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

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)