Brand beers in 2016

Hi there. Another cheap post, courtesy of some other crap I was doing today.

It's still Saturday. But a bit further through the afternoon. And after the Lentebok tasting earlier, I'm three Boks in. Though they were only 30cl bottles. While the Abt I followed them with was a full 33cl. At the same time staring at a bottle of New Glarus Milk Stout that really should get drunk. It's a present from an American friend.

The day is going well. I loaded up at Ton Overmars earlier. Found the blogposts I needed. Started the article. Soaked off some labels. Scanned labels. And went outside to look at the garden with Dolores. In particular, the woodruff she's growing. Which she'll use to make Meibowle*.

This is going great. More irrelevant personal trivia filling the screen. I was going to say that it beats tracking and trapping numbers. But I did a bit of that today, too. Scraping data from Brand's website. Which handily lists some useful technical information. For number fetishists like me.

There. I've said it out loud. Me and numbers have a complicated relationship. But a loving one. From my side. Not sure about those bastard numbers. Never totally trusted them. Always likely to make you look like a fool.

Interesting days for Dutch beer. I hear the non-Pils part of the market has hugely increased its market share.  I wish I had figures, but I'm in lazy-arse bash out the posts mode. There's plenty of circumstantial evidence. Like the number of breweries. The beers you see on supermarket shelves. And what some of the older breweries are making:

Brand beers in 2016
Beer	Style	OG Plato	ABV	Bitterness EBU	Fermentation	Colour EBC
Oud Bruin	Oud Bruin	8.2º	3.50%	16	bottom	105
Pilsener	Pils	11-12º	5.00%	25	bottom	7
Weizen	Hefeweizen	12º	5.10%	12	top	12
UP	Pils	12-13º	5.50%	36	bottom	7
Lentebock	Heller Bock	16º	6.50%	24	top	15
Imperator	Heller Bock	16º	6.50%	27	bottom	30
IPA	IPA	16.3º	7.00%	45	top	19
Dubbelbock	Dubbelbock	18º	7.50%	27	bottom	65
Sylvester		17.5º	7.50%	26	top	50
Zwaar Blond		18.4º	8.50%	36	top	12
Saison	Saison	12.5º	6.50%	19	top	8
Source:
Brand website http://www.brand.nl

An idiosyncratic bunch. There can't be many breweries with a Dutch-style Oud Bruin, Dubbelbock, IPA and Saison in their range.

One thing that really struck me is the vagueness of the Pils OG's. Most are quite precise. Odd that. Really shocked that more are top- than bottom-fermented.

I would expand more on Brand's beers. But we need to saw the top off the neighbours' conifers. Be quite a surprise for them when they come back from their long weekend.

First bin liners.




* A punch made of woodruff-infused white wine and sparkling wine.

Dutch Dubbelbock 2015

The last in my series spun from this year’s Bokbierfestival programme. It’s a much shorter set than the others, with only 11 examples. Ten really, as one is just the 2014 of the same beer, Duits & Lauret Rook Dubbelbock.

Mommeriete and Zeeburg are the only to that were bottom-fermented. Which struck me as odd. Surely Brand can't be top-fermented, s the programme claims?

I have to start off with the term Dubbelbock itself. It’s a mix of Dutch and German. Proper Dutch would be Dubbelbok, proper German Doppelbock. You’ll note that none of the beers below uses either. I can only think of one explanation. Everyone is copying the name of Brand Dubbelbgock, the first beer of this type brewed in Holland.

According to the German definition, a Doppelbock should have a minimum OG of 18º Plato. Something all the beers in the table managed, except for Duits & Lauret and Bijdehand. With a gravity of 26º Plato, Emelisse have some justification for tacking on an Imperial to their beer’s name. It has the highest OG and highest ABV of any of the beers at this year’s festival.

A quick comparison with my other two categories is illuminating. Unsurprisingly the average OG of the Dubbelbocks is easily the highest. More surprisingly, it’s FG is only slightly higher, giving it this group the highest degree of attenuation. Not what I would have guessed at all.

That Dubbelbock is both darker and more bitter on average makes lots of sense. Though there is considerable variation amongst the individual beers for both. Which means I’m not sure you can read too much into the averages.

