Let me start by saying "If you like it drink it and if you don't don't"
Just because you don't like a beer doesn't mean its not a good beer, it just means you don't like it, and conversely just because you do doesn't make it a good beer. It's a matter of your personal taste and where would the world be if we all liked the same thing. This little rant isn't about what I like or what you like but what makes a beer a beer good or bad and its all about quality.
First up consistency. Let me begin by saying consistency, repeatedly delivering the same thing is good and many people like to know that the beer they bought last week still tastes the same. But it's not the be all and end all.
For the small brewer, brewing in small batches, manually controlling the brewing process achieving a consistent beer (the same every batch) is HARD, and virtually impossible. They do try, with great effort, if repeatedly brewing the same beer, to get it to taste look and smell and feel the same each time. It will vary, but that's not a bad thing. Variation in the finished product helps them learn what the process gives. It adds a sense of craft to the product, after all how often have you cooked the same recipe for a chilli and it be identical to the last time? Be honest now, it's never perfectly the same, and that's because the ingredients themselves vary, slightly hotter a chilli, slightly less fat in the beef, slightly different natural sweetness in the onions. That's what the small batch producer is contending with to achieve a consistent product, the malt sugars vary, the hop oils and bitterness in them vary, they're all natural products, and so the finished product will vary, in the same way the shape of an artisan sourdough loaf will look different one, to the next. However inconsistency for the small brewer has limits of acceptability. You can't produce a beer with 35 International Bitterness Units (IBU) in one batch and 45 IBU in the next, you'd notice that difference from a mile away, this would be a bad beer.
For the Large producer, they can have more control over these varying elements, simply because they have huge amounts of analysis they can throw into the process, they can assess the sugar in the grain so that the same amount of sugar per litre appears in the liquid they ferment, The same amount of Alpha acids are introduced from the hops, and the water is chemically analysed and have precisely the same parts per million of calcium in the brewing water and so on... This leads to a perfectly consistent batch of beer every time. This is good because we know exactly what to expect when we by one of the big boys finest lager.
However, the argument presents itself about character, this in depth analysis and perfect consistency could be argued to be a lack of character. I say this isn't true. It has the character that the brewer wants, and just because you think the product is boring, doesn't make it bad, it's just consistent.
Perfect consistency alone doesn't make for a good beer though. There are some poor beers out there, consistent though they may be, are truly simply awful. They shall remain nameless, and are for you to decide on. They are lack flavour, or mouth feel, or are alcohol for the sake of it, or have artificial additives and do no one any favours. These are BAD BEERS.
What I'm not saying is Four legs (or wings) good two legs bad. Big can be beautiful and small can be horrible. Some big producers produce some great beers and some small producers terrible ones. A beer that consistently few like is not good for anyone, and there have been small breweries that produce a range of beers that frankly stank, both literally and metaphorically. For small producers that do this they disappear, Big boys have however have rafts of brands that sell and they can just withdraw quietly the ones that don't.
Ingredients maketh the beer! Good quality ingredients are the key to any good quality food, no less so in beer. Cheap ingredients means cheap beer, great for profit, bad for the consumer, enough said. For many a consumer it often difficult to tell the difference. But that's about educating a pallet and not about the beer itself.
The brewers own taste, in small breweries this makes the difference, a brewer will brew what they think tastes good, and if his customers generally agree (even if its a relatively small market sector) happy days, and the beer will generally be good.
In larger and very large concerns, the marketing and accountants have more of a say. A really expensive beer to produce may not get to market, simply because of that and the accountants don't like the slim margins, or it wont fit a marketing profile. A less costly beer may well be great, but still not meet with the marketing teams direction for the company. Having got there through the long and tortuous process and a beer emerges it may well be a quality product well produced and be a good beer.
But NO ONE gets it right all the time.
The last point on the production side is this. If someone really cares about what they do, every time they do it, it's more likely to be a good beer! Care (love if you will) for the product shows. If the producer is only interested in the profit they can make it will almost certainly result in corner cutting and cost cutting. The result is a bad beer.
