Teff Beer Attempt - Step 5

So for those of you joining in late, we'll wait for you to catch up with the class. I promise the notes are at least entertaining.

 In Step 1, we decided on an idea for a beer and in Step 2, we looked for a recipe. In Step 3, we went shopping for equipment and ingredients. Step 4 was when we decided to malt our own grain. 

In this exciting episode, we will do the Mash and Boil which sound like a dance craze but results in standing around and measuring things. It is best to have a beer while doing this. It is like eating eggs and chicken, a bit perverse but pleasurable.

Had to decide on a date to do this and the beer festival season is upon us. The Only was having a beer fest and it started at 5 pm, so I invited a friend over for 2 pm to help me. I mean the next two pieces seemed easy, make a porridge, takeaway the scuzzy stuff, do another boil with hops and then add yeast to the cooled down liquid.

The day before, I did a check of ingredients and equipment. Had the kit but I was missing a strainer. Given the grain used, teff, I knew that whatever I used would have to catch 'em all (Pokemon reference). The dollar store provided. Might as well check on the other ingredients. Looked at the date and preparation instructions on the yeast. Need to take out for a few hours before, blah, blah, blah and expires June 2014. Wait, that was LAST year. Before we panic, a little breath to talk about what I have done so far in terms of a recipe to make 1 gallon beer.

~ 1 lb of malted teff
White Labs Belgian Ale Yeast
5 g US Fuggle Hops (split into half)
6 g Williamette Hops (split into half)
.25 lb of Belgian Candi sugar

That wasn't my intended recipe but that it what it turned out to be. The yeast... yeast is a living being and I am so glad for my cooking experience because I have used bad yeast before and most of the time it works out. There are some tricks and one is written on the bottle on how to create an activator. If you have made pizza or homemade bread you are probably aware of how to do this. Put the yeast in some water and add a little sugar to kick start it.

Like baby delivery in movies, the first thing I did was boil a lot of water. A whole stockpot of water. About 4 times what I thought I would need. I boiled it to make sure the chlorine was all gone.

I used a little of this water with about a teaspoon of sugar and set it on the counter. The vial was for 5 gallons and I was making 1 gallon. Should remember to put in 1/5th of the yeast later on.

At around 1pm, before my buddy was set to arrive I started down the merry path to get everything going. Added the grains to about 1 gallon of water and got it to between 140 and 155 degrees for most of the mashing process. The goal is to keep it in this range to get the sugars out. Normally, you try for a slightly higher range but teff malts at a slightly lower temp with the pocket being around 142. I have read all sorts of stuff on how different temps will affect the brew but the goal is to get all the sugar out. I slipped a few times below the 140 but never for long. It was hard to keep at a great temp, and I tried to err on the lower side so that I wouldn't stop the reactions necessary to convert starch to sugars.

Lesson 1: There may be a better way to keep a constant temperature. The oven. I think that is something to investigate for next time. 

When this liquid was tasted about 40 minutes into the process, it was sweet but a grassy sweet and not horribly sugar sweet. Not sure if that makes sense but there is something called the iodine test where adding some iodine to a sample of the liquid and stays brown then there is no more starch. This process is supposed to take around an hour and a half. I boiled for around 1.75 hours and still not fully converted. That is when I decided to add candi sugar to the boil. This conversion factor is really important for commercial brewers but for one gallon as unconverted starch is money. It is important to get the flavour for home brewers but sugar provides the food for yeast farts of alcohol and carbon dioxide.

At this time, you need to get the gunk out. I poured the liquid from the stock pot to a canning pot using the sieve to hold back the grains. Then you get help from your friend to put some warm water to rinse the remaining sugar from the grains. So, I get my friend... oh wait, he didn't arrive yet.

Lesson 2: Get better friends or only make 1 gallon batches. If this was a 5 gallon recipe, this part called sparging would have been horrible. And I would have to get a bigger sink. 

Make sure you boil a lot of extra water. I found that soooo much evaporated. So, I'll use the oven or lids or something next time. It doesn't matter that much as you can always add water into the overly sweet wort (that's what the official beer porridge name is) at the end of the process.

This process of sparging, well there has to be a better way but I'm not sure I know what it is. Some research will be necessary.

So, now you have this sweet liquid. I added some more hot water, the candi sugar and brought it to a boil. Looking at a bunch of recipes, I settled on 11 g of hops for an 1 gallon batch. Looking at a lot of recipes that used these hops, I decided on putting half the hops at the beginning and the remaining about twenty minutes before the end of the boil. All boils seem to be for an hour. So, I put in the first bit and stirred and waited and my friend shows up. We have a few beer while waiting. I put in the second set of hops and create an ice bath in my sink because the next part is to cool the wort so I can put yeast in and not kill it.

We finish our beer and my friend helps by almost pouring the wort into the ice bath.

Lesson 3: Don't get sloppy drunk and try this. There are two mistakes that I made after this point and one meh moment. Yes, this stuff is simple but not foolproof.

We cooled the wort down to room temp and move it into the container that I am going to use as my primary. We take a sample and I try to use the hydrometer. The only thing I actually can comprehend and figure out is that it bobs at the 6% level for beer. I have to figure out how to calculate the specific gravity better.

The temp is  as recommended on the yeast and I add the yeast that is sitting on the cupboard. All of it. Go back up and read the piece where I talk about how much yeast I was supposed to use. The good news is that I know that yeast will only eat the food that is there and then stop. Also, since it is old, I am expecting that it will underperform anyways. We will have to see.

I put the liquid into a carboy instead of the plastic pail because I wanted to watch it ferment. I have a few old fashioned jugs for the next step which I follow up with later. For now, I have this...

Stay tuned for the next few weeks where this becomes beer and I taste it.

Radlers Everywhere!

Two summers ago, a radler was brought into this great land and saw that it was good. It became fruitful and multiplied. Now, like the mustard seed, it is growing into a weed.

Radler: fruit juice and brew. Named after cyclists. Drank after workout to quench thirst and make beer stretch if legend is to be believed. Okay, we'll stop there and start to stray from the general narrative of beerosophy and get into my own personal rhetoric.

My feelings on radlers are all over the place. I have very little reason to buy one especially since so many of them taste more like lemonade than beer. There is very little of the beery and hoppy goodness of the products on the shelf.

Putting a link to search LCBO - Radler Search at LCBO. As of writing, there were 5 there.
Putting a link to BeerStore (Yeah, I know but I'm making a point here) - Beer Store Radlers, 8 as of writing. 

Homemade is usually reserved for an overly aggressive IPA or a poor lager. The juice hides the hops or kills skunks and sweetness. It is something to do with a drainpour except... sigh, there is some interesting things that can be done with beer and juice. I rely on this trick when coming up for beer cocktails for people who don't like beer by itself. I also like it when you can use the flavours to balance each other or to complement.

Hey, I have made blog posts on these things that I like when it works. With Christmas flavours! or Mother's Day flavours! I had written and then junked a post on cottage beer that made the same statements. Sometimes, you want something juicy and alcoholic but not too alcoholic. Chagrined, I admit that sometimes I like my beer to taste like something other than beer.

The thing is... after reading a lot about pairing flavours, I wonder if most porters and stouts that are high in the ABV could use some Ribena and its currant flavour to enhance the malts and lower the fall down quotient? It could also entice some people to try stout as a summer drink and shed that dark beer is heavy bit of malarkey and bologna. (Malarkey and boloney sandwich with a side of stout - sounds delicious, btw). Maybe even pave the way for the return of the mild as a decent workman's summer drink.

I guess I feel about radlers the way I feel about any premix canned booze; it's lazy, convenient and never to my taste. Sure, I'll drink it but I'll never love it.

Dregs Round-up for December 2014

Here are a collection of links and interesting rumours that haven't made it to a full post.

Toronto and Montreal got a shout out from Daniel Boulud as cities to watch for interesting food.

While I am starting to think about a series on the issues that foodies face while grocery shopping, along comes an article that talks about replacing meat with vegetable protein. While it handles many issues of higher inefficiencies that in converting plants to muscle, it doesn't say enough about the issues of eating less processed food. I think the article in some ways furthers the more mechanistic and nutrionist leanings of food culture. The idea that animals are nothing more than conversion machines. Anyways, it was a good read and I am definitely interested in protein from other sources and of course, have issues with fake meat.

Just yesterday I talked about beer flavoured coffee and updating my quest. Seems Starbucks has beaten me to the beer barrel. The good news is that the tasters aren't exactly loving it. My experiments are here: 1st Attempt, 2nd Attempt.

