Random Dutch beers (part twelve)

After some of the stinkers I've had recently, I'm playing it safe today.

Which is why I'm kicking off with a beer from Jopen. Should be no danger here.

Jopen Gerstebier 4.5% ABV, €1.75 for 33 cl.
Very pale yellow colour, with a washing-up style head. Bit cloudy, but that's my fault for not pouring it carefully enough. Minty and peppery hop aroma.  Malt, wort and more peppery jop in the gob. Interesting. It's based on an old Dutch top-fermenting style. Strangely lemony, with more peppery hop at the end. Not sure I'd drink it regularly, but tasty enough and slightly different.

A riskier one next. The last beer I had from De Vrienschap wan't great. Though, to be fair, I'd drunk their beer several times and that was the first duff one.

De Vriendschap Puike Pale Ale 6%
Mucky copper colour. I did try quite hard to pour it clear, but didn't quite manage it. An American hop thing going on in the aroms, plus a bit of something I think might be malt. Tastes old - has the raisiny mustiness of oxidation. Though according to the sell by date - June 2016 - it can't have been brewed that long ago. Ends with some marmaladey jaminess and a fair amount of bitterness. Slightly odd, but drinkable.

Phew! I escaped alive.

Loads more to come. Especially during Krimble. A sign of the times is the number of special beer for Christmas in our local Deen supermarket. They've around 20 beers from small breweries from Noord Holland. I'll be ploughing my way through them during the holidays.

Jopen Dark Gerste No.1 launch

I seem to be announcing a lot of events recently.  For once, this one is within a tramride of my home.

On Tuesday12th May at 18:00 in In de Wildeman it's the launch of a collaboration beer between Jopen and me, Dark Gerste No. 1. It's a cheap and cheerful Dark Lager from 1911, originally brewed in Rotterdam by a rather large Dutch firm.

I'll be saying a few words about the beer. Hopefully not too many, as that would cut into my drinking time.

As usual, I'll be trying to shift copies of my wonderful book:







The Home Brewer's Guide to Vintage Beer
http://www.amazon.com/Home-Brewers-Guide-Vintage-Beer/dp/1592538827






In De Wildeman
Kolksteeg 3,
1012 PT Amsterdam
Tel: 020 638 2348
http://www.indewildeman.nl

Grätzer - it's official

Grätzer is now officially a style. At least according to the Brewers' Association.

Unfortunately, they seem to have let Charlie Papazian write the specs:

Grätzer
Grätzer is a Polish-Germanic pre-Reinheitsgebot style of golden to copper colored ale. The distinctive character comes from at least 50% oak wood smoked wheat malt with a percentage of barley malt optional. The overall balance is a balanced and sessionably low to medium assertively oak-smoky malt emphasized beer. It has a low to medium low hop bitterness; none or very low European noble hop flavor and aroma. A Kölsch-like ale fermentation and aging process lends a low degree of crisp and ester fruitiness Low to medium low body. Neither diacetyl nor sweet corn-like DMS (dimethylsulfide) should be perceived.
Original Gravity (ºPlato) 1.048-1.056 (12-14 ºPlato)
Apparent Extract/Final Gravity (ºPlato) 1.008-1.016 (2-4 ºPlato)
Alcohol by Weight (Volume) 3.2-4.3% (4 -5.4%)
Bitterness (IBU) 15-25
Color SRM (EBC) 6-12 (12-24 EBC)

Let's go through what they've got wrong. Or maybe I should do it the other way around and say what they've got right. Unfortunately that's impossible, because none of it is correct.

So here's what's wrong:

Gravity. The classic Grätzer gravity is 7.8º Plato. Not 12º to fucking 14º. Who researched that? Oh, silly me. I assumed they'd have done some research.

Ingredients. It should be 100% smoked wheat malt.

Flavour. Low to medium hop bitterness? Every old description mention the hop character of Grätzer. It was nmoted for being a hoppy beer. "low to medium assertively oak-smoky malt emphasized beer". What the fuck does that even mean?

Fermentation. "A Kölsch-like ale fermentation and aging process"? They've just made that up. Absolutely no evidence that's how Grätzer was brewed. And what about the specific Grätzer yeast strain? No mention of that anywhere in these guidelines.

What does "pre-Reinheitsgebot" mean? The Reinheitsgebot only very briefly applied to the region where Grätzer was brewed: 1906 to about 1916 and maybe a few years during WW II. The style doesn't date from before the Reinheitsgebot of 1516. So what on earth does "pre-Reinheitsgebot" mean?

It would have been nice if they'd bothered to mention the Polish name for the style.

Based on this, the Grätzer/Grodziskie I helped brew at Jopen, which we went to great trouble to get as authentic as possible, isn't true to style.

Why do I get so annoyed? Because plenty of people will take this as the "official" definition of Grätzer. I'll waste days of my time arguing about what Grätzer is really like with those who take the excrement of the Brewers' Association as the gospel on beer styles.

I wish they's just carried on ignoring the style. It would have made my life much easier.

Grätzer lives!

Finally. I finally got to try Grätzer. A proper one brewed from the right malt, hops and yeast. I wasn't disappointed.

Last night was the launch of the Grätzer and Grodziskie I've been involved with. It all hapeened remarkably quickly, this project that's so dear to me. It's just a few months ago that the idea of brewing an historic beer together popped up at a chance meeting in Bierkoning between me, Michiel (of Jopen) and Sebastian (of Freigeist and Monarchy of Musselland). And now here they are. Real living, frothing beers.

I couldn't be more happy with them. The Grätzer combines smoke and hop in just the way the old texts describe. Light and refreshing, but full-flavoured, too. A knockout session beer that you can drink and drink and drink. You'd never think it was just 3.3% ABV from the taste. The Grodziskie is ismilar, but the willow bark somehow cancels out part of the smoke, making it seem hoppier. But another great slurper.

 The launch in Wildeman yesterday was a lot of fun. Especially the drinking bit. Lots of familiar faces showed up. I even got a round of applause for my talk, all 6 minutes of it. Yes, just 6 minutes. That's uncustomarily brief for me. (Anything under an hour is brief. I'm very hard to stop, once I get going.)

You'll have to be quick if you want to try them. There wasn't a great deal brewed and all of it has already been sold to shops and distributors. Wildeman currently has both on tap, but I've no idea how long they will last.






Disclosure time. Obviously, as I was involved in the making of this beer, I have an interest in it. I had a few free beers at the launch; one free beer and a hamburger at Jopen when it was brewed.