Drunken Crayfish

Do you know that?

Brasserie Sainte-Hélène, based in Ethe in the southern Belgium, was launched in 1995 and today crafts a wide range of delicious beers using only the four basic ingredients – water, malt, hops, and yeast.

The beers by Brasserie Sainte-Hélène are unfiltered, unpasteurized products, undergoing the second fermentation in bottles or in the casks.

Let’s try today Brasserie Sainte-Hélène’s Barley Wine – a rare offering only brewed several times per year.

Barley Wine by Brasserie Sainte-Hélène is a typically Belgian adaptation of the American-style brew – a bit dryer than a traditional barley wine, it does not lose nevertheless its complexity. A strong maltiness is balanced by a good hoppy character and a higher alcohol volume (10%).

Barley Wine by Brasserie Sainte-Hélène is to be consumed cooled to 14-18 ?C as a degustation beer after a copious meal or whenever you choose it!

Enjoy!

Historian questions alcohol content in ancient Sumerian beer

A newly published German report suggests the evidence of a fermented beverage from present-day Iraq may, in fact, not have been beer, but rather, a very low alcoholic drink. Still, other experts beg to differ, Deutsche Welle reported on January, 2.

For some people, researching the origins of beer is as stimulating as consuming it.

Peter Damerow, a historian of science and a cuneiform-writing scholar at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin, was one such person. Damerow, who passed away in November, delved into archaeological findings of ancient beer production and consumption, focusing on ancient Sumerian brewing processes.

In a scholarly paper published in the Cuneiform Digital Library Journal this month, Damerow questioned whether the fermented cereal beverage – so-called Sumerian beer – consumed by the Sumerians, who lived in present-day Iraq, even contained alcohol and should be called beer.

“In the case of Sumerian beer, it is unlikely that it was really beer that the Sumerians and their successors prepared from grain and consumed presumably in large amounts,” he wrote.

“Given our limited knowledge of the Sumerian brewing process, we do not even know for sure that the resulting product had any alcohol content at all,” he added. “We really cannot know whether Sumerian beer might, after all, have had a greater similarity with kvass (a fermented grain beverage that originated in Eastern Europe) than, say, with German beer.” These claims fly in the face of what many historians believe – namely that ancient Sumerians in today’s Iraq were among the first to build agriculture-based cities approximately 6,000 years ago and produce a fermented grain-based beverage that came to be known as beer.

According to popular theory, Sumerian brewers crumbled flat bread made from barely or emmer into a mash, called “bappir,” which is Sumerian for “beer bread.”

The problem is, that’s only theory: no one knows for sure, as Damerow points out in great detail. Although many of the more than 4,000-year-old cuneiform texts contain records of deliveries of emmer, barley and malt to breweries, hardly any information exists on details of the production processes, he notes.

Even the “Hymn of Ninkasi,” of the most significant sources on the ancient art of brewing, provides no reliable information on the ingredients and the brewing process, Damerow claims. The lyric text from the Old Babylonian period around 1800 B.C. is a mythological poem that glories the brewing process.

Franz Meussdoerffer, a professor of food science at the University of Bayreuth and a beer historian, says some of the confusion arises from the definition of beer itself.

“Beer as we know it today is entirely different from what was brewed in ancient times,” he said. “Today’s beers arose from northern European cultures that didn’t know bread but gruel. Fermented drinks in the Mediterranean area were based on beer-bread, with water added for the fermentation process.”

Meussdoerffer referred to beer-bread brews as “instant beers,” like today’s light beers, which have low alcohol content – but nevertheless contain alcohol. That description of Sumerian beer refutes Damerow’s theory.

Martin Zarnkow, a brewing historian in the Center of Life and Food Sciences at the Munich Technical University who collaborated with Damerow, also disagrees with Damerow on that point and another.

“Sumerians didn’t discover beer, nor did the Egyptians, as some people believe,” Zarnkow said. “Theories point to beer being produced in the Neolithic Revolution more than 11,000 years ago.”

Like Meussdoerffer, he believes that beer-bread beverages contain alcohol and, as such, are rightly called beer.

Zarnkow was involved in the Tall Bazi brewing experiment that attempted to reconstruct the ancient brewing processes. Using cold mashing, the team produced a brew of barley and emmer and adjusted the alcohol level by changing the percentage of water. Damerow remained unconvinced by the results.

Most beer scholars, however, agree with Damerow’s general conclusion.

“I, too, am skeptical concerning how much we can securely say about the nature of ancient beer – whether from Sumeria or from Egypt, or Europe for that matter – apart possibly from the type of cereal used to make it and some generalities about how it tasted,” Max Nelson, professor of languages and literature at the University of Windsor in Canada, wrote in an e-mail to Deutsche Welle.

“We have no good way of determining what the average alcoholic strength of any ancient beer (or other beverage) was, and it is quite plausible that some fermented drinks, which were made to be drunk quickly, were low in alcohol, like modern kvass.”

Another issue, Nelson added, is that “we do not know what kind of yeast was used in the making of ancient beers, and this determines to a great extent how high in alcohol a fermented drink can be.”

In his paper, Damerow defined beer as “an alcoholic beverage produced from cereals by enzymatic conversion of starch into fermentable sugar followed by a fermenting process.”

Few in the global brewing industry would disagree with that description.