Speaking about coffee and beer, Boxcar Social which I reviewed here will be opening up another location on Queen East in the land of decent coffee. There place will have a good beer focus as well. Not sure of the opening date but they have inked the contract.

Boxcar let slip that they believe a brewery will be opening up beside their new location. There is already a bunch of breweries looking or set up on the East Side. Left Field, Sweetgrass and Louis Cifer are the ones that are well known and given coverage. On Mom and Hops, there are a number of planned breweries for Toronto and some seem to have an eastern connection.

- Danforth Brewing
- Strathmore Brewing
- Muddy York Brewing, and
- The Only Nanobrewery.

None of these seem like the likely candidate and so I wait to hear more. Anyways, there are a few morsels that I couldn't quite make into a full blog post unless I did some serious work.

Book Review: Beerology

Hmm. What background must I give to make the following make sense? Let's start with the fact that I am reviewing Beerology by Mirella Amato. I've been following her on twitter for a while. She is one of 7 Master Cicerones in the world. So, she knows beer and is very dedicated to education and promotion.

In near proximity, I have read Tasting Beer by Randy Mosher and The Complete Beer Course by Joshua Bernstein. I did a review of the Bernstein book here. These cover similar areas and it was helpful to compare and contrast against Mirella's approach.

The stated goal is beer appreciation. The design is quite engaging. Coasters dot the chapter title pages. There are smaller, more concise sections for beer ingredients and process. The pour that is recommended is one of the two classic pours. I've not seen an explanation of the differences between the pours but I bet it's out there on the interwebs. Quick run down.

Pour type 1: Vigorous center pour, stop halfway through for foam to settle then continue. 

Pour type 2: 45 degree angle and pour to middle of the glass, gradually tip and center pour.

The style section is smaller than the other books I have recently read but those differences are big and important. One is the addition of a graphic that splits the characteristics of the brew into four dimensions; ale vs. lager, colour, distinct taste (bitter/sour/sweet), and alcohol. The second is splitting the styles into purposeful adjectives such as refreshing, mellow, striking, captivating and brews beyond. This moves beyond the traditional lists that operate in a variety of ways. Sometimes by beer style or country of origin or light to dark. What is important is that Mirella doesn't recommend her categories as the final say but actively suggests that you learn more.

There is so much to say on styles especially from the point of view of beer geekery. Styles are newish and have somehow come to dominate many discussions on beer judging rather than the taste of the beer. The sense that I get from this book is that taste is probably the most important aspect of the beer. Mirella put together a great post to describe how she figured out the style and beer section. It is a great read and really illustrates the point of style versus taste and the difficulty of using style as a primary description of beer.

My favourite sections are after the style section as she gets into the ideas of food pairing, beer tasting games, and beer cocktails. While she gives some thoughtful advice on how food and beer work together, the caveat of try stuff outside the box lingers. Her framework goes beyond the cut, complement and contrast. It is not so much multidimensional as a list of considerations about everything from intensity and weight to flavour components.

Now, comes the hard questions. Would I buy this book? I'm considering it for a some very good reasons, there are so few beer guides that have Canadian references and this is one. The extra 'u' in many words might be worth it alone. This is a good companion for the big beer guides mentioned above if you want a Canadian context. If you have David Ort's cookbook then this volume works well to present the beginnings of an interesting culinary approach to beer. The third is the graphics compile complex information into a readable, digestible and immediately understandable format. Her styles as graphic representation of bitterness and intensity make it easy to compare styles. If you happen to be a food geek as well, you have probably seen flavour wheels and other tools that help you match against her graphs.

I'm in the midst of doing a trim of my books in food and beer and playing a one in, one out game. When I have finished, this is one book that would be closer to the top.

Teff Beer Attempt - Step 4

The story so far... In Step 1, we decided on an idea for a beer and in Step 2, we looked for a recipe. In Step 3, we went shopping for equipment and ingredients.

For next few hundred words, we will take you on a journey through time and space (BTW, all of our journeys are through time and space) to a placed called the Malting.

I've been reading and re-reading beer books lately. I feel as if there are no new ways to approach the topic of beer. Malting is the sprouting, drying and maybe the toasting/roasting of the grain being used to make the beer.

I bought teff. The smallest grain in the world because I wanted to make a gluten free ale from the cradle of civilization, Ethiopia. It happens to be one of the quickest sprouting grains. There were a bunch of ways to sprout grain on the internet that just didn't apply because the batch was so small. Most recipes are scaled to 5 gallons and above. Remembering my school days and having recently revisited the whole sprouting stuff on a window sill thing with the kids, this process was still fresh in my head. Recommendations are to put the grains in a bucket or some tray where water can be removed or in a clear jar or... Some of these methods were not usable due to the size of the grain but it was wide open. The only requirement was that the grain had germinated.

So, first I soaked the grain for about 3 hours and then laid it on an unused, as in new, dampened hand towel set in 9x13 pan. I took a second towel, also dew dampened by the mists from Toronto tap water and placed it over the grains and waited.

Most of the literature talked about optimal length of the sprout, some calling it acrospire and timings  for germination were all for the more common grains. There was talk about being 80-100% of the grain. Germination time for teff is two to three days. I was contemplating raiding the kids' toys to see if I could find a magnifying glass. These grains are so small that it felt like beach sand when I was soaking them. I had to rely on something other than sight, so I popped one in my mouth. Dry, vague cereal taste. Flavourful dirt.

After 24 hours, when I lifted the cloth, it seemed as if I was looking at an out of focus picture. The sprouts had started a lot quicker than I expected. I tasted it. It was slightly green tasting and less crunchy than the day before. I didn't have time to set up for drying so I didn't have time to make a decision. I think that was for the best. When I came home from work that night, there were visible sprouts at least 6 times the length while others were still in that starting stage. It was time unless I wanted the whole pan to become filler to sandwiches. I couldn't worry about the inconsistency of the sprouts.

The grain was dumped out onto cookie sheets. More cookie sheets than I expected. You need a lot of room to dry these suckers. This is probably why brewers get malt from malters. I turned on the stove at a low temp briefly and let the pans rest inside once I was sure that it would dry without starting to cook the seeds. After the initial time, I left the pans around the house to air dry. They were dry within days. Several blogs and books had recommended an optimal after drying weight but there was no way I was going to transfer these suckers back and forth. Already there were grains everywhere. Did I say that they remind me of beach sand? Same problem.

With the slight toasting they received in the oven when I put them in too early one time, they would be a very light colour. This appeals to me since I love lighter beer such as wit, weiss, and wheat beers. It will go well with the other ingredients mentioned in the previous post. Put the grains away in a cool spot and in a sealed container.

Okay, so some stuff happened. Firstly, don't use a cloth with teff. I now have a wonderful cloth that is ready to be planted. The seeds grew into the cloth.

Drying can be anxiety ridden, so if you have never dried anything, don't start with grain.

Taste the grain. I have an appreciation for the differences during the sprouting process and you are trying to get the most sugar out of the grain. We have an amazing ability to taste sugar. The larger sprouts were not as sweet as the smaller ones. While we can get all scientific about the process and remove grains that are too big or two small, the nature of handmade goods is that they are complex or sometimes muddy rather than clean and perfect. Think of the difference between a meal at home and a meal at a fancy schmancy restaurant.

Let's go at that point that I just made another way. After spending a few days worrying that the sugar would not be optimized, I took to twitter to ask about what to do. "Test during the boiling process and add amylase." That will come up in the next chapter but what I took out was that there was a possible solution. I had a more brillianter idea. I asked a few friends who spent time in Ethiopia, okay grew up there... Okay, I asked a few Ethiopian friends. You may ask why I didn't do this before but I had. The difference is that this time I described the process and got back a whole whack of information that I couldn't get from the internet. Go ahead, look. That is what I would do to. We'll wait.



Okay, for those know-it-alls, glad to see you are joining us again. Here is the recipe I got back.

My mom puts a bunch of teff in a bucket with water and lets it sprout. In another bucket she combines injera, water and sometimes spices. She also adds this green leafy thing, dried. Don't know what the English name is but we call it Gesho and here is the Amharic symbols. There is probably some on the Danforth. So, she chops it up and adds them together when the first bucket is ready. After a week or so, it is ready to drink.

There are so many great things about the recipe and how I got it, I'm not sure I can do it justice. Firstly, beer making is still the domain of women in Ethiopia and that harkens back to earlier days of brewing in Western societies. These women were known as brewsters or ale wives. A good friend of my wife is named Brewster and like the Millers, were a big part of regular life.

