He didn’t offer a long list of adjectives about their flavor, simply stating they were “the finest and most aromatic hops grown.” Spalt Spalter, as they are known today, likely hadn’t changed much since 1511, when the town banned the export of highly sought-after hop cuttings, nor have they since. One difference that Hans Zeiner, manager of the Spalt hop growers association and a farmer himself, has noticed is requests from brewers for hops picked later, so they are richer in essential oils.

“The brewers want different hops. Some want a greener hop; some want a hop that is a bit more mature. It is about the aroma, the aroma they want.” He cautioned against waiting too long. “If it’s too old, the aroma is not so fine anymore. The aroma has changed, but I cannot say how it changed.” In Spalt “fine” seems to be the only adjective necessary.

Contrast that with a different sort of description from John Mallett, production manager at Bell’s Brewery in Michigan. Mallett spoke at a seminar during the 2012 Craft Brewers Conference in San Diego, along with other members of the Hop Quality Group, recently formed because these brewers recognize the need for better communication with American hop growers. Mallett quite obviously was referring to Bell’s own highly hopped Hopslam, a double IPA, when he explained the importance of telling farmers the sort of flavors and aromas brewers want.

“(Imagine) if you’d gone to the hop growers association 20 years ago and said, I’m going to have a beer that we make 4,000 barrels of one time a year,” he said. “It flies off the shelf at damn near $20 a six-pack, and you know what it smells like? It smells like your cat ate your weed and then pissed in the Christmas tree.”

John Mallett of Bell’s Brewery is a member of the Hop Quality Group, which recognizes the need for better communication with American hop growers.

The adjectives used to characterize hop flavor in beers today obviously include more than “fine.” For instance, there’s catty, polite language for cat piss; and dank, slang for potent marijuana. They reflect that more than a few consumers now embrace pungent, intense flavors considered offensive not long ago. But they also describe aromas such as pine, pineapple, grapefruit, tangerine, melon, mango, lychee, passion fruit, gooseberries, blueberries, stone fruits . . . even Lifesavers and sauvignon blanc.

The Barth-Haas Group, the world’s largest supplier of hop products, recently suggested that hops producing such unique flavors be called, logically enough, “flavor” (or “flavour”) hops. This is a bit confusing for Americans familiar with the brewing process. They understand that brewers boil hops, usually those with a higher percentage of alpha acids, for an extended period to extract bittering iso-alpha acids, and those hops are classified “bittering” or “alpha” hops. Because essential oils are lost during boiling, to preserve them brewers wait until later in the process to introduce “aroma” hops. Sometime between adding the hops for bitterness and those for aroma, they may include a “flavor” addition. This might result in floral and spicy notes found for hundreds of years, or the bolder new flavors of today.

To avoid any confusion, the Society of Hop Research in Germany more recently adopted the label of “Special Flavor Hops”  for varietals bred to exhibit attributes previously considered “un-hoppy.” Peter Darby, who oversees hop breeding in Great Britain, refers to them as “impact hops,” while others simply refer to them as “special.” That many drinkers want these new flavors is clear. Why some hops deliver them and others do not is not.

What Makes American Hops Different

Hops add many positive attributes to beer, most notably aroma and flavor, the latter a result of what’s experienced in the mouth, including bitterness. The chemistry involved in bitterness is relatively well understood. Not so with aroma. More than 20 years ago, two researchers in Oregon proposed establishing an Aroma Unit (AU) comparable to the International Bitterness Unit (IBU). They intended that brewers would use their Hop Aroma Component Profiles, which identified 22 specific compounds, along with the AU, much as they would use the alpha acid content of a particular variety to adjust hopping rates. Since the 1960s “scientists have tried to identify the compound responsible for hoppy character in beer without success. Hoppy aroma in beer is probably not attributable to a single component but rather to the synergistic effect of several compounds,” they wrote in 1992.

Hop scientists have learned much since then, but that statement remains frustratingly valid. J.L. Hanin first used steam distillation to isolate hop oils in 1819, and later in the century Alfred Chapman isolated the key compounds myrcene, humulene, linalool, lynalyl-isonate, geraniol and diterpene. After the introduction of gas chromatography in the 1950s, researchers soon identified more than 400 compounds. The contribution many of them make is not clear because they occur at low levels, individually below perception thresholds. Synergy may change that.

Twenty-first century discoveries have brought some elements into focus. In 2003 Toru Kishimoto at the Asahi Breweries  research laboratory in Japan, determined a compound called 4-mercapto-4-methylpentan-2-one (otherwise referred to as 4MMP) is a main contributor to muscat grape/black currant character apparently unique to hops of American heritage. It has a low odor threshold and occurs naturally in grapes, wine, green tea and grapefruit juice. Hops grown in the New World, including New Zealand and Australia as well as the United States, contain 4MMP and other compounds observed only at trace levels in hops grown in England and on the European continent.

Other researchers in Japan found several American varieties contained compounds that were transformed into limelike and other citrus flavors during fermentation, but that existed only at very low levels in European aroma hops.

Something obviously happened to European and American hop varieties during the course of at least 1 million years since they split from one another. The genus Humulus likely originated in Mongolia at least 6 million years ago. A European type diverged from that Asian group more than 1 million years ago; a North American group migrated from the Asian continent about 500,000 years later. Although three North American botanical varieties exist in the wild, scientists don’t agree on how much they differ from one another, but they clearly are genetically unlike the Europeans. Virtually all hops cultivated today either are direct descendants of European types selected for their brewing and agronomic qualities, also known as landrace hops, are European varieties crossbred to improve those brewing and agronomic qualities, or are a cross between European and American varieties.

