German craft beer

Thanks for the thoughts, Herr B. Do you suppose this is true only of pilsner malt or of other malt as well? I know the beer styles aren't necessarily comparable, since US brewers (outside of macro) have generally been more ale-focused (which I glean uses a different malt than most German brews), but perhaps you could compare wheat maltings used in Germany versus those used here? (Or any other comparisons you might care to make)

 

I'm not sure if this is directed at me or not, but if so I'll say for the record that my favorite Oktoberfest and my favorite Münchner Hell are made by InBev:


...so no boogeyman here, just saying that the whole "broken rice" thing is a little more than just Urban Legend.

 

Dunno about wheat; have never brewed with it. The quality of other malts would of course depend on the base grain (which would be the same) and the malting process (which may be slightly different). I, personally, much prefer German (and specifically Weyermann) malts for all of my German lagers. I think UK malts (like Maris Otter) work best for UK styles; Czech malts (floor-malted pilsner, etc.) for Czech styles; and U.S. 2-row for many typically U.S. styles.

EDIT: maybe we need a "Judgement of Paris" for beer; I'd volunteer...

 

Maybe it was meant for me since I mentioned the decline in quality in Bud. Dunno. But that's my favorite Oktoberfest, too.

 

Simple solution: Drink beer blindly.

In my opinion, nobody can truly evaluate a beer when they know what bottle it came out of. Set up a blind taste test of 5-10 helles/American lagers, and let your senses do the talking.

On Augustiner…. they make a beer that is based around a light sulfur note. In the winter I find it quite a nice way to round out the flavor profile. It’s unique and very enjoyable. In the summer, however, they lack lager capacity and the beer is a bit too farty and green for my tastes. Tegernseer has the same seasonal capacity problem, and it’s obvious. Budweiser does not have a capacity problem (other than they have too much capacity).

I hope that someday we can get to the point where when we want to really nerd out on evaluating beers, we drink beer blindly and then discuss our findings with each other.

I love Spaten because it always finishes at or near the top of my blind taste tests. It is uncool to love anything except Augustiner in Munich. There’s nothing I enjoy more than giving a lifelong Munich resident the results of a blind tasting where they put their beloved Augustiner at or near the bottom of their ranking. Rise above the bullshit. Let the beer speak for itself.

 

I pretty much live on homebrew, Sierra Nevada, and Spaten products these days (even though the lager has again disappeared from my supermarket's shelves). My buddy and I recently did a two-man (not totally) blind taste test that included Spaten Lager. I recognized it, and it finished at the top of my "rankings" too.

 

If you want to learn more about malt I would recommend that you buy the book: Malt: A Practical Guide from Field to Brewhouse by John Mallet. John Mallet works at Bell's Brewing (Production Manager I think) and he really knows his malt!! I attended a presentation he gave on malt at the 2013 NHC and had a nice conversation with him afterwards.

Cheers!

 

@MattRiggs posted: “On Augustiner…. they make a beer that is based around a light sulfur note. In the winter I find it quite a nice way to round out the flavor profile. It’s unique and very enjoyable. In the summer, however, they lack lager capacity and the beer is a bit too farty and green for my tastes.”

@pthread1981 , I wonder if you had bottles of Augustiner Helles from summer batches?

Cheers!

 

My only slight quibble with this is that certain beers like Augustiner, in my opinion, get better as they go, and certain beers get worse. I'd daresay that 4 oz. of Dinkel Acker's CD Pils might do OK in a blind tasting, but all of us who have recently had an entire can would never have much good to say about it. Oettinger is similar. I like the idea of blind side-by-sides, though, as I recently did with Nooner and Hardywood Pilsner. Or drink one (or two) Oettinger a day for a week and then one (or two) Augustiner's per day the following week and then choose your preference.

 

This is an excellent point. We once did a blind test with (among others) Schlenkerla Bock and SA Cinderbock. At first sip, the Cinderbock really shined...and that lasted into about the middle of the (6 oz) sample. However, after drinking 12 oz of each, the Schlenkerla completely took over, and the Cinderbock became extremely cloying. IMO, "taste tests" are inherently flawed in this way, precisely because they focus not on drinking but on "tasting." Two completely different activities.

 

They're also different types of grain as the base malts - American grain is six row which has a higher amount of protein in it and leads to the more "grainy" flavor that was referred to previously.

 

6-row is becoming less and less prevalent as time progresses. The majority of the barley now grown in North America is 2-row. Once the malting companies receives the 2-row barley they can kiln it any way they like. A 'popular' malt is 2-row Pale Malt; this type of malt is frequently used to brew APAs, IPAs, etc. I have read that AB uses a combination of 2-row and 6-row malt along with rice to brew Budweiser.

Cheers!

 

Yeah I've heard the same - that Bud is mix of 2 and 6 row.

 

How about another topic we haven't beaten to death

- Overpriced beer in Germany bc it is "craft" see 9€ bock and märzen from Pax or the most grievous offender 14€ 33cl of ba stout from Brau Kunst Keller

- Germans cannot make a good IPA and just dry hop things to death

- Germans think anything not a Helles, Pilsner, Weizen or Bock is poison

- RHG ensures quality



OR...
something else
Who is going to Festival der Bierkulturen the last weekend in May in Cologne? Anyone make it to Latzenbier today?

 

Maybe we could call this forum "Menschen bei Maischen-berger"

 

Perhaps we can start a Thunderdome: Germany thread so that when two members have a problem with each other they can take it to the Thunderdome. Or maybe the Hippodrom would be better?

 

What if it's only one person that has a problem? Does he have to watch everyone else drink beer as his punishment?

 

No, we send him to Stahlsturm, who will taunt him for a second (and third...) time....

Prosit!!

 

How about this for a topic: how has New Belgium not yet protested Kehrwieder's extremely similar labeling?

 

But Stahlsturm will insist that you drink multiple Maß of non-Munich beers with him. Maybe by the 3rd or 4th Maß you will no longer hear his taunts!?!

Cheers!