Six beer myths revealed and refuted

There are myths and rumours that spread like wild fire. So today we’re revealing the top 6 beer myths that you need not believe in anymore. Here’s a low-down of the most outrageous beer myths and what you need to know :

Beer Myth 1: You can beat the beer belly by consuming light beer.
Fact: The truth is that light beer has only 90 to 100 calories and regular beer generally has about 150-175 calories a pint. Even so, this doesn’t mean that you can chug that beer every other day, or that it is just the beer to blame. The beer belly comes from club/party snacks (read: Fried foods such as chips and wafers) that you tend to mindlessly eat after or while you drinking. Everything adds up – light beer or no light beer.

Beer Myth 2: The darker the beer, the more alcohol it contains.
Fact: This is a complete myth as one of the darkest beers such as Guinness is black and has only 4.2% alcohol. The colour of the beer is because of the roasted malts and not because of the alcohol content.

Beer Myth 3: Beer is of no use if it is warmed and then refrigerated.
Fact: This is only true if you do it over and over again, an endless number of times. Else, re-chilling the beer has no drastic effects. Beer can only be ruined if it is kept open for long in air or light. All you need to do is get your hands on a fresh beer, store it in a cool and dark place and it will do just fine.

Beer Myth 4: Beer shouldn’t be bitter or sour in taste.
Fact: Your beer is bitter because of the hops present in it, which helps in balancing the sweet malts and works as a preservative. Hops depend upon the types of beers. It is because of hops that beer has that strong, earthy and bitter flavour to it and that’s what makes the beer delicious for beer lovers all round the world. If you’re looking for something sugar-laden, pick a cola.

Beer Myth 5: Green bottled beers are the best beers.
Fact: The colour of the beer bottle doesn’t just depend on the kind of beer. Darker colour beer bottles help in protection from light much better than clear bottles. That’s why you might have noticed that all beer bottles are darker in colour. Green, black or brown, the bottle colour doesn’t decide the quality of beer.

Beer Myth 6: Women don’t like beer.
Fact: Right from the medieval to recent liberated times – we women have always loved our beer. To believe that beer isn’t a woman’s drink is to believe that men don’t like cosmos. And we know they do.

Why is beer froth always white?

Beer foam consists of tiny bubbles of carbon dioxide the walls of which are made up of various proteins and carbohydrates produced during the brewing process.

A color is created because light of a certain wavelength is reflected. Absorbent blond beer takes in all the light except light with the frequencies that give the blond colour. Beer froth is white because the walls of the tiny bubbles reflect all the light. Sometimes you can see some brown flecks in the foam: these probably from the iron compounds sometimes present in the beer that are pushed to the top by the bubbles.

Source: Beer & Health

Brazil: Fifa insists beer must be sold at all venues of the 2014 World Cup

Beer must be sold at all venues hosting matches in the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, soccer’s world governing body, Fifa, has insisted.

Fifa General Secretary Jerome Valcke said the right to sell beer must be enshrined in a World Cup law the Brazilian Congress is considering, BBC reported on January, 19.

Alcoholic drinks are currently banned at Brazilian stadiums and the country’s health minister has urged Congress to maintain the ban in the new law.

Budweiser brewer AB InBev (whose subsidiary Ambev is the major player on the Brazilian market) is a big Fifa sponsor.

Fifa has become frustrated because voting on the legislation has been held up in Congress by the dispute over alcohol sales.

The Brazilian government has also failed to resolve differences with Fifa over cut-price tickets for students and senior citizens, and demands for sponsors of the World Cup to have their trademarks protected.

In remarks to journalists in Rio de Janeiro, Mr Valcke sounded frustrated with Brazilian officials.

“Alcoholic drinks are part of the Fifa World Cup, so we’re going to have them. Excuse me if I sound a bit arrogant but that’s something we won’t negotiate,” he said.

“The fact that we have the right to sell beer has to be a part of the law.”

Alcohol was banned at Brazilian football matches in 2003 as part of attempts to tackle violence between rival football fans.

Be my Valentine, says Belgian chocolatier Neuhaus

Belgian chocolatier Neuhaus has unveiled details of its Valentine’s Day collection of heart-shaped gift boxes and ballotins.

Available from the end of January 2012, the Be My Valentine collection offers two new flavours: Coeur Tendre, a creamy gianduja with crispy bits of almond crumble; and Coeur Intense, a dark ganache with a velvety texture and intense flavour, thanks to the 64% cocoa content of the chocolate from Peru.

Among the highlights is a leather box which can be filled with an assortment of pralines of the consumer’s choice. The box retails from EUR40.

A Heart Box contains an assortment of 19 heart-shaped pralines in dark and milk chocolate with three flavours: the red Coeur Praliné (milk chocolate filled with praliné of hazelnut and almond); Coeur Tendre (creamy gianduja with crispy bits of almond crumble); and Coeur Intense (dark ganache with an intense flavour, thanks to the 64% cocoa content of the chocolate from Peru). The retail price is EUR20.

Gift bags for him and her

Gift bags are available in men’s and women’s versions. For women, there is a white bag with red hearts and a red keyring, while for men there is a red bag with a black keyring.

Each bag contains an assortment of four pralines in dark and milk chocolate: two red Coeur Praliné (milk chocolate filled with praliné of hazelnut and almond) and two white Coeur Praliné (milk chocolate filled with praliné of hazelnut and almond). The retail price is EUR10 each.