That last category didn’t exist until 1917, when E.S. Salmon of Wye College in England took a hop collected in the Manitoban wild, and thus obviously native American, and pollinated it with English hops. Today, every hop in demand for exotic, fruity flavors is such a cross.

Consider Citra, the poster child for special flavors. Descriptors of its aroma include grapefruit, lime, citrus, gooseberry, tropical fruits, lychee, melon and sauvignon blanc winelike. It is half Hallertau Mittelfrüh, a German landrace variety often referred to as “noble”; one-quarter U.S. Tettnanger, which is in fact the English landrace variety Fuggle; 19 percent Brewer’s Gold, one of the first hops to result from the crosses Salmon made in 1917; 3 percent East Kent Goldings, another English landrace variety; and 3 percent unknown, which might well be—like Brewer’s Gold—influenced by American wild hops.

(View a graphic on the future of Citra)

Hop Oils and the Magic of Biotransformation

When brewers talk about hops, they actually mean the cones of a female hop plant. Hop oils constitute up to 4 percent of those cones, but more often much less. The four most prominent are myrcene, caryophyllene, humulene and farnesene. The first is a monoterpene, meaning it consists of 10 carbon units, while the latter are sesquiterpenes (15 carbon units). Myrcene has a green, herbaceous, resinous aroma associated with fresh hops and not always considered desirable.

It often constitutes 50 percent or more of the oils in American cultivars. Most of its aroma will disappear during boiling, but it can be prominent in dry-hopped beers because it has a low perception threshold on average. People’s perceptions of aromas, in fact, vary widely, presenting another challenge for all seeking to understand hop aroma. The prominent oils in hops are found in many other plants, and in the case of myrcene these include thyme, lemongrass, verbena, pistachio and fruits such as mango and grapefruit.

In their oxygenated form, sesquiterpenes are more likely to survive boiling, resulting in herbal and spicy aromas also described as “fine” or “noble.” Farnesene, for instance, makes a distinct floral contribution to beers hopped with Saaz. It often constitutes less than 1 percent of oils in bred hops but up to 20 percent in Saaz. One specific caryophyllene alcohol compound, an oxidation product, may add a very strong cedar wood note many describe, again, as “noble.” However, as much as half of the drinking population may be blind to this particular compound. Floral, mildly woody, spicy are qualities that not long ago almost exclusively defined pleasant hop aroma. They remain desirable today, but may be overwhelmed by the addition of hops—particularly bold hops—late in the boil or post-fermentation.

As a hop ripens, many other monoterpenes form along with myrcene, including linalool, geraniol, nerol, citronellol and limonene. Although their presence is often measured in tenths of a percent, they are essential to producing citrus, fruity, floral and woody aromas, whether through synergy or interaction with yeast.

Research in Japan points to the importance of the physical interaction and biotransformations that take place in the presence of yeast. In one study, scientists investigated how geraniol and citronellol, accompanied by an excess of linalool, contribute to citrus aromas and flavors. Focusing on the Citra hop, they sought to identify the key flavor compounds contributing to the aromas specific to the variety—including passion fruit, gooseberries and lychee.

They brewed one beer with only Citra hops and another with Hallertau Tradition and coriander seeds. Both Citra and coriander are rich in geraniol and linalool. The finished Citra beer contained not only those two oils but also citronellol, which had been converted from geraniol during fermentation. The same transformation from geraniol into citronellol occurred during fermentation of the beer made with coriander. Taste panels perceived the beers as relatively similar.

The same researchers followed with another study that compared the composition of monoterpene alcohols in various hops and examined the behavior of geraniol and citronellol under different hopping regimens. They concluded that blending geraniol-rich hops increased the amount of geraniol and citronellol in beer, and that this enhanced citrus character. They determined that hops more easy to find in the market, in this case Apollo and Bravo, could produce aromas similar to hops in short supply.

Still another study in Japan pointed to just how complex sorting out the variables can be. In that one, scientists examined the changes in hop-related compounds during the fermentation process, finding that keeping everything else the same and changing only the yeast strain resulted in noticeably different hop aromas.

Such results illustrate the need for still more research.

Oregon hop merchant Indie Hops, founded only in 2009, pledged more than $1 million for what can broadly be described as aroma research at Oregon State University. “Our ultimate goal is to determine what is it in hop oil that drives flavor,” said Thomas Shellhammer, who is in charge of the brewing science education and research programs at OSU. Shaun Townsend, an OSU faculty member who heads the breeding aspect of the partnership with the Indie Hops, would then use the information to develop cultivars with particular oil profiles.

Meanwhile, There’s Alchemy

Greater understanding of the hop aroma and flavor matrix doesn’t automatically make it easier to integrate bolder hop aromas and flavors into the larger beer flavor matrix. Patrick Ting, for 30 years a hop chemist at Miller (and MillerCoors) before recently retiring, pointed out it is a mistake for brewers to try to equate specific oils with specific odor compounds. “You can’t say we’ll add a little bit of this, a little bit of that,” he said.

Although hop aroma remains something of a black box, brewers find ways on what seems a daily basis to maximize these new flavors. Given a chance to brew with two of the new German “Special Flavor Hops” early in 2012, Bear Republic Brewing brewmaster Richard Norgrove started with a base best described as a wheat wine. He blended Mandarina Bavaria and Polaris in a ratio of 60 to 40 or 40 to 60, depending on the addition, making one at the beginning of a 90-minute boil, one with 60 minutes remaining, one with 40, and then dry hopping with the pair.