Second point, is the recipe itself. Read a post by Mirella Amato about losing sight of the craft. While she came to a slightly different conclusion and direction, there is definitely a sense that scientific geekery might be losing sight of a fundamental bit about brewing. It is more like making homemade bread than molecular gastronomy. Both have there places but don't worry if you mess up a little bit because there is some Ethiopian grandmother making this stuff in a bucket without heating it up to get all the sugar out. Food wants to rot. This is just controlled rotting.

And last one I'll make here. Gesho is a bittering agent. It is used like hops. Everyone makes a bitter fermented beverage. I'm wondering if there are all types of beer out there in the non European world that have so much for us. I have heard of Indian traditions and wonder about Asia. A world map of traditional beer other than the small one I have in my head that is centered around central Europe would be cool.

The next post for this topic will be on the boiling process. I just have to get some iodine and amylase.

So, the next step is here at Step 5.

Teff Beer Attempt - Step 3

The story so far... In Step 1, we decided on an idea for a beer and in Step 2, we looked for a recipe.

Now that we have a recipe of sorts, it is time to go shopping. The question for me was what ingredients and equipment did I need.

Ingredients 

The ingredients were the easier of the two to contemplate. I needed yeast, hops, malt, and water.

Yeast was easy to find and the only real choice was between dry or liquid. I chose liquid yeast as I trusted the brand name after hearing great things about it. Hops, I had already figured that I would use English hops and a number of different shops had them. No biggie.

Then I thought, let's get the liquid malt and save some time. I don't need to go all alpha beer nerd and make my own malt. A quick search through the beer suppliers of Toronto yielded no teff malt. Okay, let's see about the states. Oh, Colorado Malting will do it custom. With the customs and excise tax and the waiting and everything, I decided to ask a few brewing supply stores in Toronto with little luck. I'm sure someone does it out there but I wasn't able to find it easy by a search or a tweet.

Now comes the pseudo confession time. I'm writing this breezily and as if I am doing everything off the cuff. This is largely because I'm feeling ducky. I want this to look easy like a duck swimming but underneath the water, I'm paddling like hell. To put it another way, I've been talking about trying to home brew for two years. I have read two years of subscription to Brew Your Own, own more than six books on fermentation and brewing, read forums, follow twitter folk, ask questions of beer guys and strengthened my google fu in this glorious quest. While I AM talking out of my arse, I have a fair idea of what is going on. Most home brewers do NOT malt their own grain. Here I was with only a handful of articles, some tutorials on YouTube with no information of teff malting. So, of course, I decided rather than wait that I would malt my own. I bought teff at a local grocery store. It was easy to find as it is a common grain for celiacs and people who want to go gluten free. More on the malting process and outcome in the next step. I still have to finish buying everything.

This realization made me curse my choice of grain for a few seconds until it dawned that I was going to one up all those home brewers who look down on those that used liquid malt rather than brewing for grain, I was malting my own. Just as a background for those uber new into brewing, one of the first questions you get asked when saying you are home brewing is whether you have ever brewed from grain. Brewing from grain is just about whether or not you make the porridge and then add the yeast.

Quick review of the standard home brewing process - make the porridge and add hops, cool it down and add yeast, let the yeast do its job and bottle. Some brewers don't make their own porridge but rely on buying ready made malt. No shame. Not too many people make their own ketchup either. 

Okay, that only leaves water. I've got water in my tap and that should be okay. There are huge discussions on forums about whether treated water affects yeast and how differences in water accentuates bitterness and so much more. Water is very important but its not worth the amateur worrying about. Leave some water from your tap overnight if it is treated with chlorine. Other than that, whatever you use as drinking water will be fine for most beer purposes.

Equipment

Yeast, hops, water, and grain. All taken care of in a trip to Toronto Brewing. What about the equipment? My original thought was to just use stuff from my kitchen. I had given the question of volume some thought. Standard recipes are 1 gallon, 5 gallon or 10 gallon. I've decided that given my space, I would do 1 gallon test batches and 5 gallon batches for now. The reasons are that I can only drink one kind of beer for so long. One gallon yields about 3.8 l, that's about 11x33cl glasses, the standard metric 'pint'. More of one beer than I normally drink. Also, if a batch has gone wrong then I don't want to throw out more than a gallon. Five gallons is probably the limit of what can be done in our second kitchen due to the size. This batch from unmalted grain would be a one gallon batch.

I had most of the standard equipment - something to make the porridge in and something to ferment in and even some bottles from the U-Brew-It. Yes, a lot of books make a huge deal about the equipment but the disagreement is so wide. I ended up buying a one gallon kit.

I was swayed by a book that had the same issues I had with the uber recipe nature of most brewing books and he explained something in simple scientific terms that reminded me of the time I spent with the guys at Fermentations. I had asked them when they knew the beer was done. I had some experience with a balloon over a one gallon old timey jug used for fermenting mead and wondered how they did. A hydrometer. This handy dandy thing lets you know when all the sugar is fermented. I had to have one because Beer Making For All said so. I've also bottled and it is nice to have tubes and stuff to make it easy. Oh, and I didn't want to have to worry what was last cooked in my stock pot. Maybe there would be a need to make stock and beer at the same time.  If I brew more often, I can't take my stock pot out of circulation. Anyways, I bought a kit for some of the reasons listed above.

The trip to the brewing supplies store was fun. I proudly stated my first time status, as if they hadn't heard it before, and got all the help I needed. It was fun. I also walked away with ingredients for a backup batch for my second beer but that is another story. Did I say that it was fun?

With all the ingredients together and shopping done, it was time to start brewing. But first, I guess I had to malt the teff. That is where we will leave off today, kids. The next part will be on the malting. Sounds like a horror movie, doesn't it. The Malting.

Other posts in this series: See up top for the earlier posts and Part 4: Malting and now Part 5: Mash and Boil.

Teff Beer Attempt - Step 2

In the last exciting episode, I had talked about my grain decision and promised to talk a bit about science versus art. But first, I'm looking at that title. Step 2, it says. I'm not sure how to break it to you but I'm not sure of how many steps there are or how to break it down in digestible blog post style. So, there it is. I know the end will be the drinking of the beer and the beginning the concept. Buckle up.

After picking the grain, (not literally, I picked it up at the store in the gluten free section) I wanted to see what had been done before so off to the internet we went. Yeah, that's when I started to realize something. Just like in cooking, recipes and approaches fall into some broad categories. There are the recipes followers, the scientists, the artists, and the goof offs.

The two more junior members of the homebrew band, note that I did not say artisinal or craft, are recipe followers and the goof offs. The recipe followers measure and follow the steps without any understanding, hoping for some insight to come along the way. Some are keeping decent track of what is going on so that when it fails, they can see where they deviated from the recipe. Often these failures will push the followers into more rigid following of said recipes or push them into troubleshooting mode. The second way leads to geekery. There are a lot of geeks on the internet.

The goof offs are those who want cheap, but not awful beer. These tend to be frat boys, handy men and friends of friends who had a friend who brewed this stuff one time. Good times.

Then there are the scientists, technicians and experimentalists, who measure and note take. Sometimes they have a very clear idea of what they are replicating and other times they are testing one or more parts of the brewing protocol. What happens if I overhop here or use this method for wort chilling? How can I tweak my setup to get the qualities I desire out of the beer?

Then artists. With the idea that brewing has been happening for thousands of years, the basic recipe hasn't changed. All that is left is ornamentation and experiment. Yes, you still have to understand basic techniques and science but beer is a living thing. Beer is beautiful. Brewing is art.

Look, those are quick and dirty ideas of what I found on the internet. Of course, being the internet, the scientists and goof offs are well represented. The recipe followers often show up in forums starting their questions with "I followed the recipe exactly but..." and the artists... Hmm, I found most of them writing books. Sandor Katz wrote a great book on fermentation, Wild Fermentation, that will put your mind at ease. It doesn't cover just beer, which is only a small mention, but all types of fermentation.

I am usually more on the technician side rather than the artist side but we all fall somewhere along that line. If you are a perfectionist, the problem is that there is so much information with a lot of it being bad ideas masked in technique. How do I know this as a novice? Cooking and fermenting other stuff. When I looked at the recipes, they offered little in technical matters cause it just seems so straight forward. Boil some stuff (okay not really boil), cool it down, add yeast, let them eat, bottle and add some more food for yeast to eat and then enjoy. My sons put it this way, I am drinking yeast poo.