Do you know that?

From December to January, it is best to combine your festive meals with Bière de Noël by Brasserie de l’abbaye du Val-Dieu.

This Christmas beer has a real taste of festival. It is a highly fermented monastery beer, partly filtered but unpasteurized near to triple.

The volume of alcohol contained in Bière de Noël is 7%.

Conditioning: 33 cl bottle.

The abbey of Val-Dieu was built 1216 by Cistercian monks, who are well-known for their brewing skills.

Because of the numerous hazards encountered by the abbey over time (fire, destruction, expulsion of the monks during the Napoleonic revolution), monks have not always been able to brew. That explains why their beer production remained limited to the local level.

Fortunately, since 1997, the farm has discovered the typical roar of the brewery again.

The reinstalled brewery took inspiration from the receipts formerly used by the brewers-monks of Val-Dieu to make this tradition last. Of course, those receipts had to be adapted to the raw materials and techniques of today.

Nowadays, the Belgian Brasserie de l’abbaye du Val-Dieu offers real abbey beers, of high fermentation, not pasteurized, simple, without seasoning and brewed according to the old infusion method.

Belgium: The beer lovers’ heaven

The Trappist Abbey of St Sixtus of Westvleteren has little to offer those wishing to gawp at ecclesiastical architecture. The 19th-century buildings—squat, brick and functional—sit on a quiet country lane amid flat farmland, close to Belgium’s border with France. Yet the vast visitors’ car park is a clue that some people nevertheless consider the abbey worth a trip. For beer lovers, St Sixtus is a place of pilgrimage, The Economist reported on December, 17.

The abbey and its most famous brew, Westvleteren 12—a dark, strong ale—have taken first or second place in an annual poll of beer enthusiasts’ favourite tipples by RateBeer.com, a widely trusted reviewing website, for the whole decade that the survey has been running. Yet exactly how the American drinkers who predominate on the site get to knock back a Westvleteren 12 is something of a mystery.

Visit the abbey and you can drink it to your heart’s content, or your head’s. But it is hard to buy elsewhere. The monks tightly ration takeaway sales of the tiny quantities they produce. The abbey’s website gives details of the brief windows when buyers may attempt to call with an order. If they are lucky and get through, they will be allotted a time to arrive at St Sixtus. They are then permitted to purchase two cases (four dozen 33cl bottles) in return for a solemn undertaking that the beer will not find its way to a third party.

In a rare easing of the rules, in November the monks released a batch of 93,000 six-packs for the Belgian market, to pay for repairs to the abbey. Next year 70,000 six-packs will go on sale worldwide.

As well as having a good claim to brew the best beer in the world, Belgium is also home to the world’s biggest brewer. Anheuser-Busch (AB) InBev, based in Leuven, a small university town half an hour by train from Brussels, turns out one in five of every beer sold around the world. Across the road from head office, the ultra-modern Stella Artois brewery pumps out one of the firm’s best-known international brands.

If St Sixtus fails to match the splendour of a medieval cathedral, the main brewing hall at Stella Artois comes close. The quiet and cavernous interior is dominated by 15 immense stainless-steel brewing kettles, whose column-like spouts soar heavenwards. In different ways both St Sixtus and Stella Artois illustrate the reverence with which Belgians regard their beer.

Their country also makes a bigger range than any other—1,131 at the last count. Apart from six Trappist ales and other abbey beers, it churns out lagers such as Stella Artois and its stablemate Jupiler, the more popular brew in Belgium. Tipplers can also choose from an array of wheat beers, brown ales, red beers from West Flanders, golden ales, saison beers based on old farmhouse recipes, and any number of regional brews. Oddest are the austere, naturally fermented lambic beers of Brussels and the nearby Senne valley, a throwback to the days before yeast was tamed. These anachronisms have survived only in Belgium.

The country generously shares its creations with the rest of the world. It is one of the biggest exporters of beer in absolute terms and as a proportion of national production (statistics boosted by the worldwide thirst for Stella Artois). More than half the booze it makes is sent abroad.

How did Belgium come to dominate in beer? The answer lies in the nation’s hybrid history and culture.

Beer is to Belgium as wine is to France. It is “ingrained in the culture”, says Marc Stroobandt, an expert on Belgian beer. Belgians have been at it for a long time: the Romans are said to have brought brewing to this part of Europe; many Belgian breweries have origins in the Middle Ages. Stella Artois traces its roots to the Den Hoorn brewery, founded in Leuven in 1366: the horn remains on the beer’s label to this day. Sebastian Artois brought his name to the brewery relatively late — in 1717.

Geography helped. A beer belt stretches across northern Europe, where it is too chilly to grow grapes that can be turned into half-decent wine. But the climate and the land are excellent for growing barley and hops, the basic ingredients of beer. Belgium is also known for its high-quality water, vital for turning out good beer. The town of Spa, whose name has become generic, is in eastern Belgium. As Sven Gatz, director of the Belgian Brewers’ Federation, points out, being at a crossroads of Latin and Germanic Europe allowed Belgium to soak up influences from both that can still be tasted in its beer.

