Pilsner
All's Gold that Starts Gold
Drew & John Aitchison
A Generic Term
for something specific
Pilsner
- literally means from the town/area of Plzeň in Bohemia
- Human beings did what they do with that and now virtually every pale lager is a "Pilsner"
- Looking at you Miller Lite "Taste a True Pilsner"
- Also, I used to hate Pilsner - until Trumer
Lager History
as near as we can tell
Some Lager Facts
- German word for "store"
- Summer brewing produced bad beer due to microbiology (100+ years before the "cell", 200+ before Pasteur)
- Bavaria banned brewing from April 23-Sept 29 for 300 years
- Winter brewing favored cold fermentation yeasts
- The cold storage reputedly produced cleaner, drier, "finer" beers (and selected for some unique yeasts)
- Thank lager brewing for refrigeration and a/c (Spaten)
The Yeasts
- The old ways of classifying it
- raffinose
- bottom fermenting
- Today, genetics are showing
- most of that earlier stuff was rubbish
- S. pastoranius is a hybrid of S. cerevisiae and S. eubayanus (from Tibet/China)
- Different strains demonstrate different levels of their parent characteristics.
- S carlbergensis name is deprecated (Emil Hansen)
The Story of Pilsner
- Starts in Bavaria
- Jealously guarding their yeast strain
- Making lager version of Einbeck beers
- Beers were much like Dunkel or darker
- Josef Groll - November 11, 1842
- Combined Bavarian Lager yeast and know how with English pale malting techniques to generate Pilsner
- Within a few decades, Pilsner style beers are everywhere
Why?
-
Pilsner was unlike anything seen before on a mass scale.
- Light, golden, clear and...
-
The Rise of Cheap Glassware
- Who wants murky beer when you can see it?
- hmmm....
- Who wants murky beer when you can see it?
- As we'll see brewing since has been in response
- Also, very importantly - the Czechs have a ton of varieties of lagers... we just obsess over Pilsner
Diving into Pilsner
The Water
- Water is a key to Bohemian/Czech Pale Pilsner
- Low carbonate/sulfate water
- allows for less adjustment of pH with Pale Malt
- allows for more hop additions without a burning bite
- Pilsen profile:
- Ca:7 Mg:2 Na:2 CaS04:8 Cl-:6 HCO3:16
- bring your Ca up to 50 for smooth sailing
The Malt
- Traditional floor malted barley of Moravia
- A number of American lager malts are derived from Moravian malts (particularly Coors)
- Weyermann Barke Pils is a decent stab in the right direction
- Want the palest malt 2-3°L
- In a classic Pilsner, the only thing in the mix is that special malt
The Mash
- To Decoct or Not to Decoct....
- The conflict
- Fewer German brewers decoct
- Czech brewers swear by it
- All sorts of schedules - single, double and the vaunted triple
The Hops
- Zatec/Saaz hops are the standard.
- Other Nobles/Pseudo Work
- Tettnanger Tettnang, Hallertauer, Mt Hood, Willamette
- Oxidized Beta acids yielding spicy aromas
- You want a firm bitterness - nearly 1:1 with the OG
The Boil
- 90 minute is tradition to deal with concerns about SMM/DMS
- With more modern malts, less of a concern, but you still want a fair concentration to help boost the beer body
- So many schedules
- Classic - Pitch at 50°F, run for 2 weeks, raise to 65°F for a few days (D-rest), slowly crash to 35°F and lager for 2-6 weeks
- Speed - Pitch at 50°F, raise to 55°F after 2-3 days, raise to 60°F for another run and then to 65°F for 1-3 days before crashing.
- Very yeast strain dependent
- Diacetyl? Controversial (Classic in small doses, but...)
- Strains to consider
- Wyeast 2124 Bohemian Lager/WLP800
- WLP802 Czech Budejovice
- Imperial L28 Urkel
- Any of the 34/70 strains
The Ferment/Yeast
Tasting
Little Bo Pils - Smog City
Other Pale Lagers
(not including strong lagers)
Helles
- Developed at Spaten in 1894 as a way to battle the PIlsner juggernaut.
- Golden, clean, clean
- More malt centered with a fuller mouthfeel than Pilsner due to lower hopping (Munich Water)
- For Bavarians, Helles is still largely the drink of choice.
- Spaten Helles
N German Pils
- German pilsner malt
- Step mashed
- Defining characteristics
- harder water
- harder hop character (bitterness has reduced over time)
- Bitburger
Adjunct Lagers
- If You Don't Have Great Malt (or Malt is expensive), use something else
- Usual adjuncts are either corn or rice to give sweetness without body and allow a lighter, cleaner, drier beer.
- Profile varies around the world
- American examples - very little sweetness or anything after the ferment
- Asian examples, usually carry a big rice sweetness
American Craft Pils
- A lager evolution on the base Blond ale
- Lots of domestic pilsner malt
- Other malts brought on board to "enrich"
- Hops approach either:
- Noblish/Neutral
- Damn the torpedos
- Smog City
- Bo Pils is all traditional, German Malts, Noble Hops
- Hoppy Pils, still German malts, Cashmere, Waiti, Mandarina as hops
Italian Pils
- German Pils based, but suffused with hops
- Low pH target for Mash/Sparge (sparge at 5.5)
- Warm ferment
- Restrained hand with dry hops, but twice dosed
- Primary (0.25 oz)
- Secondary (0.5-0.75)
- Birrificio Italiano’s Tipopils / Firestone Walker Pivo
New Zealand Pils
- Half between a Pils and a Kolsch
- Warm ferment typical
- Bursting with NZ specific hops on the aroma. Bitterness is firm, but not overwhelming.
- Emerson’s Pilsner (originator of the style)
John's 2 Pilsner Day
Brewed Yesterday!
Tasting
Heater Allen
from Oregon.
Father/Daughter Team of Rick/Lisa Allen
Pilsner
By Drew Beechum
Pilsner
- 680