I've been thinking a lot about Wild Beers lately, appreciating them more and more, and also wanting to stay educated about them. I've heard brewers say they don't want people going around calling all wild beers 'sour beers' because, well, they aren't all sour. Take Trinity's TPS Report, Oakshire's Skookumchuck, or any of Crooked Stave's Wild Wild Brett series as an example, many of these could be described as delicate, rosy, lightly citrusy, and some of them have light acidity. These beers are neither Ales nor Lagers in the yeast-sense of those words, here's what Chad Yakobson says, "Brettanomyces is not ale or lager because those designations refer to a species of yeast, when you boil it down, Saccharomyces Cerevisiae ale yeast and Saccharomyces Carlsbergensis as lager yeast. Brettanomyces Bruxellensis and other species variants are a different type of yeast thereby not making ale or lager beer." So it's actually a bit strange to call one of these beers a 'Wild Ale' because it is not an ale if it's fermented with Brett...or is it an ale if it's fermented at ale temperatures? It get's confusing eh?
...But what can we call it? Brettanomyces, that's the yeast.. So how to properly designate what it is like in Belgian Ale...Belgian Brettanomyces? That doesn't fit for me...But what is going to? Maybe nothing because we are so ingrained in ale and lager. Brett isn't even much of a top fermenter...and it is aged for a while (you should or else it keeps eating away in the bottle and the bottles gush unless carefully opened...(All of our beers sadly do this.. I'm working on it..) So my best comparison for Brett is actually to lagers. That is more reasonable. Flavor wise, no.. but it's not about flavor it's about fermentation characteristics and genetics.So then, what do we call these beers? I've seen more and more brewers calling a beer a Wild Beer, or a 'Beer fermented with Brettanomyces,' or '100% Brettanomyces Beer,' or even something like 'A Porter with Brettanomyces.' Perhaps I appreciate the latter the most because it tells me a lot about the base style of the beer and that I can expect something on the funky side at the same time. The only problem I have with this is that I want some sort of sexy word, rather than a sentence description. Perhaps there are problems with this though, which I'll write about momentarily. Perhaps 'Wild' is that word? I'm not thrilled about the word, but others have come to accept it. Here's Matt Van Wyk of Oakshire on the term 'Wild' on a writeup on Brewpublic:
To me that’s a term that covers a wide range of beers aged on or fermented with organisms other than, or in addition, to the regular Saccharomyces strain of brewers yeast. Using a more broad term than “sours” will cover funky, sweaty, barnyard beers fermented with Brett, and also sour beers with Lactobaccilus of all levels of acidity. Some will argue that the term “wild” doesn’t really tell me much about the beer either, but I respond with Kolsch, Pilsner, Porter, Gratzer, Marzen……. What do these tell you about the beer you are about to drink? We’re smart creatures. We don’t need to use reds, whites, stouts, bitters, sours. Some also will argue that Brett and Lacto aren’t actually wild. They can be controlled. True, once you know how they behave and what they will do in your brewery they become much more predictable. But I might invite you into my barrel room where we can taste from about 36 oak barrels and each one is doing something different and has a different expression. The critters I’ve added are making their own schedule, and they often do it at what ever rate they want. To me, they are still wild.And here's Chad on the topic:
Then there is all about the styles and distinguishing of these beers. On ratebeer they are 'wild/sour ales.' Not really...well, "wild" yes. That is a term I have come to grips with. No, my beers are not wild, I intentionally use Brettanomyces just as everyone else intentionally uses Sacch strains. But Wild has come to mean anything with Brett in it, but also includes bacteria and the sort. But [the beer] does not have to be sour...So wild is a very broad grouping of beers which have yeast previously thought of as and traditionally called wild yeasts... So does Wild make sense for the designation of these beers? Even if it is not crazy wild.. and actually a delicate complex beer.. historically a wild yeast.. now used purposely.. This to me makes the most sense.So, perhaps now I can begin appreciating a bit more term 'Wild' because at Matt says you can automatically think about those Brett characteristics beyond just acidic or sour. It's just not as iconic sounding as Ale or Lager. It doesn't have the history but it's just missing that umph for me. I almost like "Brett" more as a word that comes off the tongue easier, as a word that does a good job sounding like it's delicate, rosy, and citrusy. Plus 'wild' could be debated on both sides, the yeast was historically wild, we control it pretty heavily now, but still don't know what it's going to do...and most brewer's go to great lengths to keep this yeast away from everything in the brew house. Whatever, maybe I'm just being silly wanting a sexy word. I'll have a Wild Beer please! The only problem with wanting a broad term like that is the same problem we have with people saying "I'll have an Ale please!" The problem is that there are an infinity of ales from thousands of breweries and they all taste different. We're not celebrating the craft or staying educated if we want the generic. I'll finish up with this great quote from Peter Bouckaert of New Belgium Brewing, quoted on the blog Divine Brew:
It’s interesting and a dangerous proposition to believe that the style will help the customer. Look what wine has done to itself. People are asking now for Pinot or a Sauvignon Blanc, they are not asking for a sustainable winery or Chad’s wine. All the wine's marketing investment has lead customers to ask for generic? Imagine the unimaginable that this would happen to us! That our customer would one day ask for an IPA instead of for Ranger. I think this would be our collective dead bed...- - -
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Finally! Time to recognise that the yeast-sense of the words "lager" and "ale" are fundamentally flawed and neither celebrate the craft nor educate.
