- 1. Introthe tag line for Nerd Night is its like thediscovery
channel. with beerthe discovery channel is great, but really,im a
fan of the second half of thataforementioned statement.Beer.And
that is what id like to talk to youabout tonight.Id considered
turning this into a bit of agame and was going to suggest that
eachtime I say the word beer all of you take adrink, but id like
you to remain at leastsomewhat lucid for the rest of thespeakers
tonight because they have somereally interesting things to talk to
youabout.Okay, now, on to the matter at hand...
2. HistoryDepending on who you talk to, in broadestdefinition,
the history of beer goes back tosomewhere between 9500BCE to
3500BCEThere are those who would say that it is thevery basis of
civilization, and those who havemade a case that if even if its not
actuallyresponsible for civilization it is very likely tohave saved
it (in the global West at least) byvirtue of the fact that during
the plagues mostwater contained any number of pathogens,but the
process of making beer made it,relatively speaking, safe to
drink.9500BCE = neolithic farming / accidental 3. beer3500 = we
start to have actual records interms of writings and chemical
remains ofearly beerBeer as it is would be generally recognizableto
us is about 1000 years old, but more onthat laterWhat is beer?
(Bread in a bottle) 4. so, what is beer?my dictionary says: an
alcoholic drinkmade from yeast-fermented malt, flavoredwith hopsand
then goes on to say: any of severalother fermented drinkswhich
gives us pretty darn broad range.that breaks out tomalthopsyeastIn
talking about each of these elements,im going to go over the basic
process ofmaking beer. Im going to be speaking insomewhat general
terms because the 5. variations in each stage are what gives usour
different types of beers.Malt & Mashing == Wort (alchemy #1) 6.
starting at the top we have malt.what is malt?malt starts out as a
grain. a brewer canuse all manner of different grains...wheat, rye,
etc but the most common isbarleyso you take your barley (or
whatever) andyou malt it.which begs the question. what the heck
ismalting?malting is the process by which we1. make some of the
yummy starchesmore available to the yeast in the form ofsugar. more
on that later 7. 2. and its also a big determiner of theflavour and
colour of the beerto do that, the barley is
(partially?)germinated... do i need to explaingermination?and then
its kiln dried.how much it is dried, at whattemperature? and for
how long is what isgoing to give us our different kind of maltsthe
longer it is dried, and then potentiallyroasted, the darker it gets
and the darkerthe resultant beerfrom the so-called crystal malt,
the lightestwhich is used for pilsners and similarlycolored beers
to amber thats used, appropriatelyenough, for amber alesto
chocolate and black malts that areused for porters and stouts.most
beers use a combination of maltedgrains to achieve whatever colour
and 8. flavor balance the brewer is looking toachievenext the
grains are cracked (also knownas milling). and as with all stages
of themaking of beer there is a range to thisactivity.how much the
grains are crushed willdetermine how much and how fast wereable to
extract the sugars from the maltmashingnext step is to translate
those oh so solidgrains into liquid refreshment.this is known as
mashing. and it takes thestarches in our cracked grain andconverts
them into sugars.to do this we add x amount of (hot) water 9.
(which for reasons that escape me, isreferred to as liquor) at y
temperature(generally about 75C) to the grain for zamount of time
(1 2 hours).yes, im using variables because, this is,well variable
depending on the beer that isbeing made, but its important to note
thatthis is not haphazard. The temperature iscarefully monitored
because it isThe practical upshot is something thatlooks, and
smells like a sweet porridge.Next we drain the liquid off and then
rinsethe malted barley (a process known assparging. The brewing of
beer, like mostspecialized activities has its ownvocabulary)The
liquid at this stage is known as sweetwort, which brings us to the
next stage...Hops (and other flavourings)Earlier i said that beer
as we recognize it 10. didnt really come into being until about
a1000 years ago. Thats because it wasnt untilaround 800 or 900BCE
that brewers startedusing hops to flavour their beers, and
hopsdidnt really become fully entrenched in beerbrewing culture for
a couple hunderd yearsafter that. Although as anyone who was atthe
Malthouse on Thursday will tell you, hopsare now most certainly
part of the verydefinition of beer.And unlike the grains that are
used to makemalt, hops have almost no other application(as far as
humans are concerned for the last800 years) other than in the
brewing of beer.What do hops do for beer?First and foremost they
offer bitterness to thebeer. This is because the resins in hop 11.