“I like to do a lot of blending, maybe change the way the oils come across,” he said. He talked in terms of abstract art versus portrait art, probably because he paints with watercolors himself. “With watercolors you dilute or strengthen the vibrancy of color by the way you use water.”

Dry hopping may eliminate one bit of the mystery for brewers, because post-fermentation hopping preserves much of the aroma in a freshly kilned hop. However, the translation is not direct, and Sierra Nevada brewmaster Steve Dresler said that can be good for his beer. The brewery has learned if yeast is not still active at the beginning of dry hopping, some odor compounds will not develop. “We don’t get the same floral estery notes in some other beers if we use the torpedo [dry hopping] process simply cold without yeast contact time,” he said.

Sierra Nevada literally invented its “torpedo,” a device packed with hops through which its brewers circulate beer after fermentation, to dry hop more efficiently. It uses Magnum (a high alpha hop rich in oil), Crystal and a restrained amount of Citra to dry hop Torpedo Extra IPA. “You can overbrew with Citra,” Dresler explained.

Once again, Citra is a poster child for the new. It can be divisive, and that’s likely part of its appeal. When Sierra Nevada began evaluating Citra about five years ago, men on the brewery’s tasting panel described tropical fruit flavors, while women called the same beer catty or said it reminded them of tomato plants. Women on average detect odors at much lower concentrations and are more likely to rate smells as more intense and unpleasant, but many men share an unfavorable perception of Citra.

Gene Probasco, who started the first American private breeding program at John I. Haas, oversaw the creation of Citra. “[The cross] was made for aroma,” he said, and at the time “mild” was a synonym for “good” when it came to aroma. That was 1990.

It was part of a project for a large brewery client, and nothing came of it. Two other large brewing companies essentially owned the rights, one after the other, to the hop during the next dozen years, but ultimately neither of them had a use for it. Only after the Hop Breeding Co. began sending samples to craft breweries was it recognized as special. That was 2008. Understanding why other equally special hops have the impact they do may take a little more time.

In Washington’s Yakima Valley, Jason Perrault developed the new rock star, IPA-worthy hop that is Citra—high in all-important alpha acids and yields notes of pineapple and mango—at Yakima Chief Ranch, now part of the joint venture with John I. Haas, Inc. called the Hop Breeding Co. Dr. John Henning hopes his new Mt. Rainier hop—spicy with a hint of licorice—catches on; he created it at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agriculture Research Service (USDA-ARS) on the Oregon State University campus in Corvallis, OR. It’s a workhorse Noble variety hop akin to grassy Hallertauer that is fairly disease resistant, tolerant to downy mildew and high-yielding with the added benefit of a desirable aroma—if you like a little licorice notes mixed with your citrus. And across the Atlantic, Dr. Peter Darby finally gained the EU Plant Variety Rights for his Sovereign hop, which exhibits classic English hop aroma like that of Fuggles—earthy with a kiss of tropical fruit—but as a dwarf variety so attractive to British hop growers. After years of breeding research and evaluation dating back to the 20th century, their efforts are just now blossoming in new beers. So imagine what you’ll be drinking starting in 2020 based on what they’re doing in their respective offices today.

Is it rocket science? Not exactly. NASA recently retired the space shuttle Discovery after 30 years of exploring Earth’s low orbit so as to focus on exploring deep space, beginning with the Mars Science Laboratory and plans for the Juno spacecraft already in the works. While hop-breeding programs are, by nature, futuristic, there is way less computer hardware involved and way more dirt. Sure, there’s some software involved, but hop crosses yield seedlings that are planted in test farms and evaluated based on agronomics and aromatics. There’s no HAL 9000 in this Beer Odyssey capable of olfaction. Instead, someone like Perrault, for example, simply stands in the field, grinds some leaves between his fingers, brings them to his nose and has no clue if he’s getting a whiff of the next Simcoe (the pine-and-grapefruit scented megastar for which he holds the patent). But there’s roughly one-hundredth of a percent chance that he smells the future. And it kinda smells like citrus, or tomatoes, or possibly cheesecake.

(UNMALTED)

Contribution: vibrant wheat flavor; improved head/foam retention
Styles: traditional in witbiers and lambics
Examples: 3 Fonteinen Oude Geuze, Cantillon Gueuze, Hitachino Nest White Ale, La Cumbre Cerro Blanco, Moonlight Sour Mash Wheat, Ommegang Witte

ROASTED BARLEY

(UNMALTED)

Contribution: bitter, roasted character; improved head/foam retention; darker color
Styles: traditional in dry stouts, and common in many darker styles
Examples: Avery Out of Bounds Stout, Guinness Draught, North Coast Old No. 38 Stout, Porterhouse Wrasslers XXXX Stout

OATS

(UNMALTED)

Contribution: silky mouthfeel; heightened creaminess and body
Styles: traditional in oatmeal stouts; also found in various stouts and porters
Examples: Cigar City Maduro Oatmeal Brown Ale, Moonlight Old Combine 4-Grain Lager, Rogue Shakespeare Stout, Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout, Southern Tier Oat

