Four Simple Ingredients

If your still awake by the time you get to this part of the Herald I am humbled by your fortitude and honored by your perseverance. I am sipping at a goblet of Weyerbacher, Heresy, this is a oak barrel aged Imperial Stout brewed by the Weyerbacher Brewery in Easton Pennsylvania. This is a

powerful brew full of complex flavors and the product of a painstaking process that involves hours of mashing, weeks of fermentation and months of aging, the culmination is a brew of heroic proportions that one can savor over the course of an hour or two. This is not your typical lawnmower beer; this is a beer for Tolstoy.

We have talked about the history and the ingredients; let’s tackle the general brewing process before we get involved in the individual styles. From time to time I may blurt out comments on the Weyerbacher so be warned. If you are under 21 skip ahead to the next paragraph.

Oddly enough we start by boiling some water (for some reason called liquor by the brewers) in a big pot called a “mash tun” into this water we add malted barley that has been ground and sieved into “grist.” The grist is added into the liquor and the resultant porridge like mess is called the “mash” This mash is boiled for some time. The duration of the boil will vary depending on the style of beer and the grains used. This could be several hours. The object being to break down and dissolve the fermentable materials (sugars) in the grist so that when the mash is decocted or strained as much of the sugar as possible will be dissolved into the liquor. The mash is drawn off the grist and the resultant clarified liquid is now called the “wort.” At this point the boiling wort is transferred to a second vessel called the “brew kettle” and is ready for hopping.

The Weyerbacher poured an elegant dark mahogany with a two finger deep chestnut head that was tightly beaded and rapidly faded to a slender ring at the edges of the goblet. The color is opaque when held up to the light, though soft highlights are evident near the very edges. This is a dark and foreboding brew, its inky darkness beckons the curious to take a long pull and savor…

The wort is re-heated in the brew kettle and hops are added at various times during this boil. If they are added early in the boil they tend to make the beer more bitter or dryer, if added later in the boil the major effect is aromatic. Sometimes they are added at separate times so that both effects are obtained. At the conclusion of this boil the hops are strained from the wort. This is the conclusion of the “brewing” part of the process.

The aroma of the Weyerbacher is vinous: ripe fruit, alcohol, almost burgundy like. Some earth and some oak notes… I am struck by the similarity between this brew and a burgundy or cabernet…

The wort is passed through a chiller to bring it to a temperature appropriate for the style; 60 –70 Fahrenheit for ales, cooler temps for lagers. The wort is moved to a large tank called a “primary fermenter” and then the yeast is pitched into the cooled wort and the primary fermentation process commences. Primary fermentation will proceed for a week or more for ales and three to five weeks (or longer) for some lagers. During this time the yeast breaks down most of the sugars converting it to CO2 and ethyl alcohol. When the primary fermentation is complete the beer is filtered (or not) and ultimately transferred to bottles or casks. Some beers may have a small amount of malt or sugar added to allow it to undergo a secondary fermentation in the bottle, such beers are said to be “bottle conditioned.”

The Weyerbacher’s taste mirrors the aroma, earth, oak, wine like grapes, strong alcohol, and some bitter hop notes…This beer style, the “Imperial Stout” has a rich and storied past. It is said that Peter the Great, Tsar or Russia fell in love with the British bitter and dark beers during his visits to the British Isles. He insisted on having this beer brought to the Imperial Court.” The aptly named A. Le. Coq (a Belgian) was appointed purveyor to the Tsars and this Stout was brewed with extra hops and a high alcohol content to enable it to survive the sea voyage from England across the North Sea, through the Baltic to St. Petersburg and the ensuing overland journey to Moscow. This interpretation by our friends in Easton, Pennsylvania may just be very much like the original. Down to the time spent on oak…today this style survives in the Baltic Porters of Carnegie (Sweden) and Synebrichoff (Finland) as well as or own local artisan brewer Heavyweight, in Ocean Township. For me, a student of history, Heavyweight’s Perkuno’s Hammer recalls the days of the Romanov dynasty … Elegant Waltzes… Hussar Pelisses swirl to the music of Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and Borodin, a delicately carved, Ancient, Volga Sturgeon cooked to perfection and mountains of Caspian Sea Caviar accompanied by frozen Vodka and the rich dark beer brought all the way from the “Thames Pool”… by a Belgian whose name began with three letters… A. Le.

Now as promised I have received some kind e-mail and some suggestions for recipes/food pairings and places to enjoy a good glass of beer, or just some beer nostalgia. Here are a few for you to enjoy. Thank you all and keep those e-mails coming.

Virginia wrote:

good show....have loved beer 4 many a year....must drink less ,but can still enjoy folklore, aroma, small sips, and fun just knowing....live out west lots of micro breweries.....will b good to see what east can offer...will visit as many as i can ....spent time in Keansburg at Old Heidelberg...like tap beer best....thanks 4 the column....

John wrote:

“started my working years as a chemist at P. Ballentine and Sons, Newark, NJ. I was fresh out of the Army in March of 1953. I spent 13 years there and your details on the brewing process brought back a great many memories. Along with the regular light beers, they also brewed India Pale Ale, which aged on a bed of hops for one year, and Burton Ale which was not sold, but given as Christmas gifts to friends of the owners, the Badenhausen family”.

Thank you for a great column every week in the Herald.

(John, you can still get Ballentine Pale Ale here in the Garden State. Will pick some up for review in a future column)

Patrick Wrote:

“Forget wine with cheese, drink beer. Here's a combo I just learned - Stilton cheese on a cracker, I chose a water cracker. Top it with this mix of dried fruit - cranberries (craisans), apricots, and mangoes chopped into tiny little bits. mix in a bowl with some chopped walnuts and then drizzle with honey. (I'm sure you could experiment with the fruit) The Stilton cheese is a very strong type of blue veined cheese; the sweetness in the above mix compliments it excellently.

Drink with a nice Weiss beer dressed with a slice of lemon, I drink Franziskaner.”