Most “Historical-Tasting” AAL?

It's just a article about a legal case (below, top left) - one of many court cases of the era in which a tavern owner was charged with selling "lager beer" and/or "intoxicating" beverages on Sunday in violation of the law. (Similar cases were brought against bars that claimed they were selling "weiss beer" not lager beer).

 

Found a couple of other interesting bits and pieces which I might as well add to this thread. In the Minnesota Staats Zeitung from April 18th 1868 there's a short article on a "beer war" in St Louis between the tavern/saloon keepers and the brewers.

Jungbier is young beer, sommerbier summer beer. I.e schenk and lager beer. No sign of common beer, or even lager beer. Again we see the difference in terminology used depending on the writer's mother's tongue, and the intended audience. The mention of jungbier and St Louis made me think of an article I read dealing with the Bavarian brewery which contained this advertisement from October 1st 1857:


"Excellent young beer in stock for sale." If it was fermented for 10 days or so and aged for 2-3-4 weeks it might have been brewed late August/early September I would imagine. Michaeli (29th of September) was the start of the brewing season in Bavaria with the winter beer/schenk beer being ready sometime late October in time to replace the depleted summer beer/lager beer stocks, unless an exception was granted by the authorities if the beer was at risk of running out.

I also came across an interesting note concerning the price of beer in the US vs Bavaria in a short article from July 4th, 1867 in Der Westbote from Ohio where it mentions an increase in the price of a Maß of beer in Bavaria and compares it against American prices:

The Bavarian Maß was at that time 1.069 liters, or 36.14 US oz. That would mean that the typical serving in the US was around 20 cl, or 6.76 oz. I recall here the mention of serving size by Belgian Professor Jules Vuylsteke after his visit to the US in the early 1890s:

200ccm is the same as 20cl, or 6.76 oz, though he notes it is "barely more than that".

Schwackhöfer also in the early 1890s notes that

Of course the average American worker would have been better paid than the average European worker at the time, so the question of who could afford the most beer is still an open question. But I think the smaller serving size, and mention of "glass" (gläser) is worth noting here for an 1867 reference.

I think if you went into an American lager beer saloon by the mid 1800s-1870s in early spring and threw a nickel on the bar chances are you would have been served a circa 6.76 oz or so glass of schenk beer (and would perhaps have gotten a cent or two back in change if they priced the schenkbier slightly lower). If you went into the same saloon in June or July and tossed a nickel on the bar you would likely have been served a circa 6.76 oz or so glass of lager beer instead. It's interesting to note that the brewer could sell a barrel of schenk for 9 dollars, and a barrel of lager for 10 dollars to the saloon keeper. The saloon keeper then gets to sell maybe 585 glasses of beer at 5 cents each, which comes out to 146 dollars and 25 cents per barrel. No wonder the breweries eventually wanted to own saloons themselves and were prepared to build lavish beer gardens and hotels.

 

On the topic of beer glasses, and for some visual aid I came across an advertisement for beer glasses imported from Germany for sale from January 15th, 1858 in the Baltimore Wecker, imported by Jacob Seeger who was also a brewery owner:

Below is a circa 1871 liquor advertisement I came across which was pretty neat I thought, showing a glass mug of lager beer to the right:

 

I think the range for the past half- century in the Chicagoland area is narrow and many could be included . Schlitz, Blatz, Hamm's & Falstaff are one group. Olympia , Stroh's, & Old Style are another. These beers taste similar and were available in bottles .

I was in a blind beer tasting a couple of decades ago. The host had each attendee bring two different 6 packs . He filled plastic cups with a few ounces of beer . We would rate the beer and try to guess which brand . Blatz was the number three beer . Stroh's was easy to brand by it's unique taste. Can't remember the winner, but the Blatz remark stuck with me. Harry Carey was a fan of Falstaff beer. The tasting lineup caused a bad headache & hangover,

 

I came across a reference to American lager beer from the 1870s which fits with the previous discussion (monologue?) on lager vs schenk so I thought I'd share it here. First a quick recap of the situation in 1870s America courtesy of One Hundred Years of Brewing:

I came across this reference to A Schwarz from an 1877 book called "Handbuch der Bierbrauerei: mit Berücksichtigung der neuesten Erfindungen" in a chapter dealing with the difference between schenk and lager beer from a German perspective. It appears as a note on page 708:

Here it is worth mentioning the long established practise of kräusening lager beers in America, giving rise to the American three step process of primary fermentation-ruh storage-chip cask kräusen fermentation, which ought to have solved the problem of flat lager beers, giving them greater carbonation and foam. So much so that in 1904, a Swedish brewmaster will write (the article dealing with the newfangled Vacuum fermentation and the associated practise of forced carbonation which no doubt had to mimick the kräusened products):