SUGAR

Forms: sucrose (table sugar), dextrose (corn sugar), brown sugar, invert sugar, molasses, maple syrup, caramel, Belgian candi sugar and syrup, treacle, jaggery, piloncillo, etc.
Contribution: lighter or darker color; can boost alcohol, increase dryness (readily fermented by yeast), and impart a wide range of flavors and aromas depending upon the type
Styles: traditional in many stronger Belgian ales (everything from white sugar to dark syrups); often found in milds, bitters, cream ales, etc., as well as a wide range of higher-alcohol beers
Examples: Bear Republic Big Bear Black Stout, Bear Republic Racer 5, The Bruery Autumn Maple, Kuhnhenn Extraneous Ale, Russian River Pliny the Elder, Russian River Damnation, Three Floyds Dark Lord Russian Imperial Stout, Westmalle Dubbel, Westmalle Tripel

CORN

Contribution: lightens body and color (compared to malted barley); can add some sweetish corn flavor and aroma
Styles: traditional in many contemporary American lagers, pre-Prohibition pilsners, cream ales, Kentucky commons, and Flanders red ales; often found in bitters, Mexican-style lagers, etc.
Examples: Bear Republic El Oso Lager, Cigar City Batch #69 Double Cream Ale, Cigar City Guava Grove, Craftsman 1903 Lager, Ithaca Brute, Rodenbach Grand Cru, Thunderhead Cornstalker Dark Wheat

RICE

Contribution: similar to corn, but drier effect overall; very light flavor contributions
Styles: traditional in many American and Japanese light lagers
Examples: Bear Republic Racer X, The Bruery Humulus Rice, The Bruery Trade Winds Tripel, Great Divide Samurai, Hitachino Nest Red Rice Ale, Kuhnhenn Classic American Lager, Kuhnhenn DR (“Double Rice”) IPA

FRUIT

Contribution: can increase dryness (fruit sugars can be readily fermented by yeast) and impart a wide range of flavors, aromas, and colors
Styles: traditional in fruit lambics and a wide range of fruit beers
Examples: 3 Fonteinen Schaerbeekse Kriek, Cantillon Blåbær Lambik, New Glarus Raspberry Tart, New Glarus Wisconsin Belgian Red, Selins Grove The Phoenix Kriek, Shorts Peaches & Crème

OTHER ADJUNCTS

Include: rye (unmalted), honey, spelt, sorghum, millet, buckwheat, pumpkin, spruce tips, sweet potatoes, peas, beets, kambocha squash, kamut, rhubarb, and chocolate.

Miller Clear, 1993-1993: Possibly the most bizarre concept for a beer, Miller Clear test marketed in three cities for six months right around the time Pepsi tried to sell us on colorless Crystal Pepsi and Coors branded the translucent malt beverage Zima. Keith Villa was already brewing at Coors and said of his pre-MillerCoors colleagues, “For the most part they’re fond of the beers they’ve made. Marketers create the face of the brand.”

Dogfish Head Arctic Cloudberry Imperial Wheat, 2004-2005: Cloudberries are tart, amber berries that only grow in far northern latitudes and are so valuable, blood has been shed over their cultivation in Scandinavia. Obviously, Dogfish Head had to brew a beer with them. Sam Calagione found a way to source them from the Arctic Circle and said, “The challenge wasn’t just the cloudberries, but the expense of getting them safely to the brewery.  But never say never.  We may do this beer again in the future”

Deschutes Black Butte Porter XXII, 2010: This year’s Reserve Series Imperial Porter, following the twentieth anniversary and Black Butte XXI, didn’t really make it. Paul Arney, “I developed this recipe so it was kind of a bummer when it didn’t work out. I was excited about chilies, chocolate, and orange.” Gary Fish commented, “experimental chocolate used in this year’s formulation never fully dissolved in the beer. The beer tastes fantastic.” The bottles’ visual presentation, however, didn’t fly so the stork never delivered bottles to retailers. Kegs were still tapped at the Oregon pubs.

Inside the plastic jar, there’s a brown, viscous substance reminiscent of molasses, or dark maple syrup. It’s the same stuff that the English brewery Batemans uses in their Dark Mild, three-time CAMRA ‘Mild of the Year’ and a key influence on Norgrove’s (and others’) appreciation of that style. Martin Cullimore, Batemans’ Head Brewer and Director, showed him the key ingredient during one of his trips: the secret to making a 3 percent mild the color of a porter, but without the accompanying bitterness or roasted bite.

When Norgrove attended a brewmaster series being held at Marston’s, another English brewery, he had the opportunity to talk openly with a number of these local breweries. “All the brewers there, they had no problem telling us anything about English beers, how things were done. I had an opportunity to learn from them and then come home and incorporate some of these things into our beers. […] Martin was well enough to show me where and how he was imparting this really rich, dark character.”

Invert sugar. Essentially, sucrose (table sugar) broken down into simpler sugars, then heated so that the process of caramelization develops additional flavor characteristics. Easily fermented by yeast. Strongly aromatic. Batemans developed their processing methods with the assistance of a local confectioner.

We started our own series of experimentations within [Bear Republic], to kind of get an understanding of how different sugars were going to relate.” Richard explains their in-house setup: currently, some cut-top kegs with propane burners. He and Peter Kruger, Bear Republic’s Master Brewer, have already been discussing the next steps ahead of them. A copper confectionary kettle, constant stirrers, direct flames. Kruger adds, “At some point, we will have one sitting over in a little room that we can fire up.” Earlier in the conversation, there was mention of procuring a coffee roaster for roasting their own dark malts.