But that process is not how beer was always made. And there is the rub. Having read historic recipes for all sorts of food including medieval bread, the technique of cooking and brewing was known to everyone so much so that the techniques were never written down. I fear that a lot of our homebrewing knowledge is of recent vintage. Sandor Katz' book and other older homebrewing books such as 'BEER Making For All' don't have the focus on styles and tight grip on process but really understand the whole idea from an historical perspective. The basic idea is that stuff rotted and people found the best way to get that rotting stuff to taste good. There is some theory that humans are scavengers and therefore like the taste of savory and sour goods because of it. That is a whole other discussion.

With all those concepts rolling around in my poor undersized head, I tried to figure out the best approach for me to get this teff brew done. I wanted to make sure I could understand what the grain would taste like. I wanted to make sure that I had yeast and hops I was familiar with. Also, the choice would have to be complementary to bring out what I thought would be the best from the grain. I chose some British hops (Williamette and Fuggles) and Belgian Golden Yeast. I'm not sure if I'll use a mix of the hops or just one. That'll be a brew day decision.

What's that? What style of beer will it be? And this is where we will part company. I'm not interested in the style. Style is a recent phenomenon to help consumers know what they are getting. It is a way to categorize beers of the world for comparison. It is a way for amateur brewers to enter into competitions and learn to make better beer. The home cook who draws from different cuisines and techniques isn't all that interested in describing their food in terms of naming the dish or determining the style of cooking. Remember, I am just a talented home cook at heart.

Thus ends part the second. In the next part, I take a trip to the store and then I wrestle and cry about the grains I chose. Hopefully there will be some real information that someone trying to brew a beer can use.

Other posts in this series: Part 1: The Big Idea, Part 3: Shopping, Part 4: Malting and Part 5: Mash and Boil.

Teff Beer Attempt - Step 1

I'm finally doing it and making my own beer at home. I'm making a gallon just to see how its done. The preparation to get to this point has been a lot of reading, talking to some homebrewers and doing a lot at the local U-Brew-It. (Hi Fermentations!).

I'm fairly confident of doing a brew from malt extract or even malted grains. Mead was no problem to do, and neither is cider. So, why did I think that this was a good idea. Teff. From grain.

Why?

How did this come about?

I was talking to a few buddies about what the next recipe was going to be <aside> Making a recipe at a U-Brew-It! means choosing a style, choosing hops and some adjuncts -- except when it doesn't. Sometimes you can mix and match what they have at the shop and not worry about it too much. It's more like making a meal out of leftovers than cooking from scratch. It doesn't make it any less tasty or creative just a little less DIY. </aside> and he brought up the fact that he was having problems with gluten intolerance.

Wait, wait, I know that some of you are now going to point out a hypocrisy, especially if you read me regularly. You'll talk about how gluten allergies have been debunked or roll your eyes or whatever. Here is the truth about that. People eat a bunch of stuff and feel crappy afterwards. Eating a gluten free diet, has up until now, meant eating less processed food. The kid feels better not eating things with gluten like eating more veggies and stuff. It could be that veggies are better for you than processed food. As big business gets into the market, we will see what happens. There is no denying the GI problems that someone who is eating a diet that happens to have gluten along for the ride causes.

It could be that processed food and additives pile up and you don't feel well. It could be that when they eat all the carb rich foods, they ignore the other good for you stuff that may regulate their lovely stomach critters. If my friend believes it is the gluten then so be it. As long as he is willing to try my older wheat type of breads and less processed food then we can keep the scientific door open. Not everyone wants to go on some elimination diet to figure out what is really causing the problem.

I haven't tasted a really good gluten free beer. I know there are a lot stateside but I'm not setting out to make a gluten free beer. I am setting out to make a beer that hails from the cradle of civilization and one of the earliest grains. Teff is the smallest and one of the quickest germinating (36 hours) grains so that if I mess it up, it will be easy to do another batch. There are two Ethiopian drinks that are sometimes made with teff but those would qualify as a mead like substance and I make take a try at those later.

A lot of attention has been paid to hops over the past few years. Grain bills, the stuff that the malt is made out of, has been changing a little too but it is still largely barley due to have readily available sugars and proteins. Wheat is particular to a few styles and corn and rice are still (unjustly) four letter words for craft beer. Older grains that are less likely to be GMO and processed are still forgotten. If I'm going to make a beer at home from scratch then it has to be something quick, simple, historic and not solely steeped in scientific homebrew geekery. I'll get into that as I go along. I'm simply trying to make a good beer from a grain that is not a common grain that has a quick germination so that I don't feel like some hippie growing sprouts.

So, I've sprouted the grain and am now drying it. It unevenly germinated but I'm not going to fuss. What I hope to understand is the process of making beer and I am not so worried about being perfect this time out. If the resulting liquid even tastes remotely like a beer that I would like to drink, then I will do this again. I'll try to blog this process as I move along. So ends the first part of the program. I think the next part will be on Science versus Art.

Other posts in this series: Part 2: Recipe Selection, Part 3: Shopping, Part 4: Malting, and Part 5: Mash and Boil.

For the Young and Old

Recently read a profile of the chef, Flynn McGarrie, in the New York Times magazine. Much was made of his age. He is fifteen years old. He is being hailed as a wunderkind.

Most of us have heard about dreaming Jiro and his sushi. He is the oldest Michelin three star chef at 82. This is also claimed as a miracle. We seem to live in the era of miracle children and never aging seniors. This could be a product of the baby boomers on both ends. As they age, the society switches it focus from boundless youth to the fountain of youth. The biggest bulk of North Americans self indulgent focus shows up in the reflections of the products and stories they consume. The advent of youth focus and teenagers grew with the baby boomers and now they turn to aging.

There is still a preciousness that is attached to young people. In the New York Times article, it is noted by one of the European chefs that this would not be such a big deal in Europe. Not that he is saying that this is a product of electronic media saturated USA nor that Flynn McGarrie isn't gifted but I feel that there is an unstated thought that this should not be as big of a surprise as it has been made out to be. As far as aging, it seems that we have forgotten that the concept of retirement for the masses is relatively new.

This attitude towards age extends to foodstuffs and beer. There is the exultation of fresh cheeses such as burrata and curds to the mature bleus and cloth bound aged cheddar. In the beer world, cask beers and real ale campaigns bracket the one side while sours and barrel aged beer squeeze the other.

There is a cost to age. Shelving, storage and the work required to ensure there is no spoilage make these expensive. The sales cycle is long. It can take years to finish the first sale and unless you are sure of your product, it is very hard to make changes. It takes a while for changes to happen. When you factor all these in, it is easy to see why these things cost money

Both artisianal cheese and craft beer are still fairly young industries in Ontario and I've noticed a trend. In cheese making it takes time to raise a herd. In beer, the sour lambics take time to age. I have recently tasted some noted Belgian lambics that have tasted thin and unaged. In a rush to meet the new demand for these products, not enough time is being spent waiting. A large brewery has recently bought many of these breweries for their portfolio and I wonder if profit is being put before product. We have isolated some of these yeasts and are now using innoculation methods that take the guessing about what critters are in the air and reducing risks for bad tasting ales. The traditional method means to expose the beer to the air and let wild yeast do the work.

Are we, as consumers, too impatient? I have tasted a cheese from a newer cheesemaker and can tell that the cheese still hasn't got there. It will. I'm not going to give up on these Ontario dairies just because their cheese doesn't have all the ripeness that is promised. It takes some years. In the meantime, I'll enjoy where they are in the process and support them when I can.

Producers risk new consumers tasting their products to be let down on what all the fuss is about. The producers are relying on the neophytes not knowing any better and leave old curmudgeons, like myself, sounding dated with 'they don't make it like they used to'. A funny thing though, this hypermediated environment may cause them to rethink their strategies. As more people get together in virtual bars and discuss relative merits of this over that, there will be a gravity towards clusters of products. They risk not being old enough or not popular enough. People will see through strategies that only serve the interest of the producer's pocketbook.

On Turning 1000

I did it. I just reached 1000 distinct beers on untappd. To some of you that statement isn't going to make sense and to others, it will be a dubious statement. So, let's just figure out what the hell I just said.

Yeah me! A new beer badge.

Untappd is a social beer application that helps you track beer while earning badges along the way. When I first heard about it, it seemed as if it would drive you to drink in a literal way as you tried to level up. I'll admit that I did drink a beer that I wouldn't have drank (or is that drunk - guess it depends on how many) in order to gain a badge but I don't think it pushed me anywhere.

What the app did do was change the way I looked at my drinking habits. I joined on December 24th, 2011. That means that in 28 months, I have drank 1367 beer with 1000 different beer. That's 48 beer per month or 12 a week. Let's step away from that number for a second and try to break it down or rationalize it.