Herbs such as coriander and liquorice, spices such as ginger, and fruits such as cherries and raspberries, once popular among French brewers, are all still in use in Belgium. This French tradition endured where that country’s influence is strongest, even after hops began to find a role in beermaking. Monastic brewers were disinclined or prevented from using that ingredient—the church deemed hops the “fruit of the devil”. One explanation for this attitude might be the monopolies granted to bishops over the gruyt (as the mixture of herbs and spices was known) that went into beer. An intense medieval PR campaign was waged in the battle between gruyt and secular hops. Hildegard of Bingen, a medieval mystic, favoured gruyt, attacking hops for causing melancholy and the gentleman’s affliction of “brewers’ droop”.

Germany’s influence is still discernible, too. The Reinheitsgebot, a Bavarian beer-purity law dating back to 1516, banned anything but water, barley and hops. Where the Germanic tendency is more pronounced, hops have always been preferred. Elsewhere, Belgian brewers continued to try their luck with whatever they could find.

Thus the turbulence of the country’s history has stimulated its brewers. At one time or another most of Europe’s great powers have held sway over Belgium; many have left behind influences and flavours. The Dutch, the last outside power to occupy Belgium before the first world war, sent traders to scour the East Indies for new spices, many of which found their way into Belgian beer. (The Belgians kicked the Dutch out to gain independence in 1830 in part because they objected to heavy taxes on beer.)

As the gruyt wars suggest, the institutions of Catholicism played a part, too. Monasteries traditionally brewed beer to sell to support their abbeys, to offer to travellers staying as guests and as “liquid bread”, a source of nourishment during Lent. Until the end of the 19th century, even when laymen ran breweries it was often educated monks who were at the forefront of the art and technology of beermaking.

All these factors encouraged experimentation. Aside from herbs, spices and hops, other stranger substances such as mustard, coffee and chocolate have found their way into the country’s beer. Pete Brown, a British beer writer, is only half joking when he sees a common thread between the “strange and mad” brews that are the country’s hallmark and another of Belgium’s relatively few gifts to the world—surrealism.

The number of breweries in Belgium peaked at the turn of the 20th century. By 1907 the country boasted nearly 3,400 commercial beer makers (compared with only around 100 today, or 12 per million people—still pretty generous compared with five per million in America). Belgians could and did enjoy a huge range of beers.

These brewers had considerable advantages over their counterparts in other countries. In Britain beer was a drink of the lower orders: no such snobbishness obtained in Belgium. Heavy import duties discouraged Belgians from buying French wine. Competition from spirits was blunted by the temperance movement, explains Mr Brown. In Belgium it led to hefty duties on genever, a gin-like drink consumed by the Dutch, hitting its popularity. Brewers, some of whom were also politicians, managed to escape attack. Belgium’s strong beers owe something to this period: many brewers upped the alcohol content to console drinkers forced to give up genever.

This lack of alternatives guaranteed brewers a large and thirsty market. In 1900 Belgians drank 200 litres per head, roughly double what Britons and Germans were putting away. Today thirsts have dried up a little: a typical Belgian now quaffs just 84 litres a year.

The rise of AB InBev began in the halcyon years of the early 20th century. Before the first world war Belgian brewing was still highly fragmented. Start-up costs were low and transport expensive, so local, family-owned firms tended to predominate.

Technological advance led to rapid consolidation. Belgian beers (strictly speaking, ales) were top fermented: the yeasty foam produced in the brewing process sat atop the liquid. But by the end of the 19th century a technique invented in Bavaria and developed in Bohemia arrived in Belgium. Lager, where the fermentation takes place at the bottom of the brewing vessel at a much lower temperature, required much more investment for artificial chilling and longer maturing times. But the clear, golden beer that resulted quickly caught on with consumers. One such was developed by Artois, by then Belgium’s second-largest brewer. Its special Christmas brew of 1926 was decorated with a festive star: Stella Artois.

After dominating Belgian brewing for much of the century, at the end of it the firm embarked on an international consolidation before the world’s other main brewers caught on. Interbrew, as Belgium’s biggest brewer was then known, bought Canada’s Labatts in 1995 and merged with Brazil’s AmBev to forge the world’s largest outfit in 2004. The merged firm, InBev, snapped up Anheuser-Busch, maker of Budweiser, in 2008.

These days, as America’s microbrewing boom shows, discerning drinkers are keen to try new and unusual brews. Belgium’s smaller breweries, with their niche beers, have benefited.

On the Grand Place in Brussels stand the ornate guild houses of the city’s ancient trades. The bakers’ and butchers’ houses are now restaurants. Another has become a bank. Yet the brewers’ house is still home to the Brewers’ Federation.

The ceremony with which Belgian beer is poured and drunk betokens a love of beer that no other country can match. Arguments in a Belgian bar will not revolve around anything so trivial as politics or football. Fierce debate might centre on the correct glass in which to serve a Stella. In its hometown of Leuven it is a flat-sided tumbler; elsewhere only one with diamond mouldings near the base will do. A barman who neglects to inquire whether you prefer your bottle of Duvel shaken slightly to mix in the yeasty lees shouldn’t expect a tip.

Cheers!

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Just for laughs: Beer turns men into women

National University of Singapore scientists has released the results of a recent analysis that revealed the presence of female hormones in beer.

Men should take a concerned look at their beer consumption. The theory is that beer contains female hormones (hormones contain phytoestrogens) and that by drinking enough beer, men turn into women. To test the theory, 100 men drank 8 pints of beer each within a 1-hour period.

