Smoked beer

Smoked beer (German: Rauchbier) is a type of beer with a distinctive smoke flavour imparted by using malted barley dried over an open flame.[1] The Rauchbiere of Bamberg in Germany, Schlenkerla in particular,[2][3] are the best-known of the smoked beers, although in Poland there is also a long history of producing such beers, called Grodziskie.

Schlenkerla Rauchbier straight from the cask (Schlenkerla tavern, Bamberg, 2003)

History

Drying malt over an open flame may impart a smoky character to the malt. This character may carry over to beers brewed with the smoked malt. Prior to the modern era, drying malted barley in direct sunlight was used in addition to drying over flames. Even though kiln drying of malt, using indirect heat, did not enter into widespread usage until the industrial era, the method was known as early as the first century BC. Also, there have been various methods over the years of preparing cereal grains for brewing, including making beer from bread,[4] so smoked beer was not universal.

Beginning in the 18th century, kiln drying of malt became progressively more common and, by the mid-19th century, had become the near-universal method for drying malted grain. Since the kiln method shunts the smoke away from the wet malt, a smoky flavour is not imparted to the grain, nor to the subsequent beer. As a result, smoke flavour in beer became less and less common, and eventually disappeared almost entirely from the brewing world.

Bamberg Rauchbier

Bamberg smoked beers

Certain breweries maintained the smoked beer tradition by continuing to use malt which had been dried over open flames. The malt is dried over fires made from beechwood logs. The malt and fermenting beer are stored under the pub and brewery in a part of the catacombs of Bamberg, a maze of tunnels under the city built from the 11th century onward, which have a very stable moisture and temperature. In former times, ice was used to cool the fermenting beer tank room, the Lagerkeller. This ice was locally harvested above ground in the winter, although when the winter was too mild, ice was imported from as far away as Finland or Sweden. The beer is then filtrated to remove the opaque colour and yeast remnants, and put into oaken vats. Two brewpubs in Bamberg, Germany, Schlenkerla and Spezial, have continued this smoked beer production for more than a century.[5][6] Several varieties of Rauchbier ("smoke beer" in German) are produced by these companies. Both are still in operation today, alongside seven other breweries in the same town. Since the rauchbier tradition was continuously preserved in Bamberg, the beer style is now marketed as Bamberg Rauchbier.

Due to the popularity of craft beer in recent years, industrially made, smoke-flavoured malts became available, and so the style has been attempted worldwide, including in its heartland of Franconia and Bamberg. Schlenkerla and Spezial, however, use a traditional, elaborate way of smoke malting. In 2017 Slow Food included these two Rauchbiere into their Ark of Taste.[7]

Grodziskie

Grodziskie or Grätzer are similar, traditional smoked beers from Poland, but made from wheat and highly carbonated, and with a perhaps older history, although they saw a period of no production in the late 1990s.[8][9][10][11][12][13]

Smoked beers outside Germany and Poland

  • In Canada, Les Trois Mousquetaires makes a smoked beer, and Half Pints Brewing Company the seasonal 'Smoktoberfest'. Also, Church-Key brewing of Campbellford, Ontario produces a peat smoked Scotch ale called 'Holy Smoke'. Cameron's brewing in Oakville, Ontario produces 'Bamburg Castle' smoked ale. Moosehead Breweries Small Batch label now produces a smoked lager using magnum hops.
  • In Chile, Cervecería La Montaña produces 'Yuta', a smoked Munich dunkel (5,6% abv) with traditional German ingredients, although it doesn't follow the classic base beer styles from Bamberg's Rauchbiere.
  • In Lithuania, Dundulis brewery produces a smoked beer called 'Juodvarnių'.
  • In the Netherlands, Emelisse produces a traditional German-style smoked beer, as well as a smoked porter and a peated Russian imperial stout. Brouwerij De Molen has several different smoked beers, such as 'Bloed, Zweet & Tranen' and 'Rook & Vuur'. Othmar also produces a traditional smoked beer, named 'Rauchbier'.

See also

References

  1. Beer, by Michael Jackson, published 1998, pp.150-151
  2. Schlenkerla Tavern & its Heller Brewery and Rauchbier (Smoke Beer), Bamberg
  3. German Beer Guide: Rauchbier Archived 2016-02-20 at the Wayback Machine
  4. Beer in ancient times Archived September 4, 2014, at the Wayback Machine
  5. "Der Brauprozeß von Schlenkerla Rauchbier". Schlenkerla - die historische Rauchbierbrauerei (in German). Schlenkerla. 2011. Retrieved 11 December 2020.
  6. "Bamberg und seine Katakomben". Weltkulturerbe Bamberg und Bamberger Land (in German). Bamberg Tourismus & Kongress Service. 2011. Retrieved 11 December 2020.
  7. "Bamberger Rauchbier – traditionally brewed Bamberg smoked beer - Arca del Gusto". Slow Food Foundation. Retrieved 2019-01-07.
  8. "Brewers Association 2013 Beer Style Guidelines" (PDF). Brewers Association. February 28, 2013. p. 14. Retrieved 26 Feb 2015.
  9. Knoke, Jürgen (Spring 2015). "Grätzer – ein verschwundener Bierstil kehrt zurück" [Grätzer – a vanished beer style returns] (in German). brau!magazin. Retrieved 1 May 2015.
  10. Szmelich, Wiktor (1994). "O historii i sposobie wytwarzania unikalnego piwa grodziskiego [The history and unique manufacturing method of Grodzisk beer]" (PDF). Przemysł Fermentacyjny I Owocowo-Warzywny (in Polish): 7–10. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 22 Oct 2015.
  11. Warschauer, A. (1893). "Geschichte des Grätzer Bieres" [History of Grätzer beer] (PDF). In Historische Gesellschaft für Posen (ed.). Zeitschrift der Historischen Gesellschaft für die Provinz Posen: Band 8 [Journal of the Historical Society of the Province of Posen: Volume 8] (in German). Posen: J. Jolowicz. pp. 333–352. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2016-03-12. Retrieved 30 Apr 2015.
  12. "The Legend of Bernard of Wąbrzeźno". Instytucja Kultury Samorządu Wojewodztwa Wielkopolskiego. Retrieved 22 October 2015.
  13. Scott, William Shawn (2012). "Project Grodziskie: A Polish Renaissance" (PDF). Zymurgy (Nov/Dec 2012): 34–39. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2015-04-02. Retrieved 24 Mar 2015.
  14. "SmokeStack Rauchbier". Gulf Brewery. 2018-04-11. Retrieved 2019-08-19.
  15. "Beers". Birrificio Lambrate. Retrieved 26 July 2016.
  16. "norwegian smoked beer". haandbryggeriet.no. Retrieved 2019-08-19.
  17. Groves, Sarah (17 October 2014). "Adnams 1659 Smoked Ruby Ale and The Great Fire of Southwold". Retrieved 2 December 2016.
  18. "Smog Rocket". Beavertown Brewery. Retrieved 2019-08-19.
  19. "Great Basin Brewing". Nevada Brewers Guild. Archived from the original on 20 December 2010. Retrieved 8 April 2013.
  20. "Tap It Thursday | Tomfoolery Brewing Company". tomfoolerybrewing.com. Retrieved 2018-03-08.
  21. "New Paltz Brewing Co (Pfälzerbräu)". Retrieved 2018-09-17.
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