Chris Schryer posted an excellent blog post about alcoholism and craft beer drinking when he attempted to drink a traditional monk's diet for Lent. Drinking a lot of beer is not necessarily alcoholism. The element of addiction is what moves drinking into that arena but then there is that very big number there.

When I was gnashing my teeth at the whole privatization of alcohol sales in Ontario debate, Brian Papineau, a beer blogger from Ottawa quipped that the real issue is that I haven't been able to find a beer that I like and that may be making me cranky.

So, both these folks have made me question both how I am drinking and what I am drinking. How did I get to this number? Well in the last 28 months, I have gone to four large beer festivals where I have sampled around 20-30 beer at each. Not all samples were fully quaffed and in reality, it was probably around 2 ounces for each sample. That handles 100 right there. There are smaller tap takeovers and more indie type beer events in the city that would account for about 10 different beer each time. Let's say, I've been to around six to eight of those beer events in the last two years. So, another 60.

Now, for regular bar going, it is in my local where every six weeks where I split six beer with a buddy, resulting in a three pint night. That would account for another 110-120 listed beer. So, 1000 beer less 270 is 730 distinct beer that I drank, mainly at home. That makes for just over a beer a day when you add in the duplicates.

That number feels about right. But how do I feel about that number?

Let's go after the second part of my introspection, why so many kinds of beer? Is it just novelty? Before I used the app, I rarely drank the same beer twice in a row and would come back to a beer in a seasonal way. I still do that now but if given the choice of a new beer, I will go for it. Part of it is due to the app egging me on but another part is the growth of beer in Ontario and LCBO's focus on seasonal releases.

Now, every quarter or so, the LCBO introduces a number of new beer that will only be around for a short while. Interspersed with these known releases, there are brewery spotlights and local breweries switching in their seasonal brews. This makes for a set of options that will only be around for a while and in some cases, will not come around. It tickles my scarcity and exclusivity bone. I want to try this rare bird before it flies away. The same drive that causes the Pokemon itch in kids, drives my need to collect them all. Do I feel bad that there isn't a go to beer for me? Do I believe that the next thing is better?

Upon reflection, the idea of a beer a day that changes only coming back once or twice a year doesn't sound so bad. It is very close to the way I eat, seasonal with variations on a theme. My burgers are rarely dressed the same way twice but because they are burgers, they are easily compared and help me appreciate the great ones when they come around again. Here's looking forward to the next thousand beer(s).
11

Did you ever have to make up your mind?

I'm just a guy who likes good tasting beer. If possible, I'd like to get it in more convenient places while supporting local, small breweries. Given the amount of hyperbole on twitter lately between the Beer Store and the Ontario Convenience Store Association, I was beginning to believe that I was the only one. Either I was in the pocket of big beer and wanted to continue the monopoly while keeping craft beer down or I wanted escalated costs and wanton death and destruction of Western society as we know it. Which one to choose?

A few days, I was challenged to take a position and frankly, I didn't know what to say. I've been brewing at a U-Brew-it for a little over three years and seriously drinking Belgian and what is now considered craft beer for around twenty years and I feel unqualified to have an opinion on Beer Store versus Convenience store. This is not some feint where I'm taking the piss out of them but rather a reflection on the labryrinthine regulations and dense legislation surrounding alcohol sales in this province.

If it wasn't for Jordan St. John's poll, I wouldn't have bothered writing anything. It is only because most of my opinions are reflected in his findings that I feel confident to say a few things here.

The Beer Store is not something I necessarily want to protect. It is owned by three large multinationals on a cost recovery basis where they use the advantages in the regulation to boost their profits through reduced costs, advantageous product placement and pricing practices to licensees. I won't bother rehashing their arguments for the continued survival of the Beer Store but rather note that they do have one shining benefit, recycling. Our recycling program is damned good and any replacement would have to do as well or better.

As a consumer, although it is a pain in the ass, I can't imagine what type of patchwork returns would exist without them. I am old enough to remember doing bottle returns at the grocery store where we would only accept glass bottles from certain brands and not others. I can imagine a return to that era. There is a reason that bottle returns are no longer done.

The convenience store arguments are all around promises that cannot be kept, including an expanded ability for craft beer breweries, more jobs and a beer in every pot. They don't seem so keen on ensuring that there is a true open market for all stores, only convenience stores. Anyways, their claims are fairly spurious and their defense is rabid. I don't trust a convenience store to have the best interests of a beer drinker at heart any more than they support the local snack food industry. They are in business to make money.

In short, they both suck.

A few observations. Currently, the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario already does risk based licensing. What does that mean? Studies show that more outlets selling alcohol (density) among other effects of privatization leads to rising costs due to alcohol. If people claim bias, it would be a weird claim that CAMH wants less money by reducing alcoholism. AGCO bases sales location on this reasoning. So, any new stores of any type would have to continue to undergo this licensing scheme.

Maybe the way forward is to modify our system slowly rather than taking the legislation out and burning it in the streets of our provincial capital. Modifications such as:

• Open the market to any location while keeping AGCO methods of evaluation whether convenience store, grocery store or Tim Horton's. I don't care.
• Allow for novel places of business while respecting AGCO. (Farmer's markets, co-owned craft beer stores, boutiques). Currently can only buy at LCBO, Beer Store, licensees, and on site breweries.
• Allow for small breweries to enter the market easier by limiting SKUs at Beer Store and LCBO. Each brewery can only have so many products at a time.
• Allow for either co-op stores of some type for small breweries from any where in the world or allow for small brewers to buy into the Beer Store.
• Offer assistance for development of small breweries as is offered for other agricultural and manufactured products. Put another way, incentives to get people who are brewing out of other breweries their own place to increase jobs.

That's all I have come up with in the last few weeks. The message is clear, younger beer drinkers don't care for the beer store but all beer drinkers like greater access. Many believe the LCBO is doing a good job. Full stop.

My point is that this false choice between either a Beer Store or a convenience store is just silly. The good part is that in the past week, I have heard more play of the beer geeks, blogger, columnists and aficionados than ever before. Real experts are finally being heard and that can only be helpful when trying to move forward. Of course, their bias is more good beer.

Book Review: The Canadian Craft Beer Cookbook

I have been looking forward to reading The Canadian Craft Beer Cookbook ever since David Ort mentioned it on his twitter feed. 

This is a good base book for someone wanting to understand the intersection of beer and food and why it is a better choice. This is in contrast to wine. I'm not sure that wine is this versatile and I'm not sure that I want to use an expensive wine to figure out that I don't like a recipe. Give me a cheaper alternative like beer and then it is less of a barrier for experimenting, more latitude for making mistakes.

The introduction goes over some basics that will be familiar to those that are both beer drinkers and foodies. It covers subjects like beer styles, beer ingredients, and recipe ingredients. There is a pragmatic tone to most of the prose. Where you don't need a particular piece of equipment but it is nice to have, the note is there. This is not a dogmatic recipe book. It is not an over expansive section and that makes it accessible to those starting on this crazy journey. The basic information is there to act as either a guide for the novice or a set of crib notes for those who have already begun.

Sprinkled throughout are profiles of interesting craft beer people and places. This shows off David's blogging and magazine background. These are interesting little snippets to break up what could be the regular monotony of a cookbook. I appreciated these bits but his head notes are so thoughtful that I am not sure these were needed. Sometimes using specifics as a touchstone can date a cookbook but I have a further thought on that later.

Not all recipes have beer or beer ingredients as part of the recipe but all have recommended pairings. The pairings tend to have a Canadian element along with a more internationally available beer. This highlights Canadian beer while  recognizing that the beer might not be available across Canada.  This also makes the book relevant to a larger international audience for books about beer pairing and food.

There are many traditional recipes that are adapted to some brands of today. Classic beer culture countries are well represented with a few Asian treats. Some of the pairings intrigued me but it was always clear why the choice was made, largely because David Ort tells you why he made the choice and what the purpose was. Along with the notes in the front about beer styles, you can begin to approach your own pairings.

I was suprised to find two recipes that call for hop shoots. I never thought about eating hop shoots but in the space of a few weeks, I have come upon two other references. In Elizabeth David's, On Vegetables, there is great story on bruscandoli or loertis or brucelando or wild aspargus or luppoli. It turns out that this extremely limited seasonal ingredient is available all around Italy where it is available only for a short time in the spring. There is mention of how it was served and it is nothing like the recipes in David Ort's cookbook. Though there is something in his style that reminds me of her writing. There are other cultures that serve hop shoots, for example in Belgium, they are called jets de houblon. The second reference was in a bathroom type reader How to be a Better Foodie by Sudi Pigott where it was talked about as being a seasonal foodie treat like ramps or wild mushrooms.