flowers are comprised of acids.As i was saying before we have
converted ourgrains into sweet wort, which i think of as akind of
magical process, but as beverages goisnt actually all that
interesting. We needsomething to offset and compliment the
maltflavour.The brewer is going to bring the sweet wortto a boil
and add hops. The quantity andvariety is going depend on what kind
of beeris being made.The brewer will probably use a combinationof a
several types of hops added at differenttimes in the boiling
process but overallMore hops == more bitterness.There are two
primary kinds of acids in thehops, unimaginatively named 12. Alpha
and Beta. And there are differentbalances between the two types of
acids indifferent kinds of hops.The higher Alpha acid hops are used
in theinitial boiling stage, and thus are referred toas boiling
hops. They are what gives us mostof our bitter flavour.Near the end
of the boiling process, high Betaacid hops are added. These are
known asaroma hops and as youve already probablyguessed primarily
contribute to the lovelysmell of the beer. But we all know that
smellis closely tied to taste.After weve completed the boiling
process,the sweet wort is now simply called wort.Now i want to take
just a brief moment to talkabout other flavourings.I mentioned
previously that brewers didnt 13. really start using hops in beer
until about1000CE in the area we now think of Germanyand really not
until about 1400 in Britain.This was a transitional period. In the
longhistory of beer before this time a variety offlowers, roots,
herbs, seeds etc were used inthe many many beers. But the goal was
theessentially the same. Balancing and makingthe flavours more
interesting.Over time, hops supplanted most everythingelse, and in
the case of the German BeerPurity Laws absolutely everything
else.But with that rich history of experimentationwe now have a
whole range of things that wemight add to the boil.Okay, enough of
that. Returning to thesubject of hops. I mentioned before that
thefirst thing they give to beer is 14. bitterness/flavour.But hops
are also slightly antibiotic. They aregoing to inhibit the growth
of unwantedbacteria in the brew which helps to preserveit during
storage.Which is another distinct advantage of beerover water. So,
drink more beer, its healthy;-)Fermentation (the wonderful world of
yeast,e.g. alchemy #2) 15. and finally we have yeast. But before
wecan get to that we need to cool our wort.And although the hops
are giving us somemildly antibiotic protection to the wort, wewant
to cool it quickly. The longer it takesto cool the more
opportunities all matter ofmicro-organisms have to take upresidence
in our proto-beer.yeast are magical little critters. reallytheyre
fungi they are responsible foradding the fun to your beer. they eat
thesugars in malt and produce. CO21.alcohol C2H5OH 2. CO2 which is
to say, those fun littlebubblesThere are many many kinds of wild
yeastsin the air.Those early beer-like beverages were 16. probably
happy accidents.Someone left a clay pot full of some kindof grain
in a store-room or cave. It got abit wet giving them a rough
approximationof the mashing process. And then the wildyeast would
settle and discover what is forthem a happy environment. It would
liveout its happy little yeast life until someonediscovered this
slightly bubblysoup/porridge and taking a sip found it tobe
generally pleasing and made theirhead feel a bit funny ... yay
alcohol!Unless of course you got ergot, but thatsa whole different
experience.Now, just like with the malting, i dontreally have the
time, or the specializedknowledge, to get into exactly what
ishappening with yeast. In fact im prettysure that someone could
give a whole talkjust on yeasts. But suffice it to say
thatsomething alchemical is happening here.The yeast is
transforming the base sugarsof the malt into the gold (or amber
orblack) of the beer in your glass. 17. Types of beer (e.g. whats
in your glass rightnow)The other important thing to note is
thathumans didnt get very good at culturingyeast until a couple
hundred years ago.Which is why particular styles of beers
areassociated with certain places... theplaces where those yeasts
wereprevalent.Because just like with the malt and thehops, the
yeast is also contributing to the 18. overall flavourSo, lets move
onto what those yeasts areand the kinds of beers we have...broadly
speaking there are two majorcategories of beerale and lager.and
they are made with eponymouslynamed ale yeast and lager yeastof
course there are the exceptions suchas Anchor Steam... but it seems
that ruleswere made to broken. Or at least bentale yeast, also know
as top fermenting 19. because they produce foam at the top ofthe
wort during fermentation. ale yeasttypically happiest at 15 - 24C/
60 - 75Flager yeast, unsurprisingly know asbottom fermenting yeast,
are typicallyhappiest at 10 - 13C/ 50 - 55with that in mind id like
to take a fewminutes to talk about what youre
drinkingtonight(Munich) lager:Ah yes this is the style, in its many
variations,that most people think of when they thinkbeer 20.
Pilsner:Similar to its Germanic cousin, but this onecomes to us
from the Czech republic.Specifically, the city of Pilsen... hence
thenameHefeweisen:Wheeee! more german beer! Well, actuallythe Dutch
have some claim to this one aswell.this beer is a bit different.
Most notablybecause it is made with wheat. 21. IPA/APALots of
discussion about the history andvariations in these
stylesBelgianThis is an odd category because its actually awhole
bunch of different categories. Lambic,Trappist, etc. 22. Porter
& StoutAs a few of you will have noticed there isGuinness on
tap here but there is also...Porters and Stouts are ales that are
madewith darker malts