Time for the tables.

type	OG Plato	FG Plato	ABV	App. Atten-uation	Colour (EBC)	bitterness (EBU)
top-fermenters	17.17	3.90	7.18	78.64%	67.6	30.7
bottom-fermenters	16.83	4.20	6.86	76.37%	54.2	30.4
Dubbelbock	19.2	4.30	8.33	79.31%	71.8	35.5

2015 Dutch Duppelbock
Year	Brewer	Beer	OG Plato	FG Plato	ABV	App. Atten-uation	Colour (EBC)	bitterness (EBU)
2015	Pelgrim	Pelgrim Dubbelbock	19.3	2.94	9.00	85.71%	95	30
2015	De Lepelaer (H)	Beemster Dubbelbock	18	3.35	8.00	82.44%	40	75
2015	Bijdehand (H)	Provenier Dubbelbock	17.8	3.50	7.80	81.40%	80	25
2014	Duits & Lauret	Rook Dubbelbock 2014	18.0	4.08	7.60	78.52%	70	27
2015	Brand	Brand Dubbelbock	18.0	4.27	7.50	77.50%	65	27
2015	Emelisse	Emelisse Imperial Dobbel-bock	26.0	6.78	11.00	75.77%	45	45
2015	Duits & Lauret	Rook Dubbelbock	17.5				60	28
2015	Molenduyn (H)	Dubbelbock					85	36
2015	Reuzenbieren (H)	ReuZ Dubbelbock					100	35
2015	Mommeriete	Gramsbarger Dubbelbock	18	4.27	7.50	77.50%	65	38
2015	Zeeburg (H)	Zeeburg Dubbelbock	20	5.17	8.20	75.62%	85	25
	Average		19.2	4.30	8.33	79.31%	71.8	35.5
Source:
Bokbierfestival programme 2015, pages 24 - 28.

Maybe I’ll be arsed to do the foreign Bocks.

Dutch Lager Styles 1870 - 1960 (part two)

Early Lager styles
It’s easy to assume, looking back from the present, that Pilsener was an immediate success. It wasn’t, because, initially at least, it wasn’t the type of Lager brewed.  In the 1860’s, few Pale Lagers were brewed outside Bohemia.

The styles of Lager first brewed outside Germany were inspired by the two pioneers who revolutionised central European brewing: Dreher of Schwechat just outside Vienna and Sedlmayr of Spaten in Munich. The two undertook a long study trip in the 1830’s, mostly to Britain, at the time at the forefront of brewing technology. What they learned allowed them to modernise their breweries and, in the case of Dreher, become the largest brewery on the continent.

Their friendship also brought bottom-fermentation to Vienna. Sedlmayr provided Dreher with yeast after his attempts to brew an English-style Pale Ale in Schewchat had failed. His amber Lager was a huge hit all across Europe, even in the UK. In the 1860’s Dreher’s Lagerbier was being shipped all over the continent and rivalled Bass and Allsopp for international fame.

Which is how Heineken noticed it.  In 1869 there was an international exhibition held in the Paleis for Volksvlijt, not far from Heineken’s new brewery on the Stadhouders kade. Heineken sold beer at the exhibition, but the public were far more interested in what Dreher was selling*. Heineken took note.


Central European Lager styles
Now for a little context. Central Europe was home to many styles if Lager in the second half of the 19th century, some of which no longer exist.

In Bavaria, the styles were, in ascending order of strength:

Winterbier or Schenkbier
Sommerbier or Lagerbier
Export
Märzen
Bock
Doppelbock or Salvator

All of these beers were dark in colour.

Munich beers in 1866
Here are a few analyses of Munich beers in 1866:

Munich Beers in 1866
Brewer	Beer	Style	FG	OG	ABV	App. Atten-uation
Hofbräuhaus	Bock	Bock	1024.7	1073.7	6.36	66.49%
Salvatorbräu	Salvator	Bock	1033.3	1076.9	5.61	56.67%
Spatenbräu	Bock	Bock	1026.8	1077.2	6.54	65.28%
Hofbräuhaus	Sommerbier	Sommerbier	1014.1	1051.5	4.85	72.62%
Löwenbräu	Winterbier	Winterbier	1017	1046.1	3.75	63.08%
Source:
"Handbuch der chemischen technologie" by Otto Dammer, Rudolf Kaiser, 1896, pages 696-697

Note the generally poor level of attenuation.

