhardt
4 – Charlie Papazian
5 – Bert Grant
6 – Garrett Oliver
7 – Jim Koch
8 – Ken Grossman
9 – Tie Vinnie Cilurzo & Sam Calagione
10 – Empty. “I would like to see . . . someone who makes the beer bar a great place to be today, those who have redefined what a Beer Bar can be.”

Go comment.

Oregon’s ‘influential ten’

Hip, Hip, Hooray.

Jeff Alworth has risen to the task and given us another regional list, calling his Oregon’s Influential Ten.

I love that Henry Weinhard Private Reserve is at the top of the list. And I don’t know how often people in Portland talk about Cartwright but I’m guessing they should more often. Jeff writes, “No one seems to remember what beers Chuck Coury brewed, but they were impressed that he tried . . .”

For the record, here’s a description from Michael Jackson’s first Pocket Guide to Beer (1984):

Cartwright’s Portland Beer (just under 4%w; 5% v) has the characteristics of an ale and is bottle-conditioned, but is fermented with a lager yeast. It is a big beer with a lot of mouth, but its fullness of body is mitigated by a substantial bitterness. Its ale character derives from fermenting at relatively high temperatures and warm-conditioning.”

Jackson gave it one-and-a-half stars (out of 5).

I’ve recounted Jim Robertson’s description before.

Not all barleys are born equal

barley manA few years ago a judge rather boldly wrote “Crisp Maris Otter?” in comments about an old ale I entered in a homebrew competition. I did, in fact, use Maris Otter, though it happened to be malted by Thomas Fawcett rather than Crisp.

I was nonetheless impressed.

I thought of this because British UK maltster Robin Appel has begun promoting the idea that not all malts taste the same. He’s taken his case to the British Guild of Beer Writers and barley farmers, commissioning Brewing Research International in Surrey to produced test batches. They seem to be proving his point. From the Guild report:

Robin Appel was determined to put this unexplored question to the test. If winemakers could demonstrate the differences between Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio and Sauvignon Blanc; and hop growers could define the peculiarities of Fuggles, Goldings and Boadicea – then wasn’t it about time that our maltsters sought to add value and individuality to Britain’s home-grown barley varieties.

In recounting the tasting guild chairman Tim Hampson wrote that Maris Otter is being pushed aside in favor of barleys that are more efficient.

The tasting was enough to impress Hampson. “Robin Appel’s malt-teasers won me over and made me think that the barley from which a beer is made is perhaps something we should pay much more attention to,” he wrote.

Sales director Jonathan Arnold said the company will continue to push the issue: “After the 2007 harvest, we intend to take this trial further by looking at the individual flavors of Maris Otter barley grown in different terroirs and soils – from Norfolk, Yorkshire, Shropshire, the West Country and the South – to see what flavor characteristics will be demonstrated by each.”

OK, the terroir part might sound a little scary – personally, I think breweries already have enough other idiosyncratic qualities that are comparable to what winemakers call terroir – but I’d still love to taste the results.

And this idea isn’t totally new. Brewers on the other side of the English Channel have plenty to say about the importance of barley selection. More about that tomorrow.