Hey Barkeep! I’ve Got A Lot of Questions

Usually with "Hey Barkeep!" we try to answer one question in detail. This month we're going to take a few questions – some from real live folks, but some from the searches that end people on this site. As I'm sure you are aware, I have the ability to see how many people visit this site each day (for those interested, it's around 100 per day, plus another 100 from RSS feeds). About one-third to forty percent of those visits are from search engines. Did you know that I can also see what people searched for that resulted in them being at my site? It's great fun.

But first. Trust me we will do a much bigger piece on this closer to Memorial Day, but on Wednesday we were talking about beers for grilling and BBQs. So, what would I recommend for drinking with grilled chicken? On the first day that the ol' MBR grill got busted out for the year, we had grilled chicken marinated in tandoori and garam masala spices and a lemon artichoke salad (with some carrots and potatoes thrown in for good measure). Paired with this wonderful food, we had the De Proefbrouwerij Saison Imperiale, a Special Reserve Belgian Farmhouse Ale from the Brewmaster's Collection. It was purchased for $9.99 + tax (about $10.25 or so) at Steve's on the west side. Also under consideration for this meal was the Thiriez Blonde ($12.99 plus tax). The Imperial Saison (nomenclature aside) complimented the chicken well. While I would have preferred a bit more hops (maybe the Blonde would have been better), the pleasant fruity tartness cleaned the palate well and the additional body on a traditionally lighter-bodied beer didn't make me full. The musty, cherry and lemon aromas complimented the chicken's earthy spices and the salad's acidity. All-in-all, a good choice.

On to the searches; these are all real search terms that resulted in hits on this website in just this past week:

Q: "Steam beer is classified as which general beer style"
A: Back in January we talked about a taxonomy of beer. We talked about how the "family" of beer has two "genus" types – ales (top fermenting yeast) and lagers (bottom fermenting yeast). Steam beers use lager yeast, so they are technically, lagers. We then discussed how you can group the genus of ale or lager into two species: warm fermenting and cold fermenting. And in each genus you will have beers of each species. Most ales are warm fermented (temperatures above 55 degrees F), but porters are cold fermented ales. Similarly, most lagers are cold fermented (temperatures below 45 degrees F), but steam beers are warm fermented. So, to answer the question: steam beer is a warm-fermented lager.

Q: "Average amount of alcohol compunction"
A: Compunction: a feeling of deep regret. Despite my guess that the person meant "consumption" not "compunction" I would guess that the average amount of feeling of deep regret related to alcohol is fairly high and directly proportional to "consumption" on a rising logarithmic scale.

Q: "Drank too much and vomited"
A: Yeah. That'll happen. Probably a great amount compunction (see above).

Q: "Alcohol spending in Wisconsin"
A: For the most recent data I could find online (Fiscal Year 2002), the state of Wisconsin collected $9.6 million in excise taxes on beer. At $2 per barrel (although there are some breweries that only pay $1 per barrel), that's more than 4.8 million barrels (31 gallons) of beer. Given that Wisconsin only has 5.6 million people, 24% of whom are under 18, that's over a keg of beer per adult in 2002. To get a rough idea of the amount that we spend on beer, we can multiply the number of barrels sold by the going-rate for a keg (31 gallons, also called a "half-barrel", but one of these days we'll get into this weird naming system). Ranging from $45 (Natural Light) to $150 (Guinness), we can take a weighted average and call it, maybe $80? Would you agree that that's fair? So $80 a keg for 4.8 million kegs is $384 million or thereabouts. A third of a billion dollars on beer alone in the state of Wisconsin. Nice.

Q: "What is rauch ale"
A: Rauch beers are smoked beers. They can be either ales or lagers. In either case, the malts are smoked before use, traditionally over beech-wood, in some cases hickory or apple woods. For the smoking process, the malted barley is confined with smoking wood for a period of time (as little as a few hours, as much as a day or two) then used in an otherwise normal brewing process. I haven't heard of breweries "cheating" and using "liquid smoke", but I'm sure it happens.