Austrian Lager styles
Austrian Lagers came in similar strength bands to those in Bavaria: Winterbier, Sommerbier ,
Export, Märzen and Bock. Though the colours were quite different to in Bavaria. In Bohemia the majority of Lager were pale in colour, while in Vienna amber was the preferred colour. Though increasingly in Vienna and Austria paler types of Lager became popular towards the end of the century.

Dreher beers in the 1870's
Year	Brewer	Beer	Style	Acidity	FG	OG	Colour	ABV	App. Atten-uation
1870	Schwechat	Pilsener	Pilsener	0.17	1016.7	1051.3	6	4.48	66.33%
1870	Schwechat	??	Lager		1017.4	1055	10.5	4.87	68.36%
1870	Schwechat	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	0.13	1017.6	1053.5	6.3	4.65	65.96%
1870	Schwechat	Märzen	Märzen	0.14	1016.9	1054.7	7.1	4.9	67.95%
1870	Schwechat	Export	Export	0.13	1017.4	1052.6	6	4.56	65.80%
1870	Schwechat	Lagerbier	Lager		1017.6	1052.6		4.53	66.54%
1876	Schwechat	Export	Export	0.13	1018.7	1052.7		4.4	63.22%
1876	Schwechat	Bock	Bock		1016.6	1068.7		7.23	74.70%
Sources:
"Theory and Practice of the Preparation of Malt and the Fabrication of Beer" Julius E. Thausing, Anton Schwartz and A.H. Bauer, Philadelphia 1882, pages 748-751
Wahl & Henius, pages 823-830

* "Korte Geschiedenis der Heineken's Bierbrouwerij Maatschappij N.V. 1873 - 1948", by H. A. Korthals, 1948, page 29.

German brewing in 1966

I've been poking around the Journal of the Institute of Brewing and I've found more stuff about post-war German brewing. They fit in nicely with my current Lager kick.

There are articles from the 1960's and the 1970's. I'll be starting with the former purely for reasons to chronology. The article we'll start looking at today was written by Professor Dr. L. Narziss of Weihenstephan. I'd like to hope he knows what he's talking about when it comes to German brewing.

First something about German drinking habits.

"During the last 15 years the change in drinking habits has had the effect of transferring much of the beer consumption from the public house to the home, and at the same time causing a change from cask beer to bottled beer. Beer outlets now include sales from off-licence and supermarket, direct delivery from the brewery to the home and sales in the factory canteen. All this has resulted in a considerable increase in the possible time interval between the beer leaving the brewery and being drunk by the consumer. It is none the less taken for granted that the beer will survive this increased distribution interval even though it may repeatedly move from cold to warm rooms and finally may spend several weeks behind the bar. It is expected by the public that the beer will remain bright and without deposit and at the same time retain its character and freshness. Despite the restrictions of the German beer law, which is based mainly on the Bavarian Purity Law dating from the year 1516, the brewer has the task of providing a beer with good biological stability and an extended flavour stability."
Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 72, Issue 1, January-February 1966, page 13.

The move from pub to domestic consumption is ongoing in Britain, while in Germany it happened several decades earlier. The point he makes about the supply chain being longer for take home beer is one I'd never consider, but it makes a lot of sense. In turn this means that brewers need to make their beers more stable to cope with rougher handling. Does he mean pasteurisation? Which, of course, is perfectly fine according to the Reinheitsgebot.