It was then observed that 100% of the test subjects:

1. Argued over nothing.
2. Refused to apologize when obviously wrong.
3. Gained weight.
4. Talked excessively.
5. Became overly emotional.
6. Couldn’t drive.
7. Failed to think rationally.
8. Had to sit down while urinating.

No further testing was considered necessary.

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Big brewers luring women with ‘girlie beers’

Beer has long been seen as something of a man’s tipple, but drinks companies are now trying to entice female drinkers with a range of new products, The Telegraph reported on December, 9.

Beer is seen as a man’s beverage, but new low-cal versions are hoping to entice more women drinkers. There’s one designed to go with curry, another tastes like passion fruit and a third contains a hint of orange peel and coriander.

With these flavours one could be forgiven for thinking we’re talking about chocolates or perfume, but no — this is beer.

‘Girlie beer’ is the new kid on the alcohol block as smart breweries see they are missing out on up to 50% of the potential market because beer is, well, mostly a man’s drink.

As a result, millions in marketing cash are being ploughed into the launch of new scoops aimed at women who avoid the beer market.

Research carried out by major breweries reveals women avoid beer because they believe it is fattening. Furthermore, advertising is sexist and it’s often portrayed as a male drink. Now, the aim is to lure women drinkers back into the market with a range of new tipples that aim to tantalise.

Top of the list in the research stakes is that many women find the inherent sexism in beer advertising and marketing off-putting.

These gripes aren’t new, it’s just that the beer companies failed to take the information into account. For example, when European market research guru Fons Trompenaars investigated the issue, he pinpointed the divide the brewers themselves created between the sexes as the main culprit that puts women off beer.

It may take a while for women to forgive the big breweries which have busily been disenfranchising them from the market for the past 50 years, and are now belatedly hoping to entice them back

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Australia: SABMiller completes acquisition of Foster’s

U.K.-based brewer SABMiller PLC said on December, 16 it has completed its A$9.9 billion acquisition of Australia’s Foster’s Group Ltd.

In a press release, SABMiller said the consideration will be paid to Foster’s shareholders by Dec. 21.

The board of Foster’s in September recommended shareholders accept a sweetened offer by SABMiller in a deal that had valued Foster’s 4% above what SABMiller offered when it kicked off its pursuit of the company in June.

Foster’s shareholders voted to approve the agreement on Dec. 1.

SABMiller plc is the world’s second-largest brewer after Belgium-based AB InBev.

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Belgian chocolate – a complex cultural phenomenon

Chocolate — like fashion, wine and finance — has become a complex cultural phenomenon. There is basic chocolate for the masses, artisanal chocolate for purists and avant-garde creations for connoisseurs. In Brussels, a polyglot city at the geographic and cultural crossroads of Europe, you get it all, The New York Times reports.

The capital of Belgium may be known as the Capital of Europe, but it is also, at least as far as most chocolate aficionados are concerned, the World Capital of Chocolate. Ever since the Brussels chocolatier Jean Neuhaus invented the praline 100 years ago, the city has been at the forefront of the chocolate business. There are a million residents and some 500 chocolatiers, about one chocolatier for every 2,000 people. The average Belgian consumes over 15 pounds of chocolate each year, one of the highest rates in the world.

But these days, the industry is changing. With countries like Germany and the Netherlands becoming larger European exporters, in Belgium, a new class of chocolatiers is finding innovative ways to hold on to the country’s chocolate crown. They are breaking away from traditional pralines — which Belgians classify as any chocolate shell filled with a soft fondant center — and infusing ganaches with exotic flavors like wasabi or lemon verbena, and creating such imaginative pairings as blackcurrant and cardamom and raspberry and clove.

Brussels is home to two of the biggest chocolate companies in the world, Godiva and Leonidas, as well as scores of boutique chocolate-makers and haute chocolatiers.

Brussels is a curious mix of conservative and avant-garde — in the European quarter alone, you have the cylinder-shaped glass dome of the European Parliament’s Paul-Henri Spaak building hovering over the neo-Classical-style Place du Luxembourg, while sgraffito-studded beacons of Art Nouveau architecture reside nearby. The city’s chocolate scene reflects that tension. The result is some wonderfully surprising creations.

“You have chocolate for tourists, and chocolate for Belgians,” Robbin Zeff Warner, an American expatriate and a former professor of writing at George Washington University who has been blogging about Belgian chocolatiers since her husband’s post with NATO took them to Brussels in 2008, said of the national hierarchy in which chocolate produced by manufacturers like Côte d’Or and Guylian are devoured in vast quantities, but mostly by the city’s six million annual visitors. Bruxellois, Ms. Warner said, prefer the artisanal makers. “The big-name big houses are great. But seeing and tasting real handmade chocolate, while buying it from the person who made the chocolate, is something special.”

Do you know that?

The homebrewery “De Halve Maan” is the only family brewery in the centre of Bruges that is still active. De “Halve Maan” is situated in the heart of the historical town and offers a hospital welcome to the visitors.

In 2005 new life has been blown into the brewery with the revival of the brewery’s activities.

Xavier Vanneste, son of Mrs Veronique Maes, restarted the old brewery after a thorough renovation of the remaining installation. He launched a new beer under the name ‘Brugse Zot’ for which a unique recipe has been developed. Today Brugse Zot is the one and only beer really brewed in Bruges’ towncenter!

