OnTap Magazine

I would love to begin this article with by setting the ambience, describing the scent of the Tap Room somewhere in Oregon, or perhaps the sounds of chatter in a packed English Pub; it would be a lot more romantic than a zoom meeting across time-zones, one participant being plunged into the darkness of rolling blackouts. As it turns out, talking beer is a very useful distraction. Jeff Alworth is cordial, very warm in character and with a depth of knowledge that is hard to rival. It is a knowledge he has built up from drinking, judging and the deep research he put in to write about beer, The Beer Bible being one of the works he is most well known for. (Every beer nerd should have a copy of it, in my humble opinion.) Ironically, the first book I read by Jeff was The Secrets of Master Brewers , while looking for deeper knowledge on English IPAs. As it turned out, there was not a huge amount about that particular style of beer in the book, other than a reference under Old Ales, but there was this remarkably poignant pre-face that pulled me in and it was impossible to put this book down. The insight shared in this book can shape the way that you look at a beer style, not merely as a recipe, but a culturally reinforced method and approach that is unique to certain regions and embedded in what we often incorrectly refer to as a beer style. I ask him to elaborate about how culture influences a beer. He starts with a contextual digression, “beer dates back much further than what we think,” referring to the way that wherever there were grains, humanity managed to make beer from it. From one culture to the next, from Africa to South America and the traditional beers in North America. “It’s like a human impulse!” he enthusiastically proclaims. “Beer is not a product of the earth, like wine.” Jeff is aware that I am sitting in the winelands of South Africa, a wine region that produces enough wine to rival some of the older European wine producing countries. And, of course, the point he makes is that wine comes from the grape that comes from the season and what is referred to as terroir . It varies by vintage, depending on many factors, whereas beer might be influenced by external factors like this to some degree, but you can produce it all year round and it might even change with the fashions of the times. (Read Chris Roth’s Style Study in this edition to get a good idea of how the American Amber has changed over the years.) The question of culture and style are part of the same conundrum, because style guides were designed in the 70s and 80s to give some sort of guide of what a style should be; this was aimed at the American homebrewers of the time who had never tasted many of these beers. We discuss the Pale Ale as an example of how large a role culture plays on style. In West Germany, very near Belgium, you have the Kölsch, which ends up tasting similar to a lager, as this is what the culture of the time and location “demanded.” In the UK it is pale and light in the absence of a lager and in the USA, it is hoppy and bright from the late addition of hops (often Cascade, as per “tradition.”) Culture drives the styles that get developed. Ingredients available at the time and location is also a big driver of recipes. In South Africa, a Pale Ale is mostly a copy of the American variety, but quite often with locally grown hops, this develops a slight variation on the style that it attempts to emulate. Is it a style? Well, it is certainly not exactly the same. “The American brewers took a lot of these styles and changed them to suit the ingredients and culture of the time.” An example of this is the IPA, a beer that is layered with low alpha acid hops in Britain, but with the adaption in the USA using local ingredients with higher alpha acids the recipes had to be drastically changed to pull flavours out of hops in different ways. This led to hoppier beers, which is at least partly reinforced by the American cultural drive for bolder flavours (culture), but also by the practicalities of how you use the new- world hops (available ingredients.) “There is this thing called a Scotch Ale,” Jeff observes, “Somebody thought it’s got peat malt in it, it must be a Scotch Ale, but of course there is no such style coming from Scotland.” Throughout our conversation, Jeff’s sense of humour coupled with his blink knowledge, makes this a very deep rabbit hole of conversation. We touch on the Wheat beer, a derivative of a Weiss and Witbier, but devoid of yeast character, for the American palate of the time. How did he develop this deep understanding? When Jeff researched the first edition of The Beer Bible , he visited 50 breweries and spoke to the head brewers of each. “Occasionally you will find a brewer that just knows so much about how the various components and ingredients relate to one another,” he pauses to try and find the words. “After forty years of experience, you just talk differently.” He recounts the way that most breweries quite often start their tours by discussing the importance of water, but then when you encounter a really experienced brewer those discussions become more instinctive, more about the way that the water changes as this natural Where there is grain, there is beer to be made Changing ingredients based on the availability ontapmag.co.za | Spring 2023 | 23