ReplyDeleteLashings of Obergäriges Lagerbier all round!
I think wild is fine. It is short, simple and can include a large number of types (just like ales and lagers)As to the non-specific description, you mentioned there are many beer designations that do not directly fit to a characteristic descriptor based on taste or a physical aspect of the yeast but, instead us a geographic (Pilsner) or historic (porter) modifier. Just because Brett is used intentionally now, I think the wild term is still valid as historically that seems to have been the case. Furthermore when dealing with something such as beer or alcohol in general, there are always exceptions and paradoxes and I for one like it. The state of the beer industry is a conglomeration of thousands of years of history, innovation and cultural assimilation and I have no problem with a fairly complex system. After all, isn't providing advice and accurate information part of what good bartenders and beer salesmen are supposed to do?
ReplyDeleteThis is a great discussion, thanks for posting it. I agree with your first thought. I, too, want a sexy descriptor word. But I cannot figure what that word is either. I think "wild" is just OK. And "brett," while good for speaking, leaves a lot of drinkers needing more information (but, really, so does ale and lager). And this leads me to another thought on the matter--
ReplyDeleteWhat I want, even more than a sexy word for yeast designation, is an informed contingent of beer servers and sellers. Not everyone wants to be closely tended to during selection and purchase of beer, but if the people who sold beer were well versed in their wares, everyone (seller, purchaser, brewer, blogger) would be better off. Then, I could ask the person working the bar, or liquor store, what to expect from Spotted Cow, or La Folie, or The Abyss. I am not saying that every employee of every beer shop in the world needs to be a Cicerone, but having a general idea of the beer on their shelves, and the willingness to help the purchaser, would reduce the need for style, and further, yeast designations on beer bottles.
In the end, I guess I agree with Peter (fitting). But I realize the difficulty of this endeavor, and I realize that I am just talking out of my ass...
Either way, beer is cool, I like beer.
'Brett' also implies the beer is just brett when their may very well be different bacteria and/or an ale yeast involved.
ReplyDeleteSure I think bartenders and beer shop employees are supposed to be good at explaining beer but I also think this education falls heavily on the brewery, not in terms of marketing and branding per se, but rather to come up with terms that people will begin to understand increasingly. I think it's really easy for someone working at a pub to get backed up, really busy, and someone asks 'What's the WWBG' and they could just say 'It's a sour IPA' or something like that really quickly. The customer will be disappointed, although most people think Brett = sour. It's easy to do that, and we need better terminology for those moments. I can't imagine the bartender stopping on a really busy night to say 'It's similar to a grassy IPA but with Brett yeast...Oh, no, it's not sour, let me tell you something about Brett beers...' It's just not going to happen like that.
I've struggled with this, too. Nothing is perfect. Every name is problematic. Sour ales aren't always sour--or anyway, the wildness may be acid but not exactly sour. But wild is also a problem. Some breweries ferment their beers spontaneously--that's truly wild. Others wood-ferment it, which is mostly wild. (It's uncontrolled, anyway.) But a lot of breweries pitch cultured brett strains. These aren't wild, though.
ReplyDeleteIf you talk to breweries that do use spontaneous or wood-fermented systems, they take a very dim view of pitching wild yeasts. They rightly want their beers, which require long aging, blending, and careful tending, to be recognized as a different category. I'm sympathetic to that view.
I see my beer knowledge dream falling short too. Sometimes long talks about beer are not possible when you are staring at a room full of thirsty people.
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree that the education lies heavily on the brewery. But the terms given out by breweries to educate the drinkers steers us quickly to style designations. Which brings us back to what to call these beers.
Brett and wild and sour label designations mean something to those that spend time with craft beer. But with folks who are new at this, they can't rely on what those words mean to tell them what to expect from the beer (but ale and lager don't really do this either). And as Jeff pointed out these terms can be problematic at the brewery level as well.
I see the need for these designations, I guess, I just wish I didn't.