By the end of 2008, “Straffe Hendrik”, a beer once developed and brewed by the Maes’ familiy returned to Bruges and is now being brewed, once again, at the brewery “De Halve Maan” according to the original recipe.

Straffe Hendrik is a Bitter Tripel Ale of 9% abv. The beer was originally from Bruges and brewed in Bruges by brewery De Halve Maan.

In 1981, Henri Maes and his daughter Veronique followed the demand of the mayor and created a strong blond beer for the inaugration of the statue of Sint-Arnoldus, the saint of all beer-brewers. However, the beer became so popular, that the demand fot the beer continued. It was given the name of Straffe Hendrik (Strong Hendrick), since it was a rich and strong beer.

Straffe Hendrik was an authentic Bruges’ Tripel beer: a strong and rich beer with lots of flavours (malt, caramel and hop) and 9% abv. In the past, lots of Bruges’ breweries produced a Tripel Style Bruges’ Ale, a “Brugse Tripel”. In fact, it was a local speciality. Today, Straffe Hendrik is the last authentic Bruges’ Tripel Beer.

In 1988, the label was transfered to another brewery and the production in Bruges decreased until it stopped completely. In 2008, exactly 20 years later, Xavier Vanneste brought the label back to Bruges. Ever since, Straffe Hendrik is being brewed in Bruges according to the original recipe and enjoyes once again an excellent reputation amongst the people of Bruges who have “their Tripel” back.

Straffe Hendrik is brewed with a subtle mixture of 6 different kinds of malt. The taste is strong with a lot of hop (Saaz and Styrian Golding) of the best quality. The second fermentation in the bottle assures a longer shelf life. Straffe Hendrik is a very rich beer with lots of flavours.

Beer saves life of man stuck for three days in a snow drift

An Alaskan managed to survive on frozen beer while stuck for three days in a snow drift, TimeNewsFeed reported on December, 7.

Clifton Vial, 52, wound up stuck in a snowdrift off a rural highway in eastern Alaska, his truck lacking the usual survival necessities. All that lay in the back was a few cans of Coors Light, frozen solid. And as any college student knows: beer is food. Even the relatively bland Coors Light contains calories to keep a person functioning. Foodless for nearly 60 hours, Vial munched on the frozen beer.

Vial says he ate the beer like beans from a can. “I cut the lids off and dug it out with a knife,” he said. The 52-year-old lived off the ration of a couple of cans for more than three days while rescuers searched for him.

Vial had taken a drive late night on Monday, December, 5, getting stuck in a snowdrift 40 miles north of Nome. Far out of cell phone range and ill-dressed for the situation in tennis shoes, jeans and a cheap jacket, Vial huddled for warmth in a sleeping bag and shrouded his shivering feet in a towel. He turned on the engine occasionally to listen to the radio and get the heat flowing, but it was no match for the -17 degree temperatures. And by the third day, Vial’s gas gauge was toeing the “empty” line.

When he failed to show up to work on December, 6 afternoon, the search was on for the missing man. It wasn’t until afternoon, nearly three days since his truck became lodged in the snowdrift, that a Nome rescue crew happened upon him. When towed safely back to civilization, Vial’s beer diet quickly hit the skids. He said he’s drinking a gallon and a half of water each day to rehydrate. Fortunately, his Coors binge wasn’t all that unhealthy – he didn’t even gain a beer belly. In fact, Vial lost 16 pounds while he lay stranded.

US craft brewers reviving extinct beer styles

Like scientists set on reviving extinct species, today’s craft brewers are possessed by a certain madness. They are re-creating steinbiers scalded with hot stones and ancient Scottish ales brewed with herbs. They are making modern interpretations of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin’s personal recipes. Researchers have even analyzed a 19th-century beer from a Baltic Sea shipwreck so that it, too, may be brewed once again, The Washington Post reports.

Then there are what might be the best-known historic beers: the widely available Ancient Ales from the US Dogfish Head Craft Brewery, including the Midas Touch, based on ingredients found in the 2,700-year-old tomb believed to have belonged to King Midas; and Theobroma, inspired by chemical analysis of a Central American fermented chocolate drink from 1200 B.C. Dogfish Head has just released its next installment, the ancient-Egyptian-style Ta Henket, — the latest example of one of the beer world’s most enduring and romantic trends.

There’s really a growing interest in re-creations — huge interest, I think,” says Patrick McGovern, a biomolecular archaeologist at the University of Pennsylvania Museum who has conducted the scientific and historical research behind the Ancient Ales. Although he has an exclusivity agreement with Dogfish Head, he estimates that the number of brewers asking him to collaborate on re-creations has doubled or tripled within the past six months. He says he has even been approached by beer-industry giants, including MillerCoors.

Of course, re-creations of historic beers are as old as the craft beer movement itself. Many of America’s best-loved styles, such as saisons, hefeweizens and imperial stouts, were once on the brink of disappearing, and many were saved by breweries that championed them. During the 1970s and ’80s, for example, San Francisco’s Anchor Brewing revived interest in not only California steam beers but also chocolate- and coffee-flavored porters, which brewers had largely cast aside.