In putting together the various pieces of adjunct usage in America, the phrase “necessity is the mother of invention” has come up on more than one occasion. It comes up again today. We’re not talking about things that normally get discussed openly (although this is partly because usually no one bothers to ask). I’ve come here because I want to know more about these things: sugar additions, rice, corn. How these ingredients can be used to make beer better. How adjunct uses are changing and developing in America. And how these brewing tools may very well serve an important role in the future of craft beer.

Adjuncts in America

Depending upon whom you talk to, the definition of “adjuncts” with regards to brewing can vary widely. The dictionary definition of the word (granted, not one of the most frequently used words in the English language…) suggests something added, but not necessarily essential to the task at hand. Some brewers include spices and other things that can’t be fermented. Others limit it to only the ingredients that serve to lighten body and color, such as corn and rice additions. Old definitions still refer to anything that isn’t “Gersten, Hopfen und Wasser”: barley, hops, and water. One professional brewer, after being asked for his own personal definition of the word, replied, “Are you asking the German in me, or the American?”

That “added but not essential” part can vary depending upon context and culture.

Many generations and scientific breakthroughs later, some brewers strive to recreate these traditional styles while others run shrieking from them. Authenticity versus innovation (or authenticity plus innovation) are factors allowing so deep a field of brewing concerns, and all come up with multiple brands. A brand comes to fruition as either a company’s calling card into the popular world of India pale ales, a personal act of artistic freedom just to see if a beer can taste like key lime pie, or sometimes just by disaster striking ever so artfully such as discovering that a keg left in freezing snow makes for amazing ice beer. Essentially, beers like these appear before us as a result of demand, risk, or sometimes by accident.

Small, medium and large producers are free to create any style―no matter how common or unique. When doing so, they rely partly on the autonomy of the brewing staff and partly on the reaction (in the form of purchases) of consumers. Three elements key to success no matter which brewer releases which beer, and no matter where it’s available: quality, timing and marketing (and on that last note, only a wealthy few do any sort of advertising to boost sales).

Demanding Hops

To find Grady Hull tinkering with hop additions on a fifteen-gallon pilot system isn’t what you’d expect of the assistant brewmaster at New Belgium, which produces well over half a million barrels each year, 70 percent of which is Fat Tire. Holding out no more, Hull said brewing an IPA has been “a fundamental discussion of our company for years… We hesitated on doing one because it’s not a Belgian style.” Since forming in a Ft. Collins, CO basement in 1991, New Belgium has focused on the malty, culinary curiosities the Belgians are known for, ranging from abbey and triple styles to experimenting with dandelions and being one of the early American experimenters with wild Brettanomyces yeast. Having expanding their operation greatly to an entire brewing campus on the banks of the Cache la Poudre River, pounding palates with hoppy IBU bombs (International Bitterness Units) just had never been their thing.

But as branding director Greg Owsley copped, “Admittedly, we were the last brewery to do one in America. But our ‘beer rangers,’ the marketing reps out in the field, were pleading for one. We wanted to (expand our) portfolio.” So Hull was tasked with creating a brand X IPA.

Development lasted around five months. Various iterations of this highly anticipated IPA involved experimenting with different hop varietals, with each batch coming up for review before a panel called the Portfolio Council. It usually consists of owner Kim Jordan, Owsley, sales director Joe Menetre, Hull, some of the marketing rangers, and the brewmaster Peter Bouckaert. But Bouckaert is a transplant from the esteemed Brouwerij Rodenbach in Belgium―so he’s more of a sour than a hoppy guy and excused himself from this brand X.

After repeated efforts, Hull said they “had something we were happy with. The first run was packaged and on the trucks with all of the accounts expecting it but we decided it wasn’t quite what we wanted so we pulled it all back at the last second and went back to the drawing board with the recipe. We decided to go really big with the hops.”

Imagine, all that beer in all those kegs and bottles, and just as it was about to emerge into the light of day, it gets sent back for further development. Surely some of this brand X IPA ended up in some happy employees fridges. But eventually, Hull hit upon the desired combination of Chinook, Simcoe, and Cascade hops aplenty and the result is Ranger IPA (the name is an homage to the reps, explained Owsley).

While New Belgium finally caught IPA fever, the demand for hops has unleashed a new generation of bitter beers even if not everyone can quite agree on what to call this boom. Mitch Steele, Brewmaster at Stone in Escondido, CA, debuted Stone 11th Anniversary in 2007, designing it as “hop-forward but black like a porter.” It was Steele’s first true creation at the brewery after owners Steve Wagner and Greg Koch hired him away from Anheuser-Busch. He says the concept was a tough sell to Koch and the fact that pilot batches “came across like a hoppy (but sweet) stout, not IPA-ish” didn’t help his cause. Fortuitously, after four failed test batches, once the brewing crew made it on the larger system, the anniversary beer came through with flying color: black. Little did he know that three years later, this hybrid-style beer would merit its own, nascent category at GABF: American-style India Black Ale.

In Steel’s vast research on IPAs, he points to the style’s birthplace as Vermont. Reportedly, the first rendition of this style came from Greg Noonan at Vermont Pub and Brewery with his Blackwatch IPA, served on draft at the pub circa 1994. In 2003, Matt Phillips of Phillips Brewing in British Columbia bottled Black Toque India Dark Ale. Concurrently, Rogue’s Brewmaster John Maier created a test batch called Skull Splitter internally or externally dubbed an imperial schwarzbier. The appropriate name has been a matter of debate. Phillips has since caught the Pacific Northwest bandwagon and renamed the beer Skookum Cascadian Brown Ale. Rogue’s goes by Black Brutal Bitter. They are considered the harbingers of a style locals call Cascadian dark ale or CDA for short. Whether or not they lose the name battle, many such CDAs also refer to themselves as black IPAs on their labeling.

