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Lambic Digest #0461
From postmaster at lance.colostate.edu Tue Oct 4 04:37:32 1994
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From: lambic-request at lance.colostate.edu (subscription requests only - do not post here)
To: lambic at lance.colostate.edu
Subject: Lambic Digest #461 (October 04, 1994)
Date: Tue, 4 Oct 1994 00:30:15 -0600
Lambic Digest #461 Tue 04 October 1994
Forum on Lambic Beers (and other Belgian beer styles)
Mike Sharp, Digest Coordinator
Contents:
Re: Lambic Digest #459 (October 02, 1994) (TANTILLO)
Re: Lambic Digest #460 (October 03, 1994) (ptimmerm)
DeTroch? (Spencer.W.Thomas)
Framboise Noir Help (Larry Lynch-Freshner)
Wit Yeast ("RKESSLER")
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 3 Oct 1994 11:49 EDT
From: TANTILLO at ocelot.Rutgers.EDU
Subject: Re: Lambic Digest #459 (October 02, 1994)
Hi,
I have enjoyed reading lambic digest, but could
you take me off the mailing list since I don't really
ever get a chance to read them?
Thanks,
Chris
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 3 Oct 94 08:54:30 PDT
From: ptimmerm at mashtun.JPL.NASA.GOV
Subject: Re: Lambic Digest #460 (October 03, 1994)
Martin Lodahl writes:
{
Dave has acquired limited access to HPLC, and proposes to prepare
standardized wort samples from a variety of extracts, for analysis
of their sugar profiles.
}
Sounds great. I haven't used one since school days, but remember
clearly how quick and easy it was. I have a great paper which
looks at ability of several yeasts to metabolize various sugars.
This is an excellent way to characterize yeast metabolic abilites,
without the need of mutluple tests. Anybody want to spring for one?
I'll drive! :-) Just the thing to make a yeast test interesting.
Opps! lambic digest, Ill talk lambics. OK I found a source of
used wine barrels, which the vintner says have pediococcus, and
is willing to sell for $40.00. Cautions? Comments? Barrel Lust?
paul t-
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 3 Oct 94 12:44:30 EDT
From: Spencer.W.Thomas at med.umich.edu
Subject: DeTroch?
A bunch of "lambics" from DeTroch brewery (brand name "Chapeau") just
showed up here. I tried the Geueze (and avoided the Banana,
Pineapple, etc.) Pretty bland. Not sour, not sweet, only a hint of
character. Why does Jackson say this is a good example? Or have they
really gone downhill lately? Or is it just blandified for the export
market?
=Spencer in Ann Arbor, MI
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 3 Oct 1994 12:52:25 -0800
From: <larrylf at taligent.com> (Larry Lynch-Freshner)
Subject: Framboise Noir Help
Help!
I've taken 2 gal. of my pLambic and put it into a seperate container with a
few pounds of black raspberries, in order to make a Framboise Noir. After
2 days there was no initiation of secondary fermentation. OK, a year is a
long time, so I decided to help things along, and added some more yeast.
Its been 2 more days, there is still no activity. Any ideas out there?
BTW: The pLambic has a very nice aroma, with lots of lactic and some
brett. in the nose. Its flavor is mild though. Definatly sour, with
enough complexity to be at least semi-satisfying. I don't know what the
%acid is (or how to determine for Lactic. I do have an acid kit for wine,
but I don't know how to translate from tarteric).
delete LarryLF->OrphanOpinion(*this);
------------------------------
Date: 03 Oct 1994 16:29:16 EST
From: "RKESSLER" <RKESSLER at HR.HOUSE.GOV>
Subject: Wit Yeast
On the spur of the moment, I bought a package of Wyeast's
"Belgian White Beer" yeast. Can anyone out there give me a
profile on this? My local brew store suprisingly didn't have a
profile. Are there any bugs in this? How does it attenuate? Is
it very temperature sensitive?
I recall some vague discussion about this yeast in the past, but
I don't remember anyone giving anything definitive. Phil Seitz,
if you're out there, I need you!
Thanks in advance for providing the guidance I so desperately
need!
- --Rick Kessler (rkessler at hr.house.gov)
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 3 Oct 94 16:26:21 PDT
From: ptimmerm at mashtun.JPL.NASA.GOV
INTRODUCTION
Frank Boon runs a lambic brewery in the traditional brewing town
of Lembeek,south of Brussels. This brewery has been hailed as
the new wave of lambic brewers. In many ways he is on the
cutting edge, with exporting beer as far away as California. In
other ways, his brewing vision is a return to the past. Frank
has been exposed to the brewing arts since his childhood. Ginder
Brewery of the village of Mirchtim was run by the Boon family.