Nowadays, ever-more-obscure styles are reappearing with increasing frequency, from Polish smoked-wheat beers to the English strong ales known as Burtons. Among the more prominent examples: the ancient Scottish beers resurrected by the Scotland-based Williams Brothers Brewing; the Ales of the Revolution series from Philadelphia’s Yards Brewing, including Thomas Jefferson’s Tavern Ale and Poor Richard’s Tavern Spruce Ale; and the early British recipes dredged up by beer blogger Ron Pattinson, who has collaborated with the Boston area’s Pretty Things Beer and Ale Project and Brouwerij de Molen of the Netherlands.

The obscurity of the beers hasn’t dulled the drama of the phenomenon. Brewers now probe history books for beers in need of rescuing and crisscross the globe to research forgotten recipes. That might sound like overstatement, if not for one key detail: Beer re-creations have proved to be great fodder for reality TV.

Dogfish Head’s quest to make Ta Henket, for example, was portrayed last December in an episode of the Discovery Channel show “Brew Masters.” Also on Discovery Channel, the special “How Beer Saved the World” depicted the replication by Atlanta’s SweetWater Brewing of an ancient Nubian brewing technique. History Channel countered with its own “History on Tap,” in which home-brewers were given the task of re-creating beers in the style of those brewed by colonial America’s Pilgrims.

In “Brew Masters,” McGovern and Dogfish Head President Sam Calagione traveled to a date farm on the outskirts of Cairo and set rotten dates in sterile plastic trays to ensnare wild Egyptian yeasts. (A Belgian lab later isolated and mapped the DNA of the strain that Calagione eventually used in Ta Henket.) Then there was the obligatory Anthony Bourdain-style stroll through the bazaar, where Calagione and McGovern selected historically significant ingredients for the beer: chamomile; the fruit of the doum palm; and zaatar, a blend of herbs that sometimes contains thyme and savory, which McGovern had identified in wine residues dating from about 3150 B.C.

“The story is critical because it’s what differentiates a beer from any other beer,” Calagione said. Still, he added, “just because you hear of some creepy group of Norwegians that 300 years ago put the blood of virgins into beer doesn’t mean you should replicate it. You have to have a story, but can you have a story and also make a world-class beer?”

The answer appears to be yes. De Molen’s SSS triple stout, a re-creation of a version of the extinct style brewed in London on July 8, 1914, was like thick coffee with notes of caramel and whiskey. Norwegian Wood, from Norway’s HaandBryggeriet, wasn’t brewed with blood. Instead, with its understated smokiness and hints of spice, it recalled the country’s wood-smoke-scented farmhouse ales, which died out in the 1800s.

In a way that other drinks often don’t, these beers explicitly convey the distinctive tastes of distinctive pasts. “I can write stuff and bang on about, ‘Oh, the beers were very different back then,’ but people don’t listen very well,” says Pattinson, who is now trying to bring back Scottish India pale ales. “If you give them a bottle of something to drink, they’ll understand.”

It’s not just the general public he’s trying to satisfy, though. “The main reason I do any of this is because I want to taste the beers,” Pattinson says. “You look at all of these dusty old brewing logs, it gives you a bit of a thirst.”

Beer allurement of Brussels

There is a lot of things that you can say about the city of Brussels where being a favorite tourist destination is concerned. The architecture, the mixed cultural base, the history, and of course the Belgium cuisine are all great reasons to visit the city. However, for many international travelers as well as the locals, it is the beers that hold the allure for a lot of people who have never experienced what Brussels has to offer, Venere.com reports.

The following is a list for some of the top picks where Brussels breweries are concerned.

Brewer’s House – originally, this was the brewers of Brussels guild headquarters. Today, the Belgian Brewer’s Association is located in an 18th century mansion in the Grand Place in Den Gulden Boom. Today it is more of a museum, but it is well worth visiting because of the overview that it provides the visitor with of the history of the beer brewing industry in the city of Brussels. The museum is located in the cellar of this structure and the upper floors are always closed to the visiting public.

Museum van de Gueuze – Lambik and specialty beers have been produced here ever since 1900. Despite the fact that the quintessential beers of Belgium have primarily been of the Lambik variety, this is the only true brewery of this nature left in the city of Brussels. The tours are all available in English and will delight anyone who appreciates the true art of beer brewing from the containers that the beer is aged in to the bottling machines that are still in use and the tasting room. You’ll be able to experience some of the best Lambiks that this brewery has ever created when you take the tour of this establishment.

A La Mort Subite – locals and tourists alike, whether they are young or old, patronize this caf? because of the atmosphere as well as the beer. The beer menu offers some of the best in the following categories:

four of the six Belgian Trappist beers
Gueuze
Kriek from the Brussels region
Lambik

The bottom line with the beers of Brussels is that you can find some of the greatest beers in the world here from their famous Flemish Red to the Lambiks of the region and their renowned pale lagers. They are all here and waiting for you to sample them.

World: Beer market forecast to grow by 2.4% this year

2010 was supposed to be the year that the global economy bounced back. Beer consumption growth improved, but at just +1.6% the advance was lower than in 2008 and, except for 2009, the lowest level since 2001, industry analysts Plato Logic said in their On-the-Hop report at the end of November.

Rather like the global economy as a whole, the beer market was indebted to the emerging markets, which grew at +3.3%. The mature beer markets were again lower, falling by -1.5% (2009, -1.9%).