Now here's something about the types of beer brewed in Germany:

"Types of Beer Brewed

Although light, bottom-fermentation beers with original gravities of 11-5 to 14% (46-57°) form the basis of most requirements, flavour preferences in the various areas may be quite different. In Bavaria the light, full-bodied, mild lager beer of 11.5 to 12% original gravity (46-48°) is mainly preferred whilst the famous dark beer, once in great demand, continues to be pushed more and more into the background. The dark, strong beers of 18-20% (74-84°) are generally welcome only at certain times of the year. The other two types are basically the Pilsener (up to 12.5% O.G. with 240-400 g. of hops per hl.) and the pale strong export beer (up to 14% O.G. with 180-270 g. of hops per hl.). At the same time, there are many variations between the two types and it is quite possible that a beer known as Pilsener in the Wurttemberg area may be less bitter than an export beer in the Rhine Ruhr area.
Journal of the Institute of Brewing, Volume 72, Issue 1, January-February 1966, page 13.

I love the way he calls Helles "mild lager beer". I've always thought of it as the Lager version of Light Mild myself. Nice to know such an eminent brewing scientist agrees with me. You'll remember from my earlier writings that Dunkles was Munich's favourite beer until WW II, after which it was replaced by Helles, which remains the most popular style.

Bock remains mostly a seasonal style, usually sold in the colder months. Or, in the case of Maibock, in spring. Though he only seems to be talking of Doppelbock. Standard Bock would have an OG between 16.5º and 17.5º Plato.

How handy that he's given hopping rates. Because we can compare them with ones from the late 19th century:

19th-century hopping rates
Beer	OG Plato	gm hops per hl
Bohemian Lagerbier	12.5°	420 - 500
Bohemian Export	13.5°	450 - 550
Munich Summer Bier	12.5-14.5°	200 - 300
Source:
American Handy Book of Brewing , Malting and Auxiliary Trades byWahl & Henius, Chicago 1902, pages 780-792.

It's clear that hopping rates had declined, though the styles and regions aren't an exact match.

Next time it will the turn of top-fermenting styles.

Lagerbiers from around Dresden 1878 - 1880

More from the wonderful tables of "Chemie der menschlichen Nahrungs- und Genussmittel" from 1903. It's undoubtedly the best single source of 19th-century beer analyses I've found.

This is an interesting set, having been collected in one area over just a couple of years. I recognise some of the names: Waldschlösschen,  Feldschlösschen and Radeberg. Though, given the range of gravities, I don't believe these are all really a single type of beer.

Unfortunately, only in a couple of cases is there any mention of the colour. I wouldn't like to guess what the colour of the others was. If it was 20 or 30 years later, I'd assume most were pretty pale. But the 1870's is a bit early for Pale Lager. That was still mostly a product of Bohemia and Austria, with the Viennese or Munich styles most popular elsewhere in Europe. There are two examples whose colour I'm prepared to guess: the bömisch is pale and the Bavaria dark. The rest are anybody's guess.

The most identifiable type is bömisch. The two examples are some of the weakest and it looks like bömisch is the equivalent of Výčepní Pivo. The gravities are very low for German bottom-fermenting beers. The weakest Helles seems to fit in with the bömisch stylistically. All three have relatively high degrees of attenuation.

While I'm on the topic of attenuation, you'll note that it's a good bit higher than in the Winterbier and Sommerbier from Nürnberg we looked at. Sommerbier averaged 71.17% and Winterbier 69.30%, as opposed to 74.37% here. That could be connected with their generally higher gravity: Sommerbier averaged 1058 and Winterbier 1053.6.

Of course, modern Lager have much higher degrees of attenuation, more like 85%. Which explains why, though the gravities are higher than today, the ABV, at 5%, is very similar to today's equivalent beers.

The next identifiable group is Dunkles, though they both come from the same brewery, Waldschlösschen. They're both around what I would call Export strength of around 15º Plato. While we're talking about strength, Waldschlösschen has the largest range of gravities, supplying both the highest and lowest. The strongest, Bavaria, is up in Bock territory and approaching Doppelbock land.