They made a selection of ales, lagers, and table beers. These
beers were distributed to the village and the surrounding area
only. It was closed in the 1970's when his cousin closed
the doors for good. By this time Belgians were drinking 90%
lager beers. This was not the end of the beer for the Boones.
He began to distribute craft beers within Belgium, supplying a
good deal of the beers in Brugge and throughout Flanders.
Competition grew , as the craft beer trade began to burgeon, the
decision to become a lambic blender was made. In 1989, he moved
from blending and doing the fermentation to having a complete
brewery. By this time lager beer drinking in belgium is down to
70% of the market share. The Boon brewery is leading the charge,
but using very traditional beer to do so. This classic
brewery, in its historic setting, and the philosophy of the
brewer himself are what make this product special.
The history of the barrels used for making lambic beers tell much
about the times. During WWI, one half of the barrels in Brussels
were taken by the germans for use in making sauerkraut and other
foods. However, after world war two, many 7000 liter casks were
returned as war reparations to belgium. There are a great number
of these huge casks in Frank Boon's cellars. They are not often
used by lambic brewers because they would hold an entire brew, and
blending would be difficult.
HISTORY OF THE AREA
Historically, Lembeek was an enclave between Hainaut and Brabant,
which are now provinces. The geography of the area is dominated
by the river Senne. Lembeek was a walled enclave set on a
peninsula formed by the bending river, creating a strategic
position. The last war for Lembeek ended in the treaty of 1121,
after about 65 years of fighting. This treaty made the enclave
independent, and it was said it relied only on "God and the Sun"
This enclave did not have to pay taxes to its larger neighbors,
but was able to levy its own. Being situated on the major trade
route from Paris to Brussels, the economic situation there was
quite favorable. During the 1800's there were 43 breweries in
Lembeek, and the "lambic" beers produced were the most popular in
Belgium. This historic note explains the popularity of lambic
beers in both Paris and Brussels today. While this has been
reported before, it bears repeating. The effect of the french on
this area cannot be forgotten.
At the time of the french revolution, this town was known for
it's distilling. The french word for still is "alembic". The
local products were considered competition for the french brandy
industry, and the brewers/distillers were put out of business by
the rulers in France. Despite this official ban, the locals
still managed to get through the locked doors and operate their
equipment occasionally. With the loss of the special tax status,
there was little reason for brewers to stay in Lembeek, so most
that remained moved to the south of Brussels, where they had been
doing blending and distribution for some time.
KEEPING ABILITY
Before the advent of Lambic beers, there were other styles of
beer that were popular. Two were "waegebaert" and "cuyte". The
little information available indicate that these were darker
beers, with a very limited shelf life. The term "faro"
originates with these older beers, which were also sweetened
before drinking.
INGREDIENTS
The raw ingredient for the grist at Boon are 42% raw wheat and
58% malted barley, with a color of 4.0 to 4.5 ebc. The preferred
barley varieties are Triumph, with Alexis and pils malts being
less desirable. The malster contracted for the grain is Mouterij
Dingermans Stabroek. The malt is custom made to order, with 30%
overage typical in the order, so that there is never a shortage.
The surplus is typically sold off.The hops used are Poperingen,
Brewers Gold, and Northern Brewer. The hops are annualized, or
stored to reduce bittering. 400 grams per liter of hops are
used, with historic values being closer to 600 g/l.
THE BREWING TECHNIQUE
The most traditional method of brewing is used at Boon, the
turbid mashing system. This system is much less well known in
the US than either the infusion or decoction systems. It has
been developed to deal with the high raw wheat content and
provide the proper wort for spontaneous fermentation to proceed
with high levels of unfermentables and free amino acids. The
disadvantages of the system are the lengthy brewing time and the
specialized equipment. The brewing day at Boon is very long,
starting at 7:00 a.m. The grist in ground by a single mill, with
the wheat is ground to a fine powder. The grist is gravity fed
into the mashtun, which has cast-iron false bottoms. Strike
water is added at 32oC before adding the grist. The complicated
gear driven mash rakes insure that there is good mash-in. Milky
wort, from the top of the mash, is drawn off via a side arm
arrangement on the mashtun. This wort is pumped up to a copper
where it is boiled for five minutes to deactivate the enzymes.