This genius of this book is that with the continued proliferation of breweries and resuscitation of styles in Canada, there is definitely going to be an updated version at some time. As more restaurants take up the beer pairing, there are other options for a good blog on beer pairings and possibly a continuing series. Of course, that might be wishful thinking on my part. The recipes are fairly safe, standard and beer friendly. It would be nice to see a few more recipes that push the envelope but this is a good first book about Canadian Craft Beer and food. It would make a good choice for the budding beer geek on your list.

Beer Flavoured Coffee, 2nd Attempt - Part 1

As you can see by the title, this is my second attempt at making beer flavoured coffee. The first fiasco can be found here. I was trying to make a monsooned style coffee and it didn't work particularly well but it gave me enough hope to try again.

So, what am I doing this time? Starting out with green Costa Rica Amistad beans and splitting it out into two preparations involving soaking beans at different parts of the process in Beau's Lugtread. Why Lugtread? Nice malt base with some sweetness and a bit of light fruit. It should not have too much bitterness to overwhelm the coffee. The coffee tasting notes themselves have citrus and hints of cocoa. I am roasting the coffee somewhere between a light and a medium roast.

First Preparation: Take 200g green beans and soak in Lug Tread until swollen. Dry out beans. Roast to desired roast then grind as needed. I'm going to take better measurements as I go along such as, added 1/2 bottle to green beans and the weight after drying, etc, but this is the general idea.

Second Preparation: Take 200g green beans and roast to desired roast (5.9 at high heat and medium fan). Wait overnight and then soak. Will probably soak for the same amount of time. Dry and then grind. I might end up drying the beans in both cases in the oven as I don't want the roasted beans to become stale. I do expect that the beer will prevent oxidation.

Anyways, just a goofy experiment to see where this all goes. I have also kept back a few green beans to roast as a comparison.

Why Drink Mass Market Beer?

So, recently I have had a few mass market beers. The people that I was with were surprised by my choices and questioned my beer acumen. Also, got a little ribbing from untappd friends. It may surprise some people but I am not much of a beer snob in terms of not drinking this or that just because it is mass market. I'm the same way with food.

I would like to have the best of what's available but there has to be a way to enjoy what is in front of you. These applies to life in general. It does not mean settling or making do but rather to enjoy an experience on its own merits.

To put it another way, don't let the lack of good food and beer ruin a birthday barbeque for a friend. Relax, enjoy and soak it in. The friend is more important that drinking mediocre or even shitty beer. Next time, offer to bring a case of something that is close to the style of beer. Pass it around but don't be a douche. That's my job.

I tasted Bud Light Lime Mojito for the first time because I was curious how it became popular other than the marketing. After drinking it, it made me think of a poorly made Desperados or a beer cocktail. I get why people would like it. I get why people wouldn't make this concoction of lime, mint and splash of spirits at home. I didn't like it but at some summer dinner party, I would consider introducing a few people to a similar beer cocktail or a decently made punch bowl of mojitos.

Anyways, after all that ado, here is a list of reasons on why a craft beer drinker should try mass market beer.

• it`s what is at the bar/wedding/party/mitzvah/bbq/whatever
• you are broke
• you are broke and want to get drunk
• remind yourself why you like craft beer
• important to understand why something is popular so that you can continue to be an evangelist for craft beer (there's a reason why the Catholics were really good at their conversion rates)
• sometimes, it`s okay to have a refreshing beverage on a warm day and not to give a fuck
• not be a douche bag when someone offers you something they genuinely enjoy. Figure it out.
• keep an open mind and see what the big boys are doing (Alexander Keith`s Hop Series, Blue Moon, and Beer Academy) 

Defining Bad Beer, Part 4

Recap

It has been a while since posts, so for those who can't follow the bouncing red ball or do not have photographic memories or are just showing up now, here is the recap. In the first part of this series on trying to define bad beer, I made the argument that unspoiled mass produced beer that did not taste bad was not enough to define bad beer. In the second part, I argued that aggregate sites such as bulletin boards, beeradvocate, ratebeer and untappd were biased towards micro and craft brews and at best could help you find a candidate for bad beer. In the third part, I took a look at beer judging and how its focus was to help brewers get better by judging the beer by the category that the brewer said it was looking to achieve.

Wow, that last post is a month past. I've had some time to reflect on where I thought this series was going to go and... well, it has been interesting. Two other bits that have added to my reflections are the study that came out about ratebeer and beeradvocate. Bunch o' links here...

Amateurs to Connoisseurs ,
Amateurs to Connoisseurs - The Powerpoint,
Understanding Rating Dimensions,
Understanding Rating Dimensions - The Slides. 

The papers are more on product and product recommendations but some of the conclusion of the first paper resonate with what was posted in the second part of this series.

The other bit adding to my reflections was a comment made by David Ort on his trailer for his Canadian Craft Beer Cookbook. He makes the personal observation that craft beer "...is delicious beer that's made by people who are proud to drink the beer and emphasize flavour over any other goal."

These two bits nicely bookend where I thought I was going with this series when I began it. At the end of the day, there is the drinker and the drink in front of them. What affects the individual drinker when drinking the brew and what affects the brewer when brewing the brew?

Drinker

I suppose that a lot of what a person decides is based on their own experience and where they are in their journey towards expert drinkers. That is some of what the above papers are looking at but there is a whole raft of perceptual biases that affect one's ability to judge. In a large group, I suppose that biases will be dampened down somewhat. This isn't to defend the tyranny of the majority but it is to say that it is mostly inoffensive.

One of the more interesting experiments that I heard of recently (and can't find the link) where a person was given the same product and tasted both, would develop a preference between the two. It's just something we do as human beings.

The other factor that has perked my interest has been the idea of educating palates, whether it be ratebeer or a buddy telling you that you have to try this, and craft beer is a little about that. It drives the idea that anything in opposition to that is not good.

So for a drinker to define a bad beer, it will be:

• in regards to the lowest thing that they have tasted, 
• where they are in their experience, 
• a bunch of other bias such as what was their first beer, last beer, worst beer memory, 
• and what level of expertise they are at.

Brewer

Why do brewer's brew beer? To drink and to make a profit. To suggest that craft beer exists only in terms of taste is to ignore a truth. If they can't make money, they won't be there long. Most small brewers charge a premium for their product because the market will pay it, the brewery is at capacity and the ingredients require a mark up.

Craft brewers often make a bad batch of beer due to issues of experiments gone wrong or production line issues. This doesn't make their beer bad.

A lot of words in this essay have been spilled on intention, as in does the beer meet the intention of the style or the brewer. On the whole, a beer can't be bad if it meets the style requirements. There are always exceptions and the most obvious one to this statement is wild beers. If you are making a brew based totally on the environmental factors, well, things might turn out the way the brewer intended but still taste good.

There are basically three considerations for the brewer in terms of this bad beer discussion: ingredients, profit, and taste. I figure that if some aspect is ignored, the result is bad beer or bankrupt brewer. So big corporations that look for the cheapest ingredients to maximize profits and decide mostly by boardroom then we are definitely looking at bad beer possibility.

What makes a beer bad?

I guess I have dithered long enough on this question, so here is my answer:

• first priority profit with little regard to taste (beer by committee),
• a good number of "ordinary" drinkers actively dislike beer with few people who like it,
• and will probably not be on the shelf for long

So there it is. It seems that by this definition there is very little bad beer but probably a lot of mediocre brews. 

Beer is Going Highbrow?

Wow.

In Food & Wine's October issue, there is a column on beer that made me slam down the magazine and tweet. Given that I tweet a lot, that is unsurprising. This time, it is different. I respect the magazine and expect it to have authority. It does get a little dicey when it moves from its core strengths but they try.

The article in question, 'Beer Is Going Highbrow (and Why That's a Good Thing)', by its very title is already creating a dissonance. There is a dominant idea that beer is lowbrow or common. I thought that this was an attempt at getting a headline. I read the article once, then twice, to make sure I understood what just happened. There were a couple of tired tropes such as the vinification of beer, and a surprise of the breadth of beer's taste but there was something a little more unsettling to me.

In this article on beer, wine is mentioned twelve times with two of those instances being in the compound word wine-ification.  Beer is mentioned 36 times. I have not looked closely at all the other articles in this months issue but I believe it is safe to say that most articles on wine don't mention beer at all. This 1:3 ratio is a little high for a non wine article. This issue of mentioning beer's rise needs to stop being compared to wine. In fact, the whole article is a series of missed story lines. The real interesting bits are not followed due to the self described 'proud connoisseur of Miller High Life' not getting the parts that are unique to beer.