The public’s response to Stone’s one-off 11th Anniversary was so positive, it was brought back―recipe unchanged―as Sublimely Self-Righteous, dubbed a Double Black IPA. The name is an inherent misnomer since a beer cannot be both black and pale. Regardless, Koch’s probably glad he issued his brewmaster artistic license and gave this beer the green light because it earned a bronze medal in the inaugural IBA category at GABF.

That brewing out on a limb could lead to fans clamoring for a beer’s wider release is what every brewer aspires to. Sometimes demand follows supply. Such was the case when brewmaster Ron Gansberg from tiny Cascade Brewing in Portland, OR, walked up to the stage during the 2009 GABF to receive his silver medal in the Barrel-aged Sour Beer category for Vlad the Imp Aler. In his excitement, he missed the announcement that his Bourbonic Plague then won gold. At Cascade, Gansberg has an assistant brewer and someone to help with blending. Bourbonic is the bourbon-aged version of their spiced porter Bain du Bruge and Vlad is the product of simply blending some of their inventory. Those beers are just now available in bottles though will likely only be sold from the pub.

So what about water?

Though less acknowledged today, since brewers can effectively alter it to suit their needs (more on that later), water is, in fact, primarily responsible for the development of the pantheon of classic beers. “It is really interesting to look at the variety of styles that popped up in different parts of the world and became popular and good because of the water they had available to them,” notes Harpoon Brewing’s vice president chief brewing officer, Al Marzi. “The ingredients were all the same, except for the water, and you’ve got completely different beers being made.”

The basic recipe has always been water, malt, hops and yeast. So, why did the darker beers develop in Munich and Dublin, the hoppy pale ales in Burton, England, the pilsners in Plzen? As Olympia Brewing Co. founder Leopold Schmidt, so astutely proclaimed at the turn of the 19th century, it’s the water.

The True Connection Between Hard Rock and Beer

Water is the medium in which all the magic in the brewing process happens. And as innocuous as it seems—it’s clear and, for the most part, tasteless—it’s not all the same. You may have actually noticed when traveling that the water in, say, Portland, OR, may smell (or even taste) a little different from the H2O that comes out of your own tap at home. You may even have to use more soap or shampoo to get a good lather depending on what the water is like. This is what’s referred to as water hardness. And this, specifically, is what’s responsible for the development of different beer styles.

The chemistry of turning malted grains, yeast, hops and water into a delicious, refreshing alcoholic beverage, is relatively straight forward: grains are transformed into starches that, with the help of water and heat, the yeast can consume and turn into alcohol. But a little something called “water hardness” complicates things. “Hardness is mainly due either to lots of calcium and magnesium in the water, so-called ‘permanent’ hardness, as it’s relatively difficult to get rid of,” explains Professor Alex Maltman of the Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences at Aberystwyth University in Wales, “or bicarbonate in the water, ‘temporary’ hardness, which can be precipitated out by boiling.

“There’s a whole range of taste effects [in brewing] that arise from the presence of these substances, such as calcium promoting the bittering contribution of hops, and magnesium enhancing beer flavor, like salt in food. But the main effect—certainly of bicarbonate—is to affect the pH, or acidity, of the liquid during brewing.”

Yeast, who, let’s face it, do all the heavy lifting in the brewing process, are particular about the environment they work in. So, if the pH is comfortable for them, they can do their job well. Now, before this chemistry was known to brewers, they simply had to adjust their ingredients to suit the water. Bicarbonate-rich water—such as that in Munich and Dublin—creates a high pH (too alkaline for the yeast to do their thing properly). But roast some of the grains nice and dark, and it lowers the pH in the mash; the yeast are happy and they make a tasty dark brew, such as a German dunkel or Irish stout.

We can thank the varied geology of this great blue marble we inhabit for the variety of beers we drink today, because the different dissolved minerals in water—depending on the source—have had a profound effect on the development of brewing beer. “Burton-on–Trent in England has very mineral-rich water, including calcium and magnesium,” says Professor Maltman, “so it produces a strong tasting beer. It is also rich in sulfate, which adds a characteristic flavor and improves stability. This why the style known as English pale ale originated there, and the stability enabled it to travel far in those colonial days, even as far as India, if brewed strongly—hence India pale ale.” A relative lack of dissolved minerals, or “soft” water, such as that in Plzen in the Czech Republic, was key in the development of pilsner.

So, yeah, it’s the water. But, really, it’s what’s in the water. That is to say, those dissolved minerals—calcium, magnesium, sulfates and bicarbonates—are really what affect the pH, taste and stability. Which begs the question, how did they get there and why do some places have more or less? The answer lies in the earth itself. “The chemistry of water is greatly influenced by the geology of the aquifer in which it has resided,” explains Professor Maltman. “As one example, the bedrock below Burton, England, consists of sedimentary strata formed around 250 million years ago—a time when what is now England was closer to the equator and in desert conditions. Saline lakes evaporated to leave the sediments—what is now bedrock—rich in minerals such as gypsum, also known as calcium sulfate, and Epsom salts, also known as magnesium sulfate. Just as they were originally dissolved in the ancient lakes, these minerals now readily dissolve into the local groundwater, which is why Burton brewing water is like it is.”

