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....
  • 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

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