For an analogy, it would be like taking a veteran tea drinker who, when they drink coffee, drinks Tim Horton's (Dunkin' Donuts for our American friends) and bringing them into coffee culture to describe it. They will have to fall back on what they know (tea houses, tea brewing and preparation) against coffee. There is always the possibility that curiosity will move them beyond this position but it would require a lot of effort.

Some of the missed opportunities include describing the evolution of watering holes with no mention of the history of breweries and pubs being the first places often built when towns began in North American. Little heed is given to the evolution from sports bars to gastropubs to the brasseries. Brasseries may be new to America but they had a long history in Belgium and France.

There are some words spilled over the complex delivery system in the Torst bar where they have a custom-built system to control carbonation and temperature of each beer. That is where it stops. A description of the look of the system with no pressing of the bartender on why this is. I am genuinely interested, as a reader, on what adjustments to a pedestrian beer could make it better. If you pulled a Bud through that system, how far could you pull the flavour in different directions? This is something that is distinct to beer.

There is talk about how a new beer glass has been designed to enjoy IPAs. What is left out, is why was a new glass required. North America has become so innovative in brewing that there are a number of new and emerging styles of beer. Some are an historical recreation of brews where others are something new. American style IPAs are one of these new styles. There is a quote from the producer of the glass that this IPA glass outsells their wineglasses. Is there something about beer that makes more than two or three styles of glasses mandatory?

The roots of these more interesting conversations are there and the author knows it. In the last third of the article, a beer sommelier states that the current beer culture is probably close to pre-Prohibition era. The author goes on to discuss the sommelier as being one of the earliest pioneers in pairing beer with food totally ignoring the Belgians and the Germans. The sommelier in question is Greg Engert, who Food & Wine chosen as one of ten sommeliers of the year in 2010, the first beer person to be chosen as such. The author could've followed up on these comments and left over dangling questions.

The coffin nailing comment of ' "beer" soon began to feel like an inadequate term to describe what I was drinking." made me think of two things. Food & Wine would not send someone who only drank Baby Duck wine to a winery and accept the same statement above with the word wine in it. It would be disrespectful.

The other thought was about the beerification of wine. Wine is now being put on tap, the places it is being served are more democratic, and vintners are becoming more like rock stars and less like old money, old vines. There is experimentation with adding flavours to wine and in general, the process of wine making is simpler and has not evolved as much as beer has in the past 10 years. Barrel aging, wild yeast strains, new strains of hops, revival of hopless beers, and grain experimentation are just a small smattering of exciting and innovative events in brewing. That is the real story, not how beer culture is the new wine culture. Beer culture described in this manner reminds me of the snobbery against California wine in the past.

Defining Bad Beer, Part 3

Time for another whack at the bad beer pinata. In the first part of this series on trying to define bad beer, I made the argument that unspoiled mass produced beer that did not taste bad was not enough to define bad beer. In the second part, I argued that aggregate sites such as bulletin boards, beeradvocate, ratebeer and untappd were biased towards micro and craft brews and at best could help you find a candidate for bad beer. In this part, we take a look at the experts.

History of Beer Judging

You can bet that in ancient Sumer, where the earliest beer recipe can be found, some may have died at the king's hand over bad beer while others were exalted. Now that could be Guy Kavriel Kay's next historical fantasy novel. The tale of some brewer, probably a woman, being raised to courtier due to her prowess with the brew. In a slightly more contemporary note, Toronto Beer Week starts tomorrow and there will be a documentary about the guy who may have started the modern era of beer judging, Michael Jackson.

He approached beer in a local and historical approach, treating beer as a product of terroir. He made a modern differentiation between ales and lagers and started to form the framework for describing different styles of beer. His first major work was written in 1977. I was unable to find where he defined bad beer but did find where he talked about what some others thought bad beer was. This definition of styles led, of course, to judging how well a beer met a style. Before we get there, let\s talk about the other experts that have come since Michael Jackson.

Battle of the Experts: Sommeliers

There are two recognized arbiters of beer and beer service are Prud'homme and Cicerone. Both are focused on delivering beer as intended by the brewer. The lower levels of Prud'homme are geared towards appreciating beer to the final levels where you are expected to achieve a level of proficiency in terms of 'methods of designing, developing and facilitating beer education programs and events'. Cicerone helps servers get to understand all aspects of beer and to serve the beer in a way that it should be. These both hint at the intention of the brewer and ensuring that the beer served is free of technical defects from improper storage or serving. There is that word, intentionality. That will show up in the fourth part of this series.

Unfortunately, bad beer, in absence of defects, is not discussed in either syllabus. So, the experts are refusing to weigh in on bad beer or is it something else? Let's go a step further and discuss judging of beer because many of these people who achieve sommelier status, at some point, judge beer at competitions.

Here Come the Judge

There are a few judging bodies but I'm only going to tackle the Beer Judge Certification Program because it is one of the best documented of the bunch. They publish clear study guides and beer style guides. There are objective and measurable characteristics with clear examples. For instance, Lite American Lager states that there may be some light corn and sweetness and that strong flavours are a fault. Examples of this style are, you guessed it, Miller Lite and Coors Light. So, they are supposed to taste like that. Hunh, who would have thought that?

More importantly, the purpose of the judging and scoring is to:

• To give the entrants valuable feedback on the quality of their brew as perceived by the judges in order to enhance the quality of homebrewing.
• To provide training for aspiring beer judges.
• To maintain valid standards of judging.

Took the above from their site. They are trying to help homebrewers be better. When you enter a competition, you have to state what style you are brewing. Even if you do a fruit beer, which is a catchall category, you still should note the underlying style that you have added fruit. Once again, it is about the intention of the brewer. A 'bad' beer is one that does not conform to the ideals of the brewer. 

Styles do evolve and get created over time. Older styles are often revived. The workings of how this happen can be seen by looking at how the judging guide has changed. None of this gets us closer to bad beer, though. We get from the experts is that the history and geography of a beer matters. The way that the brewer intends the beer to be appreciated matters. 

So, in the last part, I'm going to try to pull these two elements, the drinkers and the brewers together in some way at getting at the bad beer. 

Before I get to that one, a few things. This part will be my weakest. I can't pretend to be well versed in beer judging and it was only with hours of research that I could make sense of this area. What this post has kindled in me is a sense that maybe I should spend some time looking at these three programs. If you are at all interested in understanding the depth and breadth of beer nerdery, I would recommend highly going through the three websites. 

The second thing is that in the last week, a great post summing up the approach from the other side was posted. I include the link here because it definitely gets at how not to be a jackass and how to be a good snob. 

Beer Forward Restaurants

A nearby cafe, Lazy Daisy's Cafe, had a contest to help determine the beer selection. I reviewed this place when it opened and it has largely lived up to my assessment. It is a local focused business and all of its effort goes into creating and maintaining their prime clientele of families. Now it is time to expand the business to include evenings. Already they have had comedy nights where some headliners try out some of their new material. There has been alcohol served under a special occasions permits but now, alcohol will become a fixture.

My recent restaurant reviews have included some type of assessment of the beer available with the food and how it matches. So, I am now wondering what advice would I give someplace like a local cafe on what to include on their craft beer list. We'll ignore all those definitions for local and just go with a more woolly idea that the beer has to be able to be delivered within four of five hours of an emergency beer call.

Lagers: There are two good reasons for this entry, the first is to piss off the craft beer snobs and second, lagers are the most popular beer in the world. You have to give people something they recognize and like. You could get a little loose with this definition of lager and include Kolsch as a style. Steamwhistle, Lug Tread, Mill St. Organic are all reasonable. If you extend craft to include the way the beer is made rather than who owns them, then Beer Academy has a few and Creemore Springs would be a good addition. Only warning, don't only stock lagers. Find no more than three and go with it. These don't have to change often because stereotypical lager drinkers are ones that stick with it.

Farmhouse/Miner's Ale: These are spiced, flavoured ales that are known for their refreshing ability. Grissette was made for miners to drink and biere de garde and saisons were the same for farmers and their seasonal workers. Originally, these were all lower alcohol beer meant to go with the breaks during the work. Not to get you drunk but tasty. From experience, it is easier to get help if your lunch spread is tasty. The differences between farm work is slight so any advantage to getting help is a benefit. 