So one may safely draw the conclusion that since the geology of North America is equally varied, the water is too. True enough, and though it hasn’t exactly given rise to specific beer styles, the water available to brewers here has had a profound effect on them—from San Diego’s challengingly hard water to the surprisingly perfect-for-brewing Brooklyn water. The difference today is that with the advanced understanding of what’s in our H2O—most municipal water suppliers can provide brewers with an analysis of the water makeup—we no longer have to brew beers that suit the particular local hardness. Or as Al Marzi at Harpoon so cleverly puts it, “The brewer’s art can be expanded to create any type of water he’d like to have for a particular style.”

The bedrock below Burton, where the city draws its water is rich in minerals—calcium, magnesium, sulphur—and thus quite hard. Though you don’t specifically taste them in the English pale ales, such as Bass, that made the area famous, the effect they have is unmistakable. The clipped, pronounced edge to the hop bitterness is a direct result of minerally hardness. As is the faint nose of sulphur, which not only adds to the characteristic earthy aroma, but is also a natural stabilizer, a characteristic that made pale ales particularly well-suited for shipping in the nineteenth century.

Plzen, Czech Republic

Plzen’s water is incredibly soft and pure—a result of the metamorphic rocks in the area, which are largely insoluble—making it a virtually unadorned palate for the brewer. It is this water that gave rise to beers like Pilsner Urquell, a lager that adeptly spotlights its four basic ingredients without one dominating. The Saaz hops and pale malts find the perfect balance of spicy bitterness and a certain grassy/floral sweetness, coming together in a light-bodied beer that’s full of flavor.

Dublin, Ireland

Ireland’s capital sits on a bed of limestone (calcium carbonate), which on its own isn’t particularly soluble, but because the water that filters through it has some acidity to it, the limestone dissolves to form calcium bicarbonate. Making beer with calcium bicarbonate in the water is tricky business because it upsets the brewing pH. The remedy? Roast the barley very dark, which not only balances the pH in the mash, but gives the characteristic dark color, smoky flavor and caramelized bitterness that typify dry Irish stouts like Guinness.

Munich, Germany

Munich’s water, like Dublin’s is affected by local limestone deposits, though the source of this calcium carbonate—the Alps—is considerably more dramatic than its Irish counterpart. And like Dublin, the city’s known for its dark beer, in this case a lager, known as a dunkel (which means “dark” in German). Full-bodied dunkels, like Ayinger Altbairisch, are made with dark-roasted malts, which naturally dominate both the aroma and flavor, with the sweetness and bitterness—think caramel and molasses—carefully balancing each other.

Dortmund, Germany

The pale lager produced in Dortmund may well have tasted similar to those made in Plzen—that was the intent—were it not for the higher sulphate and calcium carbonate in the local water. The result, as typified in DAB Export, is a pronounced hop sharpness and a slight rounded sulphur taste.

I recently stumbled onto a small book, The Botanic Brewers Guide, published by the English chemists and flavoring makers Potter & Clarke in 1920 (first edition 1899). A guide to those wishing to manufacture such brews, it provides recipes and techniques to produce these early sodas.

In England, beers of less than three percent alcohol could be brewed without license or tax, but beyond that level the tax authorities were on your case. The book mentions one offending product that tipped the scales at a staggering (pun intended) 10.8 percent alcohol, its brewer pleading ignorance.

The book lists a number of botanic beers, including burdock ale, chamomile beer, ginger beer, horehound beer, sarsaparilla and spruce beer, as well as the herb beer, hop bitters and dandelion stout detailed below. They’re chock full of funky charm and are an authentic link to the day when medicine, alcohol and refreshment were not so separate as they are in our world today.

At the time, saccharin was the latest and greatest, and all the recipes call for it. Artificial sweetener solves a big problem for fermented soda producers: how to make the drink sweet without having the residual sugar turn the bottles into bombs. Fortunately there are workarounds for the problem, including some much better tasting artificial sweeteners.

Before saccharin, soda would not have been sweet. The added sugar would ferment in the crock or in the bottle, producing alcohol and carbonation. Preservatives such as calcium bisulfate or salicylic acid, would have added a discernable taste to the beverage. Today potassium sorbate is the preservative of choice. It is highly effective and tasteless, used at four grams per five-gallon batch. We also have refrigeration, which can slow fermentation and preserve our homemade soda for a few weeks.

The artificial sweetener Splenda (sucralose + a dextrin bulking agent) has a very clean taste and should work well in any of these recipes. Quantities of 3–7 ounces (85–199 grams) should work in any of these recipes.

Soda Strategies

Here are several additional strategies, any of which should produce good results:

1. Ferment partially, then at 1003 OG (1 °Plato) bottle and cap and allow the soda to carbonate naturally. This will require artificial sweetener if sweet soda is desired.

2. Ferment totally, then force-carbonate in keg. This also requires artificial sweetener.

3. Bottle in plastic soda bottles (do not use glass for this) shortly after fermentation begins, and frequently check carbonation by squeezing. When desired carbonation level is reached refrigerate to slow down fermentation. Do not allow bottles to warm up after this, and do check from time to time. I would not recommend holding bottles like this longer than a week or two.

4. Keg the beer before fermentation and check the pressure often until the desired carbonation level is reached. Place into refrigerator to slow down the yeast, and add 4 grams of potassium sorbate to make sure it doesn’t get started again. Continue to check pressure level and vent if necessary.