So the brewer has produced a high quality product, a beer that tastes great, and people like when they try it out on a few punters. Then comes the venue serving the beer. This is a bit unfair to say a beer is bad because a pub landlord doesn't give a damn about his cleanliness, or cant nurse a cask ale to the proper condition. Nevertheless at the end of the day it's the customer's experience of a beer; and if it's not looked after, it may well be their last, even for a great beer. For the big guys, this isn't much of a problem, they have lots of venues, and it may not impact the beers overall effect in the market (its very big after all). For a very small producer the reality is somewhat different. They have limited outlets that will take their beers and can't afford to be too picky about who they sell it to, especially if it's via a distributor. A good beer's death nell in an area can be signed by one bad landlord. Bear that in mind, be picky about where you drink, and even if you thought the beer was bad in one location, firstly tell the landlord, and secondly give it another chance somewhere else.
I've gone on too long, there's lots more I could rant about, but I'll save that for another time.
]]>With the output from some brewers you might think the answer is yes, and indeed hops add a whole load of freshness and flavours that you don’t get for other sources. You knew this was coming…. but there’s a great deal of complexity to a beer that comes from the grains used to obtain the fermentable sugar, the brewing process and the yeasts too.
Beers can be just a carrier for the hop tastes, neutral grains, neutral yeasts really do let the hop characters shine through. So even if you want the hops to be the star of the show, you need a stage to put the actors on and a bunch of technicians, props, costumes, and backstage crew to support them, otherwise it’s all a bit of a non-spectacle.
The alcohol itself can bolster flavour. Recently a very large commercial beer dropped it’s alcohol percentage, and many regular drinkers of the brand complained it had lost all its taste, some might argue it didn’t have any in the first place, but it serves to illustrate the part the strong stuff plays in a drinking experience.
The malted grains used in creating the sugar for the yeast to work on alter the beer immensely, no matter what the beer, the flavours from the grain will be there to a greater or lesser extent. The flavours range from honey to biscuity through chocolate and coffee and a whole range of tastes in between.
Many Belgian beers are kind of fruity, with a hint of clove or ripe banana, you wouldn’t want this in a traditional English ale, but it works for the style, and a good number are brewed with very similar hop pallet to many lagers. What makes these complex flavours, other than some subtleties in grain comes in part from the fermenting temperature (quite warm) and from the yeast, Belgian Abbey Yeasts give this wonderfully rich fruity spicy note from the esters it produces during fermentation.
The latest yeast to hit the craft scene, and certainly a favourite of mine, is a Norwegian Farmhouse Yeast called Kveik (pronounced K-Vike). Traditional farmhouse yeasts from the low countries have a real funk, almost musty, taste to the finished beers. Kviek doesn’t but it does produce a little sharpness (not quite sourness) to the beer, it’s delicious and refreshing and has a number of plusses for the brewer. It ferments like a rocket, a normal for day fermentation can be done in as little as two, it tolerates an enormous range of temperatures, meaning you don’t have to control the fermentation process quite as hard, and it can produce some lovely estery (like the Belgian beers) notes, it has a high degree of attenuation (it turns more of the sugar to alcohol) and finally it has a high flocculation (it clumps together) and drops out brighter quicker. You can drink the beers exceedingly fresh and young, or it will mature nicely softening and mellowing as it ages. It doesn’t work for all beer styles but it’s very trendy and worth a try if you’ve not had a beer produced with it. My next experiment at home will be a high alc Belgian style made with this yeast, sort of a Kveik Kwak, should be interesting.
]]>Falco from Squawk in Manchester is a fine example of the style, pours hazy but not like soup, shows signs of the alcohol within leaving some tears on the glass. Pale but not super pale.
Beautifully balanced hops and malt giving this a lovely easy drinking beer which makes it a dangerous 8%'er (i.e. you can neck it wihtout getting the alcohol burn)
For me this is a 4.5 Yum ..... get it while you can otherwise it'll be dissapearing into my cupboard. !
