What if rye-bread eaters had prevailed?

While others were watching their brackets get busted in overtime Friday evening I was reading “Six Thousand Year of Bread: Its Holy and Unholy History.” Why? Because a book about brewing with wheat should include the role wheat has played in various cultures where people drink beer.

It’s not exactly light reading, so maybe I was looking for a reason to laugh when I came across the explanation of how wheat became the grain of choice in Europe in the nineteenth century. That’s a longer story involving French tastes, but here’s the excerpt that might make you smile:

“In the Middle Ages Europeans were very fond of the taste of rye. Some of the East Germans had called themselves Rugii (rye-eaters) — undoubtedly to distinguish themselves from the ignoble eaters of oats. In Anglo-Saxon England August was called Rugern, the month of the rye harvest. As late as 1700 rye formed 40 percent of all English breads; around 1800 the percentage had dropped to 5.

“Where rye bread was firmly established — in large parts of Germany and Russia — it remained. Physicians and farmers insisted that people who for centuries had eaten the dark bread of their fathers, which gave forth a spicy fragrance like the soil itself, could not find the soft white wheat bread filling. They pointed to the physique of the Germans and rye-eating Russians. The wheat-eaters countered with the claim that rye made those who ate it stupid and dull. Wheat-eaters and rye-eaters eaters spoke of one another as do wine drinkers and beer drinkers.”

Beyond the old beer vs. wine thing I thought first about lager drinkers vs. ale drinkers. Then I recalled a conversation during Zoigl Day in Neuhaus. The local I was talking to asked me about what sort of beers I like to drink. When I mentioned I’d been seeking out weiss beers he quickly explained he didn’t drink those. He had to make too many trips to the bathroom if he did.

Thought never occurred to me to ask if he preferred rye bread to wheat bread.

 

Book review: Tasting Beer

Tasting BeerAt the end of the Preface to “Tasting Beer,” right before you head to Page One, there’s a picture of a glass of beer with a command: “Don’t even consider starting this book without a beer in hand.”

Since you have the book in the other hand you probably aren’t going to ask yourself if, since you are already drinking a beer you like, you really need this book. So I will. Do you think more knowledge about beer will make that beer taste better? If you answered yes then you should own this book.

(Before going on, a bit of a disclaimer. Author Randy Mosher and I are friends, and he asked me to to the “technical edit” of the book. Yes, that sounds as laughable to me as it must to you; like Malcom Gladwell calling me up to ask for story ideas. I don’t get any royalties from the book, so there is no incentive for me to give it a review that boost sales. Because I don’t know of another beer book to be published in 2009 that should be of as much interest to you I’m going to write about it.)

I thought about “Tasting Beer,” but wasn’t ready to write this review, when I posted “The tyranny of the tasting note” last month. Quite honestly, there’s more here than many of you are going to want. Perhaps you don’t feel the need to be able to turn to your dining companion and whisper, “I believe I’m getting a touch of autolysed yeast.” More than you might want now, that is, since once you head down the road of beer knowledge stopping ain’t easy. Because everything in this book is presented in easy to bite off chunks you can grab what you want now and come back later for more.

Mosher makes it deceptively easy. Consider this: “Every sensation found in a glass of beer has its origins in the decisions of the brewer and malstster made druing its manufacture. For instance, the tangy, green perfume of hops? That’s the result of the careful choice and deployment of prized aroma hops in the brewhouse or perhaps the fermenter. The light nuttiness and hints of raisiny fruit? That lightly kilned pale ale malt and a dab of crystal. And all of this is shaped by the mysterious workings of a particular strain of yeast under certain conditions.”

Whether that looks terribly simple to you or densely confusing it will all be clearer 27 pages later in a chapter called “Brewing and the Vocabulary of Beer Flavor.” You’ll be ready for “The Qualities of Beer” and looking forward to it.

I hate quoting book covers, but I’m going to point out that the subtitle for the book is, “An Insider’s Guide to the World’s Greatest Drink.” That’s certainly true, but you exit knowing you don’t have to be an insider to enjoy the beers Mosher writes about. Further, the back cover claims “Tasting Beer” is “The Portable Beer Expert.” Indeed.

Still with me? Then you’ve reached the part of the review where the reviewer offers a profound thought. I’ll pass and give the author the final word:

“Beer is only as good as the people who seek it out, support it, keep it honest, and, most important of all, enjoy the genuine pleasures of it.”

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– Order from BeerBooks.com (and support a business that cares as much about beer as you do).

– Order from Amazon.com.

Or drive to the bookstore and buy it right now.

More reasons why local matters

As promised yesterday, some things to think about when we are talking local.

You won’t see the word beer, but that doesn’t mean the lessons aren’t relevant.

First, this comes from a conversation back in Sitka, Alaska, last summer. A local (of course) and I began talking in a locally owned coffee shop and finished in the connected locally owned bookstore. He explained to me that the coffee shop used to be on the main street, but had to move when a T-shirt vendor offered to pay a higher rent. Thing is the T-shirt shop catering to tourists wasn’t locally owned and wouldn’t be open all year round.

This is when I learned that for every dollar spent at a locally owned business 45 cents stays in the community. For every dollar spent at a business owned by outsiders only 14 cents stays.

Second, a lesson from newspapers. You might recall I’m a newspaper junkie (or was, when you could buy more newspapers), and I found “The imperative of localism and local news” long . . . so I can appreciate your apprehension.

Here’s a takeaway. Newspaper readership began to decline long, long before the advent of the Internet. They quit serving the local community as they once had, not all at once but bit by bit. They quit being as local.

Not a good idea. Not for newspaper owners. Not for brewers.

 

Here we go again: Defining craft beer

A quick tip of the cap to Andy Crouch for a bit of looking behind the curtain, otherwise known as first-rate beer journalism. (And, as Alan will tell you, I’m a curmudgeon who doesn’t rush to such judgment.)

OK, Crouch doesn’t get an “A” for headline writing — “The Brewers Association’s Quiet War On Blue Moon, Leinenkugels, Goose Island, and Maybe Even Elysian, New Belgium, and Your Brewery …” is a mouthful — but please go read the post.

You and I might feel like we’ve beaten the “what is craft beer?” horse to death, but I’m big on knowing about the place where a beer is brewed. Of course, then I get to decide whether to call it a craft beer.

 

Working class people and beer

Expensive beerWhen I read stories about beer and when I talk to brewers and brewery types I have I have this little list of personal hot button topics. (It’s me; you may not care.)

One is what’s local about beer and does it matter? Another is the danger that beer could become an elitist drink ala some wine. I won’t bore you with all of them.

Tomorrow a link about local. Today I suggest you read Pubs and Class from Boak and Bailey. Interesting on many levels, including why people would go to pubs, the importance of community, etc., and comments that certainly add to the conversation.

But don’t overlook item No. 1: “It costs too much.” Goodness knows I’ve typed enough words here explaining why I think you should be willing to pay “more” for beer. Defining “more” being the challenge, of course.

The fact is that the price of beer, again depending on how you define “more,” makes a difference to many drinkers. And you are being a snob if you discount that.