OnTap Magazine

and Pediococcus ) and the wild yeast Brettanomyces or ‘Brett’. It was aged for up to two years in wooden vats and served with mild or fresh beer to round- out the acidity. When you think sour beers, you immediately think Belgium. But Belgian sours were influenced by British brewing techniques. In the 1870s Eugene Rodenbach travelled to Britain to learn about beer ageing and the blending of young and old beers; later introducing those techniques in a classic Belgian sour, the famous Flanders Red ale. Brettanomyces means ‘British Fungus’, a name actually given by researchers at the Carlsberg Laboratory in 1904 to mean a spoilage organism of British ales. Brett was commonly found in the wooden vats and gave the beer an earthy, ‘funky’ flavour, which the British considered a desired quality. However, changing tastes meant Brett was largely driven out of British brewing, as were sours. STYLE AND SUBSTANCE... A beer style is a snapshot of a time, one that may change or stay constant as beers evolve. Much like a recipe, it enables brewers to create ‘authentic’ versions of a traditional style. But it can also be a starting place for innovation. The evolution of British beers may have influenced many of the beer styles we know today, but the British beer culture has always been more than the beer itself. No Autumn evening is improved more than by a pint of ale in a cosy English pub... other than perhaps by switching it up to a stout! Most beer styles fall into two general categories, defined by yeast type. Ales are mostly brewed using a top-fermenting yeast, while bottom-fermenting yeast is used for lager. Temperature and time further differentiate ale and lager - longer and cooler for a lager brew. Another classification is ‘wild ‘or ‘mixed’ fermentation, often called ‘spontaneously fermented’. These beers are fermented with bacteria (such Lactobacillus and Pediococcus ) and/or wild yeast (from the Brettanomyces family). Not all these beers are as untamed as you may think; outside of Belgium wild beers and sour ales will be inoculated directly with specific fermentation strains so that the brewing is controlled with the aim being to sour the beer. Spontaneous fermentation is when the entire fermentation process occurs in an uncontrolled or wild environment. Belgian Lambic is the product of spontaneous fermentation. Known as the ‘Mother of All Beers’ – a mix of funky, lemony acidic, barnyard horsey and dry - the Lambic style is the oldest of all existing beer styles and is specific to the Pajottenland region of Belgium. The beer is fermented in large shallow open vats (coolships) where airborne bacteria and yeast fall on to the cooling beer and begin the fermentation process. Lambic is stored in wooden barrels where it continues to ferment. Gueuze is a blend of young and old Lambic and it is traditional to add cherries (Kriek) to a young Lambic or raspberries (Framboise). Flanders Red ales and Flemish Bruin (or Oud Bruin) are also spontaneously fermented but in tanks and then aged in barrels where they develop a more vinegar-like sharpness due to the presence of acetic acid bacteria (Acetobacter) . These Belgian classics are beautifully complex in flavour. Once tasted, never forgotten. THE STRAINS AND THE STYLES OUR DISTRIBUTORS IN AFRICA: bevPLUS (PTY) ltd. and Dematech (PTY) ltd. 13 Michigan Street · Airport Industria · 7490 · Cape Town · South Africa Phone bevPLUS: + 27 - (021) - 820 9500 e-mail: info@bevplus.com Phone Dematech: + 27 - (021) - 385 0483 e-mail: info@dematechsa.com www.bevplus.com WEYERMANN ® SPECIALTY MALTS A Family tradition of Quality and Competence. Bamberg - Germany · www.weyermannmalt.com