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Don't think this is a sweet pastry stout .... it's a real grown up bitter stout, just as it should be, the richness of the flavours come from the dark chocolate vanilla coconut and tonka bean. Although it's 12% it drikns as if it's much lower in ABV, smooth and creamy from the Lactose but not over sweet.
This is a real adult beverage. For thoes of you that like a strong bitter chocolate, this is one for you. The tonka bean adds a subtle almondy background but doesnt over power. Superbly put together beer.
It's 4Yum from me.
]]>It's a double IPA so at 8.5 % ABV it's pretty potent and you should expect some alcohol sweetmes and tears on the glass, it doesn't dissapiont. An initial grain bitterness gives way smartly to an alcohol sweetness but not too overporweing. Then come in the classic West Coast IPA resinous pine on the pallate followed by a hint of tropical fruit and some Citrus notes. The backgroutd malty caramel supports the hop notes and finishes with a touch of the grain bitterness and a helping of linseed which lingers well.
A well crafted balanced beer typical of the style. (although of significantly better quality than some west coast breweries can manage)
YUMSCORE - 3.5Yums (I'd buy this again)
]]>It's all very simple. If it’s an ingredient in the beer that is designed to alter the flavour, aroma or mouth feel of the finished beer, and it isn't malted barley, water yeast or hops, it's an adjunct.
Other things that brewers add to their beer, such as finings other clearing agents, aren't adjuncts, they are processing aids.
Adjuncts can be grouped in to two broad categories, fermentable and unfermentable. Fermentable adjuncts include other grains, fermentable sugars, and fruit. Unfermentable ones include, spices, herbs, some sugars such as lactose (commonly found in stouts)
Fermentable Adjuncts in addition to directly impacting on the flavour and mouthfeel also affect the alcohol level, whereas unfermentable ones don’t.
A good brewer will use adjuncts to alter the characteristics of their beers to the benefit of the finished product. Lazy brewers will chuck them in because they want something different in flavour but can’t be bothered to re-work their recipe to do it properly and a bad brewer will use something to make the beer cheaper trying to con the drinker they’re getting something they’re not.
Don’t get me wrong adjuncts are good. They help in many modern beer styles and after all where would we be without the mango and lime smoothie sour? (answers on the comments below please and try not to rant too hard)
Good things to do with Adjuncts.
Improve the mouth feel of a beer: - Thin watery beers, no matter how much alcohol and funky flavours can put a drinker off altogether. We like a richer thicker feel to what we drink (although this can go too far). There’s many thigs you can add to a beer at various stages to achieve this. Oats and wheat in the mash are a great example of adjuncts used for this purpose.
Enhance sweetness or reduce the bitterness:- Stout’s are bitter, without a doubt not just from the hops but also from the dark grains, Dark grains can have a harsh tannic bitter or even burnt note that the brewer wants to soften out without loosing the other flavours gained from the grains (coffee, chocolate, liquorice, spice). Lactose sugar (extracted from milk) is a great way to do this. Lactose in it’s own right is low in flavour, and if you try the powder it’s not all that sweet either, but the impact on the overall sweetness (or reduction in bitterness) can be marked. It also has the benefit of increasing the density of the beer and so the mouthfeel. It works for pale hazy beers too where you want to back off the hop bitterness and leave the hop flavours to shine. This is why milkshake pales are called milkshake (they have milk sugar in) if it doesn’t it isn’t a milkshake beer!
Bolster the alcohol content: - When a brewer wants a higher alcohol content (improving mouthfeel and sweetness) but doesn’t want to alter the fundamental flavour of the other grains, adding a neutral tasing grain works, rice is a good example. The addition of rice to some commercial beers, which I shall leave nameless, however is also a way of making them cheaper, rice is a bucket load cheaper than malted barley. But it has it’s place.
Complement or boost a flavour in the beer: Adding mango pulp into a beer can be fab especially if it’s used in conjunction with a hop that delivers a mango like flavour, such as Mosaic. If it’s used subtly is super. Chocolate into a stout complements the natural chocolatiness of the grain.