So, these all share a dryness factor, sometimes fruity and sometimes spicy. Great Lakes Brewery has three grissettes bottled but due to the low alcohol, they may not age well. Saisons and biere de garde will stay a little better but availability can be an issue. Oast House from Niagara is doing a number of these styles. Black Oak has a summer saison. Amsterdam has started experimenting and maybe they will continue to offer a new saison depending on the season. Nickelbrook, Bellwoods, and Sawdust City all do at least one good saison.

The saison beer style often appeals to those who drink red wine. The biere de garde can be a little malty. All of these pair well with common workers' food. I would advise cafes to change their ingredients on the sandwiches to go better with the brew. Mess around until you find something you like.

IPA: It's the standard beer for novice craft beer enthusiasts. That may be a little unkind but every brewery does one of these. This beer is great as a palate cleanser and pairs well with spicy foods. You gotta have one. Flying Monkeys does a good job with theirs and has that name brand recognition. In reality, most local brewers do a decent version from Amsterdam's Boneshaker, Double Trouble's Hops and Robbers to a little more food friendly but expensive to carry Spearhead. It might be best to get something that isn't on the LCBO shelves like GLB's Karma Citra or Wellington's Shangra-La to attract beer enthusiasts with something they may not have tried.

Witbier/Weissbier: A wheat beer goes great with food. Differences between the Belgian wit and the German weiss are that the wit is spiced and slightly sour while the weiss has banana and clove notes from the yeast. There are more nuances but that is the basics. This is the type of beer that you pull out for a summer day. If you are looking for a local German weissbier, you can't go wrong with Denison's Weissbier. It is phenomenal with scallops and seafood. If you do go with the witbier, then White Picket Fence by Bellwoods would be good. In general, if you are operating a bar/cafe on the east side, bringing west side microbrews like Indie Ale House, Bellwoods and Kensington would be a good idea. 

Porter/Stout:  Need something to go with dessert and for those people who say they only drink dark beers. Just for the record, the colour of the beer may have nothing to do with the flavour. When people talk about drinking dark beer, it is roasts and malts with chocolate and coffee tastes they are talking about. Mill St. Coffee Porter and Sawdust City's Long Dark Trip to Uranus are good examples. This is often treated like a seasonal, so maybe it would be good to offer either a porter/stout or a sour beer. 

All that stuff above is mainly about styles but what I mean by a beer forward menu is that there is at least a beer for each course that compliments and makes the meal more enjoyable. There must be a mix of recognizable names and new brews. There has to be some accessible beer for new drinkers but a challenging beer or two for aficionados. Might be worth a small bottled beer selection for just this purpose. The staff need to be able to explain what these beers are like and be able to suggest what goes with what. Lazy Daisy has gone a long way to engaging the local beer drinkers and this is what their business model has been. It will go a long way to help to gain goodwill from the regulars if they are included in making the decisions. If only every restaurant would take some simple steps to making their beer list more interesting for food pairing... 

Defining Bad Beer, Part 2

In the last post, I made the argument that unspoiled mass produced beer that did not taste bad was not enough to define bad beer. I suppose, I could have said that small, handcrafted brews made by dedicated guys drank by three people are not necessarily good beer, as well.

So rather than worry about one person's definition of "bad" beer, (that's me!), let's see what is out there for a whole bunch of people saying what is bad beer.

Crowd sourcing or the wisdom of crowds is a big deal nowadays. There are different levels of ability of each individual adjudging beer but the hope is that somehow the overall approach evens out.

The Beer Club for Drinkers

An instance of the clubby kind of bar room chat and discussions is The Bar Towel.  The people running the show there also do the Golden Tap awards and Canadian Beer News. Frequent contributors are beer bloggers, beer writers, brewers, drinkers and thinkers. There are some beer reviews and it can be a little inside baseball. There is little total panning of a beer and it is hard to get at what makes a bad beer by reading the reviews. The whole thing feels like sitting at the bar and asking the scruffy regular what he thinks of the beer. Except, it is in a bar like the Only or Bar Volo and the scruffmeister may have even brewed some beer at some time and loves to shake up the youngsters. It is a cool place to hang out and get and give tips on events, breweries, and homebrews and all sorts of beer business. Hard to find anything out about bad beer.

Social Drinkers

So, if you can't figure out what those people are saying on the discussion boards maybe something like the tweeter can help. Untappd comes the closest to that type of experience. You can add friends, 140 characters of info, check in where you are... sound familiar? There are differences of course, chief being a badge system. You get badges for drinking. Drinking a beer on a special day, kinds of beer, beer events, and ... just go look at the options. There are both micro/macro beer tabs so that you can track whatever in the hell you are drinking. The badge system moves you mostly towards variety and craft brews. Although there are some badges that would only be fulfilled by drinking from the same brewery and the 'lite' brews of the world, so I suppose there is some claim to be serving the macro market.

It is hard to try to figure out bad beer as all the bits are organized to get you your next good beer. You can get the top beer by the style by country. If you want to see if a particular beer rating, if you type it in, it will give you how many people have drank it and what the average score out of five is. So, Coors Light doesn't end up scoring bad.

Full disclosure, this is the application that I use to track my beer likes and consumption. The standard ranking system is out of five stars. My ranking works on three stars being average, two being a beverage that I don't want to taste again and one star being please "God, no, don't make me taste this again". If something has no stars assigned, it is just that I was too drunk or my taste buds are messed up or I'm just not sure yet. Given that type of idiosyncratic ranking from myself, I know better than to trust what I see.

If you can find a beer that you think is bad and it is confirmed as a one star by a large number of drinkers then that might be a bad beer. I have not been able to find one of those yet. Not sure if it is the madness of crowds but even something like Coors Light Iced T gets 2.5 stars. Maybe plebes don't know what they are drinking? So if we can't trust the ordinary people, who can we trust?

Okay, let's get a bit more elitist.

What Do You Call a Group of Beer Nerds?

Two sites where self selected beer nerds gather are ratebeer and Beeradvocate. These sites are primarily for 'sharing beer information' and 'respect(ing) beer'. There are articles on how to judge and taste beer. A lot of the material is good but there is a fine line between liking the finer things in life and judging other people's taste because they aren't yours. Snobs versus nerds is the way it is put on Beer Advocate.

There is a standard judging criteria that is followed by beer nerds wanting to be judges. Both these sites users will use this rubric often. This is helpful for you to understand what makes a good beer and indeed what kind of tastes are not to the style of beer or desirable in a beer. This makes for good understanding of relative merits of beers within categories. There are helpful guides on both sites to help the process.

So, onto the bad beer ranking on Beer Advocate. Handily, here is their bottom of the list. Their top of list for American Adjunct Lager includes PBR which is not one of my favourites but that may be a factor of where I tried it. Regardless, the brothers who run the site gave PBR a healthy mark and others on the site panned it. There may be a little play between beer nerds and snobs at work. If you take a look at some of the discussions, you get stuff about shelf turds, deviation ratios and questions on why would you like PBR. The deviation stuff is cool. It shows what the range of difference in the marks for any beer is and also an individual's deviation from the review average. The funny thing is that some people obsess how far away they are from the average mark as if it is some type of black mark on their ability to taste beer. It is possible that some beer is not universal and will strike someone's palate differently. It rings a little bit of I want to be different in the same way that those people are different. There is that fine elitist line.

Rate beer has a little bit of difference on their site. They have a list of the worst beers. Olde English 800 appears there and the brothers of Beer Advocate agree. On untappd, Olde English Canada gets a decent score but the American one seems to be about equal across the board. So, we have one candidate for a bad beer. Rate beer has a system of ranking a beer within a style. This exists in Beer Advocate but it is not as explicit. The explanation is here. This idea may explain why I wasn't able to find American Adjunct Lager as a style. That's one of those macro type beers. There even have a link for top macros that is broken. Not sure if they have noticed or care.

So what can we draw from these two? The problem with the lists on the two beer nerd sites is that there seems to be a bias towards micro ales and a bias against macro lagers, even though some of the more reputable tasters would rate some of the beer higher than the general users. The elitists can't agree on a bad beer as a group. Since there seems to be little agreement between the four sites listed above, maybe the crowd isn't enough? Democracy is the worst system except for all the others we have tried. Yup, that is a bastardized quote that I am not even going to look up. Check the google.

So, is this just the misinterpretation of self selected beer people and their understanding of judging? I guess to answer that we will have to wait for Part 3. That one may take a while because I want to do a little on the history of judging. Not something that I am an expert on. Vetted judges work, more or less, for the legal system. Some people make the bad quip about the system being a LEGAL system, not a JUSTICE system but we will wait until next time to chime in.

If you want to revisit Part 1 on what is not to be considered bad beer then go back and click earlier in the sentence.