Pilsner Hate

Well, I'd phrase it as:

"At some points, Koch claimed he modeled SABL on Pilsner Urquell, while at other times he's claimed it is "...brewed using the same recipe and processes that Jim Koch's great-great grandfather used in the mid-1800s". Still other times admitting that Joe Owades tweaked that old family recipe, adding kraeusening, dry-hopping and picking modern malt and hops. He has also listed it as a "Vienna Lager" on the Samuel Adam's website."

 

I thought Boston Lager was modeled after a Munich style lager? Very similar to Red Oak Bavarian Lager imo, it has a prominent malt backbone. It’s not a beer I usually buy unless I’m pinned down at one of the National type wing joints, but it’s certainly a decent enough beer.

 

Or was it based on a recipe created in the "early 1900s"? Then again a 13% plato lager beer, decoction mashed, kräusened (added or not by Owades) and using around a pound of hops per barrel would hardly have been out of place at any time during that time period. But lager beer isn't specific enough these days I guess.


"Hey guys, what kind of lager beer exactly?"

 

Don't see a lot of pith helmets in La Crosse these days.

Note the gentleman at far left, second row from the front; that's no Pilsner.

 

Koch's shifting perspective aside, Michael Jackson also described it as "vaguely Pilsnerish" in his pocket guides way back when.

 

Yeah, there's been so much contradictory and mis-information about Koch and Samuel Adams Boston Lager in the past +30 years that it'll make one's head spin. (I've tried to save all of them but eventually it just gets too difficult to even sort through all my "hardcopy" and computer files...).

Some stems from Koch's natural hucksterism and likely some from non-brewing reporters not understanding what Koch said (he does talk fast and jumps around a lot, plus he always seems to be drinking when interviewed ).

Lots of confusion about the St. Louis "Louis Koch Brewing Co." (which most brewery history sources say existed only for a few decades - 1859 - 1882) and how long the original recipe was brewed, etc.

Altho' my favorite is a 2004 INC story which contained this bit of nonsense:

Now, it is odd how Koch picked the name "Boston Beer Co." rather than "Boston Brewing Co.", the former being the name of what had been "America's Oldest Brewery" up until ~1956 (not the "1970s") when they shutdown, but I assume that this one was a misunderstanding by the writer, but it was the basis of the story comparing the two large independent breweries left in the US.

 

The only pilsners that I hate are the over hopped messes that some of these 'craft' brewers put out that are really pale ales masquerading as "pilsners".

The "real deal" pilsners, though? Love me some of those, whether Bohemian, German or a well made American version

 

You hit the nail on the head there! There is the old expression of "talking out of both sides of your mouth", I am convinced that Jim Koch has more than two sides of this mouth.

Cheers!

 

IMO you deserve the Gold Medal for this post in this thread. You observation of "...it’s so simple and based off of balance" is right on here! The beer geeks do not seek out beers that are predicated on the aspect of "balance" but instead they want beers that are extreme/off-balanced - beers with HUGE tropical flavors or HUGE pastry flavors or HUGE....

I am a BIG fan of Pilsners because I personally appreciate the "balance" of these beers.

Cheers to you!!!!

 

Pilsner is an underrated beer in my opinion, Give me a bohemian ,German ,or Czech and I will be happy, If it is crafted with love and care-

 

Seemed like he just called it whatever fit his agenda at the time.

Almost looks like it was photo shopped in there.

I think it's because he IS hammered all the time. At least the few times that I've met him in person and talked with him.

 

Yeah, forgot about that. Looks like in the 1st Simon & Schuster Ed. (1986) he just said, at the '85 GABF it "...had more Pilsener character than any other beer in America" but he went all out the next edition, even knocking down the Vienna comparison:


(gradually dropping the pilsner mention in later ed's.)

 

I like good pilsners, but most pilsners (especially American ones) are not good.

I have nothing against average pilsners, but if the bar has a good selection of other types of beers, I will never order one.

 

Because both are refreshing, undemanding beers.

After spending your summer day mowing the lawn and doing yard work few beers go down as well as a Miller High Life.

 

After nearly 30 years of working in Photoshop you can pick out tell-tale details of manipulation(s). Don't see any in that pic.

 

Pilsners are one of my favorite styles. Not easy to brew, but an excellent one is a pleasure to drink. When I lived in Germany those were my daily drinkers.

There are many made in the US that I gladly drink. When in Austin Live Oak and ABGB come to mind. Urban Chestnut makes an excellent one too.

 

The word "hate" gets thrown around so much these days. Losing meaning.

A preference is rarely made out of hate for something else.

I like pils.

 

JK, I took note of the aspect of “single decoction”. Is Boston Lager is still brewed using single decoction mashing? Did the former Schaeffer brewery in Breinigsville, PA have the capability to conduct decoction mashing? Or did Boston Beer Company upgrade the brewery so that decoction mashing could be done? Do you have any specific details on the decoction process (e.g., what percentage of the mash/grains are extracted, etc.)?

Cheers!

 

Great points. I don't want to over generalize from my own experience, but another issue might be that I don't think it was unusual for more casual folks to shy away from purchasing imports in the past due to expense and bad experiences with old beer. And if you're ignoring imports there often simply weren't that many pilsners floating around to get into (this clearly varied a bit by region - PA seems to have been ahead of the curve with Prima and Penn and probably others).

I didn't get on the pilsner train until the domestic breweries started making them in force, and then I worked backwards to the imports based on what I learned here on BA. So I was a pretty avid (though not a deep in the weeds BA type) craft drinker for a couple decades before becoming a pilsner lover. For people who've only gotten into beer in the past half decade or so, they might deserve some slack in branching out. With the rise of craft AAL's, pilsners, kellers, etc. it might be that there's going to be a whole cohort who will now grow up with that end of the beer spectrum just being an accepted and enjoyed part of the landscape.

 

David Grinnell, BBC VP, said "We’re set up for decoction mashing now..." in an interview in 2010 about the company's renovations to the ex-Schaefer brewery. And in his Quench Your Own Thirst book, Koch has several pages on converting their original contract-brewery, Pittsburgh Brewing Co., to allow decotion, noting he spent $8,000 on equipment for them, and that the PBC brewing system (w/an extra vessel) was one of the reasons he and Owades chose them.