Add a flavour that you can’t get from the usual beer ingredients: Blackberries in a porter or plums in a stout can be delicious for example. There are many classic fruit beers that are fruit added into a grain base, such as Kreik the Belgian cherry beer. Hazlenut and orange are also often used as adjuncts.
There are bad things to do with adjuncts, but they’re pretty obvious when you taste the finished article. Adding tastes that clash or end up medicinal is not a good thing to do (unless you like beer that tastes like cough linctus).
That’s a brief look at adjuncts, there’s lots more to be said on the subject, but it’s a start.
If you’ve come across anything really unusual (rumours of brewers adding an old pair of socks to the mash I’m sure are apocryphal) pop on a post and enjoy the wild and varied flavours that adjuncts can bring to your beers.
]]>Mass produced versus Small and niche.
Let me get this straight, there’s nothing wrong with mass produced beers if that’s what you like, there are some that I like too. Mass produced beers only work because people either: like them; are used to them and not interested in putting in the effort to find something else; or are simply scared of the unknown. I too succumb to these attitudes and will quite happily go for something I know well on occasion, rather than stress my pallet with something I don’t.
Small and niche isn’t always better. There are some beers that although popular, not necessarily bad drinks but just don’t appeal to my pallet (although sometimes there are horrible monstrosities that sneak through the net). The good thing about the small producers is that they are innovative and small batches allow experimentation with tastes that the big boys simply can’t risk doing without trashing their heavily invested image. Investment in a new beer for a tiny four barrel brewery is relatively small in the scheme of things whereas a big boy brewer producing millions of litres a year, can little afford to get it wrong and have a beer that few want.
Dark Versus Light
There is no argument here, it's not one versus the other, its both in equal mesure. I love the whole gammate of beers, infact I haven't yet found a style I dont like. Subtle session pales to beltingly strong dark imperials I like to try them all and judge each on its own merrit. Quite regularly there's a beer I dont like, it doesn't appeal to me. But that doesen't mean its a bad beer.
So what is a bad beer ?
We're not talking beer thats gone off or brewing faults or other nasties, but beer that is simply overprocessed, that has flavours dampened down or removed, that has no character, a beer that is not about what it's made from or has no care about where its from. There's lots out there, doesn't mean I wont drink them just means I'll try and avoid them.
So that's beer in general. More posts to come including: Beer Tasting, Beer styles, and reviews of beers I try.
]]>Let me tell you why. I Like food and drink and take great pleasure in it and I’ve discovered a desire to write. I’ve thought about writing novels, histories, stories and other stuff and I haven’t simply because I’m too lazy to put in the necessary effort that getting something published, with editors and agents and all that stuff needs to make it work. I’m not here to make money out of this although there will be some promoting of my own businesses (I did say it was unashamed before anyone complains). I also have an ego that needs massaging occasionally to think I’m doing a good job, and a bit of a show-off but also quite shy at times.
Who am I to say what people should be drinking and eating, firstly I’m not (telling you what to eat and drink) if you have a reason for eating and drinking what you do and what you like good for you. This blog is about what I like and why I like it (see I told you I have an ego). But so you know where I’m coming from and with what biases I have, after all everyone has them, a little bit about me. Firstly I’m an inveterate foodie, I’ve loved the tastes and smells of food all my life, it’s a great pleasure to me to eat. I grew up with alcoholic drinks around me, my Grandma made fruit wines and my Grandad was an old school home brewer. I was introduced to the flavours early and by the age of six could distinguish every (and believe me there was a vast array) of English fruit and vegetable wine in the pantry, from parsnip to plum and carrot to rhubarb and every possible thing in between. I home brewed for many years and became an accustomed ale drinker by the time I was 18. I’ve run restaurants, owned and been head brewer at a local brewery, and now own a beer and gin bar here in Andover. So on with the motley (as hardly anybody ever actually says).
Beer’s great, I love it. I’m not a snob about it, but I know what I like and what I don’t and why. In my opinion, we all should know the what and why (otherwise life is all a bit pointless isn’t it). If your interested in beer, wine and food please read the posts, if you’re not you’re probably looking in the wrong place.
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