Thursday, 2 July 2026

What is psuedo-Lager?

A short video looking at the fake Lagers brewed in the UK in the 1960s and 1970s.

 

Labels: , ,

5 comments:

Andrew Bowden said...

I don't know if they still brew it, but Fuller's Frontier was sold as a lager but apparently used their normal yeast. I've often wondered if Robinsons are using their ale yeast for their Helles and other lagers.

2 July 2026 at 03:05
Jeff Renner said...

In the later 19th C in the US, ale breweries faced with the same situation came up with much the same solution and called them Cream Ales. Several of the originals still exist, Genesee Cream Ale in New York and Little Kings Cream Ale from Cincinnati, where I grew up. Strangely, it was originally brewed by a lager brewery, Schoenling. It had a reputation of being crazy strong, although it was actually under 6% abv.

2 July 2026 at 13:44
Anonymous said...

Interesting video but it leaves me with some questions. So is decoction capability the main difference between an ale brew kit and a lager brew kit in this era? I find this curious as many modern breweries I am aware of seem to brew very nice lagers on systems that are definitely not designed to do either step mashes or decoction. Is fermentation with lager yeast not enough to distinguish a lager from an ale?

2 July 2026 at 16:14
Ron Pattinson said...

It's not just the equipment for decocting. It's also having fermenters that can be cooled to a low temperature and lagering tanks. Pseudo-Lagers were usually fermented with a top-fermenting yeast, too.

3 July 2026 at 01:28
Rob Sterowski said...

I enjoyed Genesee Cream Ale when I was in NYC ten years ago. It wasn't the best beer I had in New York, but it was definitely the best value for money at under a dollar a can.

3 July 2026 at 09:00

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)