The kettle then receives boiling water from another copper, which
is fed in via a "scottish cross", which directs the hot liquor
throughout the mash. After stepping the mash up to 78oC, by
adding boiling water, and filling up the mashtun, wort is drawn
off through the false bottom. At this point, the starch test
still shows positive, indicating starches in the runoff. The wort is
pumped up into an empty copper, where the hot liquor was taken
from. Then the turbid wort, at near boiling temperature is
returned to the mashtun. 120 minutes elapse for conversion, and
then wort is again drained through the false bottom. Some of the
key effects of this system of mashing are: the ability to break
down large amounts of albumen and other long chain proteins into
smaller usable free amino acids, the selective destruction of
alpha-amylase, by extraction in the turbid wort and
denaturization in the copper with boiling, and the resulting
production of wort with a large fraction of longer chain sugars
and starches. The lambic beer brewed is at 12.7 plato.
IN THE COPPER
The boil lasts for 4.5 to 5 hours. The brewery only uses anuated
hops, which have lost there flavor attriburtes. After the boil,
the wort in pumped into the roof for separation from the hops,
cooling, and spontaneous inoculation, by wild yeasts from the
atmosphere.
FERMENTATION
The inoculation occurs in the cooling tanks above the brewery.
The wort is allowed to come down to 18-20oC. The goal at this
early stage is to get a rapid start to fermentation, like in all
brewing. Rapid in this case refers to less than three days.
Once fermenting the wort is pumped into casks, where is will
stay. The casks provide a semi-aerobic environment, where both
aerobe and anaerobes can coexist. Any cask which is too
permeable to air will allow to many aerobes, causing excess
acetic acid build up.
THE BREWING SEASON
Brewing only takes place from after the first hard frost until
spring. When the daily temperature is above 8-10oC, brewing is
stopped. This usually means from October through April. In this
time, 50 brews are put up, of around 7000 liters each, this gives
a yearly production of 350,000 liters per year. There are
typically about 300,000 liters in wood at any one time in the
warehouse.
BLENDING TECHNIQUES
Gueuze was traditionally made by a method similar to the german
kreusening method, with only five percent young beer being added
with a small amount of yeast and sugars. Today, the typical
gueuze blend has only 50% aged beer, with the remainder being
young lambic. The base beer was traditionally aged 18-24 months,
but this too is changing to accommodate higher production levels.
Frank still bottles using the old 95% method, and uses a dosage
with a yeast concentration of 2000000 cells/ml to start the
refermetation.
PRODUCTS TODAY
The mix of production a Boon is as Follows: Kriek 80%, Faro 2%,
Framboise 2%, and Gueuze 16%. Traditionally all of these beers
were unfiltered. Today, many of these beers are filtered. The
exceptions at Boon are the Marage Parfait, which is the deluxe
bottlings of kriek and gueuze. The extra handling required for a
sedimented product is a drawback for mass marketing.
KRIEK
Kriek is a very popular drink today, with boon kriek showing up
in at least 7 countries. Historically, Kriek was a sweetish,
seasonal drink favored by the ladies. The cherries typically
ripen the third week of July, and the kriek started showing up in
brasseries three weeks later. The Boon example forgoes the
sweetness, but doesn't finding lacking cherry flavor. The
reason is lots of cherries, about 35 metric tones per year, of
which 25% are used when fresh. The cherries are left on the beer
for six weeks at Boon. The smallish tart Sharbeek cherries,
called krieken, that grow in flanders. This product has become
so popular that it nor accounts for 80% of the Boon production.
QUALITY AND HISTORY
There are a number of factors at work in the lambic production
and their level of acceptance by the public. Historically, tastes
have changed, and the market has responded as best it could. It
was common early in the century in belgium to have cafes which
did their own blending of beers. The typical blended beer was
faro, which was mixed every day, from cask lambic and candy
sugar. This beer was traditionally taken from the second quality
beer from the lambic brewers. At one time 90% of the lambic
brewers production was distributed locally for blending.
First quality beers are dry, sherry-like, and of a modest
sourness. These were reseved for Gueuze. Bottling of Lambic
increased after WWII, as consumers viewed them as being more
fashionable. This forces many more second quality beers to be
blended into bottled gueuze. These relatively sour, or hard
Gueuzes are today considered very traditional. But there is an
older tradition, which is of less sour Gueuze, which is the pre-
war tradition, when only the finest barrels were bottled. It can
be argued that these factors have played an important role in the
resurgence in popularity of Lambics. Beer tastes were moving
away from the sour beers that were becoming typical of the
bottled lambics. Now, with less sour, but very traditional
lambics available again, there is something of a return to to
favor in the beer lovers.
------------------------------
End of Lambic Digest
************************
-------
