Beer and Pie

Last weekend CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale) invited beer lovers to the Real Ale & Cider Festival in Hull’s Holy Trinity Church. Ale and cider... in a church? There sure are worse ways to start your Saturday!

When we arrived at Holy Trinity at noon we were greeted by an old man, already holding a pint of dark liquid in his hand. He kindly pointed us in the right directions of the beer token stand. One token will get you half a pint, though you will pay an extra 10-25p for the stronger beers. Armed with two tokens each we had to choose from about 25 ciders, 21 bottled world beers and 120 different ales. My philosophy when confronted with such a large selection of drinks is to go for the one with the most interesting name. And that tactic works very well when choosing an ale as breweries can get very creative. For some reason that can’t be said for cider, though. But I’m a cider girl so I had to try at least one half pint of the appley goodness. Moorlands Farm Medium Sweet Cider was my first drink of choice. It was very fruity and sour - I liked it because it was genuine and you could really taste the apples.

Then we moved onto the ales. Drink number two was Victorian Porter by 8 Sail Brewery. Not the most exciting name either, I know but it was recommended to us. By now I can no longer hide that I’m no expert on drinks. I would describe most beers as “quite nice” and while I can taste the difference when I compare two ales, the memory of the taste doesn’t stick at all. Hence the lack of taste descriptions! We chose Marvellously Poetic Porter and Blackout because they were all out of Abduction. Clearly I’m not the only one who picks a beer because of its name! Ironically, Blackout was the most memorable one out of the lot and adjectives such as citrusy and flavoursome actually stuck in my mind... especially when being enjoyed with hot pie and pasty! 

A German on English Beer
While I like English beer I can understand why one would not as some of it can be an acquired taste. Many Germans consider the English to be somewhat strange for choosing to drink warm beer. My uncle is a great example of this German scepticism. He came to England for the first time a year ago with my dad. Dad, who knew what he was in for, insisted on my uncle trying an ale. Well, it didn’t go down well and he was in disbelief how anyone could enjoy a drink that tastes like it has been forgotten in the sun and has gone flat! My dad had to finish his pint. Dad isn’t even too fond of ale but one should never waste a pint, eh!

In the 23 years I lived in Germany, I have never heard anybody say: ”Man, I really fancy a flat, lukewarm beer right now.” We have dark beer and light beer but they’re served cold and don’t taste flat. I’m happy to be proven wrong here, though. So Germans approach beer with very different expectations as my uncle had to find out. Don’t expect a crisp, refreshing beer when you order ale. Saying that, I’m probably offending some ale lovers because ale does not equal ale. It covers the whole spectrum of colours, tastes and alcohol content. My knowledge of English beer is rather limited, although I drank plenty of it. It was time to put an end to my ignorance and at least get a glimpse of what it is all about! 

The Secret Is in the Sauce... errr Yeast!
All beers can be put into two categories: ale and lager. My ignorant self would have distinguished the two based on look and flavour. Ale is warm, dark, quite flat with a very “heavy” taste while lager is golden, clear, carbonated and served much colder than ale... right? Wrong, loads of mistakes can be made when you try and distinguish the two beer families in this way. So I needed to put on my imaginary lab coat and find a more scientific approach!
 

The main difference is in the kind of yeast used in the fermentation process. Ale yeast ferments at warm temperatures between 12-21°C with the yeast accumulating at the top, which is why ale is a top-fermented beer. The aging time is comparatively short. Lager yeast accumulates at the bottom of the fermentor (bottom-fermenting) at 3-10°C and the cold temperatures stop it from releasing its distinctive fruity, complex flavours often found in ale. Its aging process is longer. In fact, the word lager comes from the German verb “lagern”, which means “to store”. It makes lager taste “cleaner”.

Porter, Stout and Bitter are all ales! And each one can once again be divided into loads of different subcategories depending on how much hop you put in, what malt you use etc. So you should check out the beer family tree. It makes it much easier to visualise the connection between the different beers. To give you a brief idea though:

• Original Porter used roasted unmalted barley and it's very dark. 
• Stout is essentially a strong porter. Guinness is one of the most well known stouts out there. It's made from pale malt, roasted unmalted barley and sometimes caramel malt.
• Bitter has a distinctive hop flavour and an amber colour.

And finally, how come some ale is just ale while other ale is real ale? Non-real ale is pasteurised. This means that the yeast is being "killed off" before you drink it. With real ale, the yeast is not removed. It will ferment in its cask right up until the point when you drink it. It also doesn't contain any artificial carbonation and all the carbon dioxide in it is created during its natural fermentation.   

I like real ale and cider but frankly I also love clear, force-carbonated drinks... which sound much less appealing when putting it like that! And so ends my adventure into the world of beer for now. But we’ll be back next year for all these beers we haven’t tried yet. The date already stands: April 24-26, 2014!