Q: "Returnable beer bottle Indiana"
A: Don't know. Why don't you ask the Hoosier Beer Geeks?

It's The End of Summer

This summer has been pretty active around here. Beer fests galore. Lots of great summer wheat beers - Leinie's, Capital, and New Glarus all had particularly good years for their wheat beers. Leinie's had their best-selling seasonal beer in their Summer Shandy. Which, if if you haven't tried it (and based on Leinie's numbers, you probably have) it's surprisingly decent. It's a lemonade-ish beer (a "shandy" is typically half lemonade, half wheat beer) that goes down well bitterly cold. And, the nice thing about it, at least for me, is that it doesn't give me that beer drudgery that I get when I drink a cold beer on a hot day after working outside.

While the American wheat beers (some ales, some lagers) have been particularly popular, there are two types of wheat beer that have been, if not ignored, at least not pushed as hard: wit, and saison. These are both interesting wheat styles from Belgium and France.

The saison is interesting because as a style it almost went extinct. Recently there has been a revival of sorts and breweries all over the world are producing beers in the saison style. The saison originally started as a farmhouse beer with each one tasting far different the next. At the end of winter, a batch was brewed in preparation for the summer work. Because refrigeration didn't exist yet, the beers were typically fermented at temperatures much higher than usual (side note: typically ales are fermented at around 65-75 degrees). This was possible because of unique yeast strains that were capable of withstanding such high temperatures (sometimes up to 90 degrees). Moreover, because of the high fermentation temperatures and long bottle-conditioning periods (filter!? HAH!) these beers can have a quite a sharp alcohol-y taste. Some reports indicate that these were initially very low-alcohol beers (3% ABV or so), but they are now typically in the 5-8% ABV range. Of course, Americans like their hops, so the American versions of saisons can sometimes be fairly hoppy, but typically the hop profile was moderate with extensive use of the european noble hops (grassy and citrus-y).

The most famous of the American saisons is the Hennepin from Ommegang brewery in New York (Ommegang is actually owned by the Belgian brewery responsible for Duvel). The Hennepin (BA.RB.) is wonderfully complex, yet light, not overbearing, but definitely assertive. The yeast is definitely the show, but the malt and hops provide a wonderful chorus. Also available around the Madison area is the new Farmhouse Brewery Saison 7 out of California. (BA.RB.) It's not quite as assertive, not quite as bold, and a bit thin tasting. It's hard to pick out quite what is wrong with it, but between a lower yeast profile, a strange hop profile (more lemony than typical), and lower carbonation than the Hennepin it is definitely a more muted saison. But, it is a style definitely worth checking out and you can't go too wrong with either of these as your starting point.

Another interesting style is the wit. The wit is a very un-American style because it is typically very low hopped (if at all), but the Americans actually make some pretty examples. The Northern Europeans famous for this style typically used spices such as coriander, bitters, and orange as preservatives instead of the hops preferred by the English and Germans. They are typically golden in color and hazy with a strong foamy head. In the US we tend to bastardize these drinks by putting a slice of orange or lemon in them (e.g., Blue Moon).

The American gold standard of this style is the Great Lakes Holy Moses White Ale. It is fruity and light, with an astringent bite, and a light, moderately carbonated feel. Ommegang Brewery also makes a wit that is quite good if you can find it around town. More popular in the stores (although the Great Lakes is widely available) is the Victory Brewing Company's Whirlwind Wit. It is a very good example of the style with a moderate fruitiness (not nearly as strong as the Holy Moses), with a bit less body, and a clean, crisp finish.

There aren't a whole lot wits from the Wisconsin breweries. This is somewhat surprising given the Northern European decendency of many of the residents here. I think the biggest reason for this is the saturation of the market by the American wheats and light lagers. Hopefully, maybe next year, some of the breweries can give the style a running shot.