The
tidal wave of craft beers that has flooded the beer market in the United
States has been a blessing to beer drinkers in America. The end of the domination of
Miller and Anheuser-Busch, for most beer drinking Americans has enhanced the
overall standard of beer in America. Today, the amount of styles of beers that
American beer drinkers have access to when at their local grocery store can be
overwhelming. IPA’s, pale ales, hefenweizens, stouts, porters, lagers, lambics,
saisons, bock, and much more, including variations of all these beers. Not to
mention massive number of new breweries popping up all the time have saturated
the beer market.
The
overwhelming access to this huge selections of beer style and the rapid increase of breweries
that make them has caused Americans to neglect some of the most important and best beers ever brewed. American beer was built on a perfect,
smooth, light tasting stylte of lager also known as pilsner. Rarely can you find
a Craft brewery that brews pilsner.
There may be two major reasons for the neglecting of this perfectly balanced
beer. Pilsner yeast must be fermented at a lower temperature (55° F, as opposed
to lager yeast which ferments at 68° F according to White Labs Yeast). It also must be fermented longer. This
requires large spaces for refrigeration systems to ferment pilsners. Smaller,
less funded breweries may not have the funding, space, or equipment to ferment
a pilsner.
Pilsners
were first brewed in the Pilzen, a city in the Eastern region of the Czech Republic near
the German border. It was
originally fermented in the cellars of the monastery that holds a steady
temperature of about 55°. Today
you can visit these cellars and they still hold a cold temperature, although
the breweries have moved across town.
The
original Miller, Budweiser, Pabst, Schlitz were all modeled after the Czech and
German pilsners, and this is the other reason that Americans have shunned
pilsners. The stigma of the large-batch nation-wide brewery in the current
generation has been very negative (except for the re-emergence of Pabst,
hipsters love that horrible, horrible beer). This encourages craft breweries to try new things, which may
or may not be a good idea. Sure a
pumpkin beer around thanksgiving could be interesting, but some breweries take
it too far.
Original
German or Czech Pilsner is brewed following the German purity law which only
allows the use of grain, hops, water, and yeast. It is the perfect
combinations these that make pilsner the perfect beer.
If done correctly, it is a perfect
balance of flavors; hoppy bitterness and acidity, fruity, and malty all at the
same time. Some American breweries have attempted their own pilsners, most notably Mama Lil Yella Pils by Oscar Blues in Boulder, Colorado and Scrimshaw Pilsner by North Coast Brewing Company. Both of these breweries make good attempts but do not have the true pilsner flavor. Trumer is the one brewery that stands out among breweries in America in terms of making a perfect pilsner.
The aspect that makes Trumer that stands out among other is that they only brew pilsner. Trumer is originally an Austrian pilsner (which is still brewed in Austria), that has been transplanted from Austria and is now brewed in the San Francisco bay area. They have taken a long time successful import and simply moved its brewing and recipe to the United States.
Craft Breweries get too carried away with the amount of IBU's, malts, different types of hops, and varieties of yeast. There needs to be a new beer movement toward quality and not originality. To many breweries try to hard to be different and original, when all they need to do is simply brew beer that is enjoyable to drink. If more craft breweries began brewing pilsners, the American beer industry may regain its standard of quality, drinkable beer.
Here is an great article on the American Craft Beer Industry:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/12/craft-beer-expensive-cost_n_5670015.html