Lagerbiers from around Dresden 1878 - 1880
Date	Year	Brewer	Beer	Style	FG	OG	ABV	App. Atten-uation
	1878	Waldschlösschen	Lagerbier bömisch	Lagerbier	1008	1037.9	3.89	78.89%
Aug	1879	Nöthnitz	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1010	1042.4	4.19	76.42%
Nov	1879	Nöthnitz	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1009.9	1042.5	4.23	76.68%
	1878	Radeberg	Lagerbier bömisch	Lagerbier	1008	1044.0	4.69	81.82%
	1878	Waldschlösschen	Lagerbier Hell	Helles	1010	1044.7	4.51	77.63%
	1878	Hofbrauhaus (Dresden)	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1011	1045.5	4.49	75.82%
	1878	Reisewitz	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1014	1048.6	4.49	71.19%
	1878	Medingen	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1012	1049.8	4.91	75.90%
Dec	1879	Felsenkeller	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1013.4	1050.4	4.80	73.41%
	1878	Felsenkeller	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1014	1050.5	4.74	72.28%
	1878	Plauenscher Lagerkeller	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1012	1050.5	5.00	76.24%
Jan	1879	Meissener Felsenkeller	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1012	1050.5	5.00	76.24%
Jul	1879	Feldschlösschen	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1013	1050.5	4.88	74.26%
	1878	Radeberg	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1012	1050.8	5.05	76.38%
Sep	1879	Bayerisches Brauhaus	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1011	1050.9	5.20	78.39%
	1878	Bayerisches Brauhaus	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1015	1051.2	4.69	70.67%
Feb	1880	Plauenscher Lagerkeller	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1014.1	1052.6	5.00	73.19%
	1878	Gambrinus	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1012	1053.0	5.34	77.36%
Nov	1879	Gambrinus	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1013.6	1053.3	5.16	74.48%
	1878	Felsenkeller	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1016	1053.6	4.88	70.15%
Feb	1880	Elsterwerda	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1018.2	1053.9	4.63	66.23%
Feb	1880	Reisewitz	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1016	1054.2	4.95	70.48%
	1878	Feldschlösschen	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1013	1054.4	5.39	76.10%
	1878	Hofbrauhaus (Dresden)	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1019	1054.8	4.63	65.30%
Jan	1879	Hofbrauhaus (Dresden)	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1019.5	1054.8	4.56	64.42%
Jul	1879	Hofbrauhaus (Dresden)	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1014.2	1055.5	5.36	74.39%
Feb	1879	Waldschlösschen	Lagerbier Hell	Helles	1012.3	1056.2	5.71	78.09%
	1878	Waldschlösschen	Lagerbier Dunkel	Dunkles	1013	1057.6	5.81	77.43%
Feb	1880	Waldschlösschen	Lagerbier Dunkel	Dunkles	1015.2	1061.1	5.98	75.12%
	1878	Hofbrauhaus (Dresden)	Lagerbier	Lagerbier	1019	1063.0	5.71	69.84%
	1878	Waldschlösschen	Lagerbier Bavaria	Lagerbier	1014	1072.1	7.61	80.58%
Average					1013.4	1052.0	5.01	74.37%
Source:
Chemie der menschlichen Nahrungs- und Genussmittel by Joseph König, 1903, pages 1102 - 1156

There are some examples which are clearly versions of the same beer. For example, the Felsenkeller at 1050, Gambrinus at 1053, Hofbrauhaus at 1055 and Nöthnitz at 1042. And you can see some breweries had a range of beers at different gravities: Hofbrauhaus at 1045, 1055 and 1063; Feldschlösschen at 1050 and 1054; Felsenkeller also at 1050 and 1054.

One odd thing. If I remove the extremes at either end - all the beers with gravities below 1048 and above 1058 - the averages for the remaining beers come to almost exactly the same as for the whole group.

There's loads more Lager fun in "Chemie der menschlichen Nahrungs- und Genussmittel". Just a lot of work extracting it all. Expect more dribbles regularly.

pticheval (gris)

My pticheval was grey. And marroon, too. And it did get me to Paris. Where I now sit, sad hotel desk before me.

A bottle of Andechs Doppelbock smiles at me from the left of my keyboard. "Stop being such a tart, Andechs." She doesn't answer. Unsurprisingly. Few bottles of beer possess lips, much less the power of speech.

We'll be becoming much more intinately involved shortly. If I can get her to pop her top. These German birds.


C'est l'heure de dire bonsoir. Priez pour moi. Demain, il me faut faire quelquechose difficile. En utilisant mon pauvre Francais. Je suis perdu.