The recipes below are taken directly from the book and have not been changed except to substitute Splenda for saccharin. The process recommended by the book is to boil the herbs and roots in half the water for 15 minutes or so, then strain them out. Sometimes the ingredients were placed in cloth bags to make separation easier. Sugar and artificial sweetener was added to this mix along with any other ingredients like color, acid or heading agent, and then rapidly cooled to about 70 °F (21 °C) fermentation temperature. “German,” presumably meaning lager, yeast was preferred for its cleaner flavor over yeast obtained from ale breweries, and pitched at the rate of a quarter ounce per gallon. Twenty-four to 36 hours later, the beer has cleared and is fit for bottling. A considerable amount of gas will remain in the brew and fermentation may continue in some small way.

The quality of sugar matters. The author states that the beet sugar of the day “…is generally artificially bleached and may produce an unpleasant odour in the beer.” My friends in the modern-day soda business confirm that pure cane sugar is by far preferred for soda making over beet, which imparts a dull and lifeless flavor.

These should offer grown-up tastes, and should be appreciated by your homebrew-drinking friends. It is my hope that these sodas offer us a delicious window into the crisp, refreshing and temperate past.

A millennia ago, the magic maiden Kalevatar, along with her brewing gal-pal Osmotar, of the Finnish-Hungarian national epic, the Kalevala, spend a whole poetic chapter seeking the power needed to kick-start their brew, to get it “…foaming, higher, higher, higher.” They try all the common household products of the day: pine cones, the spit of bears in battle, and more. Having tried everything, a dollop of honey does the job, rendered potent by yeast unwittingly gathered by a honeybee making her rounds.

Ancient people also knew that the waxy sheen on the surface of grapes was brewers yeast and often added grapes or raisins to their brews to initiate fermentation. Yeast, as a vital substance, was well known even as far back as ancient Sumeria, that first great beer brewing civilization that blossomed in Mesopotamia some 5,000 years ago. The nature of yeast, however remained a mystery until researchers in Europe identified it as a single-celled fungus. around 1834.

One species, Saccharomyses cerevesiae, is used by brewers, bakers, vintners and distillers, although the specific strains are different. With the regular surplus of yeast that is an inescapable feature of a brewery, it’s no wonder that a bakery was often located right next door.

Yeast metabolizes sugar and produces alcohol and carbon dioxide gas, which gives beer its foamy prickle. If these were the only two chemicals yeast excreted, beer would be a pretty simple affair. Fortunately for our palates, yeast is kind of a messy eater, and gives off a wide range of flavor chemicals that add spicy, fruity or other appealing aromas to beer.

Think of yeast as little bags of goo. Inside are various structures that synthesize proteins, generate energy and much more. Each cellular process can take a number of steps, which means that there are chemicals floating around in there that are produced by one action and needed for the next. The membrane of the cell is a little leaky—necessary to gain access to ingredients needed for yeasty living—but some of these intermediate products ooze out and remain in the beer. Chief among them are compounds such as esters, phenols and ketones, potent aroma compounds that contribute much of beer’s charming complexity.

All of this chemistry happens faster at higher temperatures, and this creates the great division of beer into ale and lager. Yes, the yeast is slightly different in regard to its tolerance of cool temperatures, but the key difference is that at the cool temperatures of lager fermentation, things happen slowly and the yeast has plenty of time to clean up its messy work environment, leaving lager beer untainted by the fruity and spicy overtones common to ale.

The Yeast Rancher

As a brewer, this is really good stuff to know. Each different strain, especially with ale types, has its own signature set of characteristics, and subtle tweaks of temperature can make dramatic differences in flavor and aroma. Between choice of strain and control of temperature, there is a world of flavor yeast can add to your beer.

Yeast adds an overlay of character that largely follows national origin. English yeast, although widely varied, always has a certain “Englishness” about it, and that is true of other brewing traditions as well. You can take just about any wort and make it taste Belgian just by using Belgian yeast, which is a neat trick if you like Belgian beer. A few styles—saison and hefeweizen for example—are utterly dependant on specific strains for their signature aromas.

Brewers do not make beer. We only make wort, and it’s the yeast that turns it into beer. As a brewer, you must add “yeast rancher” to your list of responsibilities. Yeast likes the same things we do: a nourishing meal, plenty of good company, and now and then a breath of fresh air. For brewers of all (or mostly) malt beers, nutrition is rarely a problem, but it does become an issue in high-adjunct beers and especially in meads, where nutritional supplements are essential. Pitching an adequate amount of yeast is usually covered by following the supplier’s directions, but be advised that with strong beers the amount of yeast needed can rise, often dramatically.

Yeast for homebrewing comes in two forms, dry and liquid. The liquid comes in more varieties, often with known pedigrees. The dry forms are a little more generic, but great strides have been made in dry yeast in the last ten years or so. Either can produce perfectly delicious beer. Read the descriptions carefully; they contain lots of clues as to how each strain might affect your beer.

For advanced brewers, yeast culturing is well within the capability of reasonably advanced brewers, although far too complicated to describe here. It pretty much follows basic microbiological techniques. With a bit of kit and some basic skills, you can preserve yeast, grow it up from bottled commercial beer, and join the secret society of yeast rustlers and rare strain traders.

Below is a recipe designed to be adaptable to a number of different yeast types. With an English strain it becomes a summer, or golden bitter. With a Kölsch yeast, you have a fair version of that style. Use a Bavarian weizen yeast, and it will morph into a reasonable approximation of that style, and with the various Belgian strains, you can ferment up a brew with many possible personalities. And who doesn’t like a blonde with a little mystery about her?