Trends in the first half of 2011 have been influenced by a wide range of factors. Although the dominant factor continues to be the world economy’s slow emergence from recession, other variables have included natural disasters, climatic influences, unforeseen political factors and some uneven comparatives. Inevitably this has created a very mixed picture, with the beer market in some countries clearly under pressure while also showing signs of recovery in others.

The provisional indications point to a year of improved growth in 2011, at +2.4% making a total market of 1 896 mln hl, Plato forecast.

While this would appear to indicate a return to more ‘normal’ growth rates, it is still a lower rate than recent mid- and long-term “cagrs”. If ‘headline’ global beer has therefore arguably remained ‘resilient’ through the crisis, the recovery phase also appears to be slow and, above all, patchy – reflecting the overall economic environment. Excluding the impact of growth in China, Plato’s projection for all other markets is +0.9%. The analysts forecast that the mature beer markets will decline again in 2011 (-1.2%).

However, Plato Logic expect mid single-digit declines (or worse) to be limited to just a few markets with quite specific circumstances in 2011, with a number of countries either recovering or continuing to grow. This is reflected in the ‘two-speed’ nature of the projected regional growth rates.

In general, much of Europe has been experiencing another difficult year, with some mixed climatic conditions as well as the further impact of ‘austerity programmes’. The Eurozone crisis continues to cast a shadow over the prospects for the region. Overall experts expect the region to be broadly flat, with West Europe volumes down by around -1%.

For East Europe (including Russia) Plato analysts are currently projecting a small increase of +1%, depending somewhat on how the Russian market develops in the last quarter. The crisis has been particularly severe across the emerging economies of Eastern Europe, a region that had been a key driver of global beer market growth over the period 1998-2007, and where the economic recovery remains fragile or even elusive. Nevertheless, some beer markets have returned to growth in 2010/2011.

North America is also forecast to be broadly flat, with some recovery in Mexico expected to compensate for continuing weakness in USA and Canada, where recovery in both the beer market and the broader economy remains elusive. A sharp slowdown in Brazil, together with modest growth elsewhere in the region, points to a relatively disappointing year in South America, with just +3% growth forecast.

China has seen growth in the first 9 months of around +7%, according to latest estimates, and Plato Logic also expect the full year outcome to be in the range +6.5-7.5%. The analysts also expect growth in India to continue, but at a lower rate than in 2010. Plato are projecting growth of just +1% for the Far East region, as despite further advances in ‘Indochina’, they are projecting another weak year in Japan (-3%) as well as decline in Thailand.

Plato analysts forecast that the Africa/M.East region will continue to move ahead, by around +4%. It should be noted that the political and social unrest that has developed across many countries in North Africa and the Middle East during 2011 has been largely affecting markets with low levels of beer consumption.

Plato’s current projection for world beer market growth in 2012 is +2.6%. Excluding the impact of growth in China and Africa, the projection for all other markets in 2012 is a more modest +1.8%.

The analysts’ ‘control scenario’ for 2012 does assume that the world beer market will continue to pick up, albeit modestly. The immediate outlook for 2012 remains particularly uncertain given the state of the global economy, Plato said.

Belgian chocolate – the gourmet standard of the world

When it comes to chocolates, there are the everyday candy bars we consume every day, the more exotic Godiva or Ghirardelli-style chocolates found in coffee houses and specialty stores, and then there is Belgian chocolate. Belgian chocolate is considered to be the gourmet standard by which all other chocolate confections are measured. Even the Swiss, known for their own high quality chocolate, imported the basic recipe from French and Belgian chocolatiers, WiseGeek reports.

What makes Belgian chocolate unique is the quality of ingredients and an almost fanatical adherence to Old World manufacturing techniques. Even in today’s world of automation and mass production, most Belgian chocolate is still made by hand in small shops using original equipment. In fact, these small chocolate outlets are a popular draw for tourists visiting Belgium today. Tours of Belgian chocolate shops include tastings and exclusive souvenirs.

Belgian chocolate itself has been popular since the 18th century, but a new process created by Jean Neuhaus in 1912 increased its popularity ten-fold. Neuhaus used a special version of chocolate called “couverteur” as a cold shell for what he called ‘pralines’. These pralines are not the same as the sugary treats offered in American candy shops. Belgian chocolate pralines could be filled with a variety of flavored nougats or creams, such as coffee, hazelnut, fruit or more chocolate. Few other chocolatiers in Neuhaus’ day could duplicate the complex flavors of his pralines. Many of the Belgian chocolate praline companies are still in operation today – Leonidas, Neuhaus, Godiva and Nirvana are famous for their gourmet pralines.

One technical advantage Belgian chocolate has over other chocolatiers is the storage of couverteur before use. In the chocolate making process, the cocoa beans are ground and mixed with sugar and cocoa butter and then smoothed out through tempering (careful addition of heat). Most chocolate companies receive their chocolate in solid form, which means it must be reheated in order to be usable. Belgian chocolate companies often receive their couverteur in heated tanker trucks soon after the tempering process. Because the chocolate has not cooled, it retains much more of the aroma than the cooled varieties.

Belgian chocolate may be expensive, but those who have sampled it say that there is no comparison between a standard chocolate bar and a Belgian praline. As a gift or special indulgence, Belgian chocolate is one product which lives up to its reputation for quality.

Do you know that?

Refreshing as an aperitif and just as full of flavour and rich in aroma as a beer from heaven, DeuS by Bosteels Brewery is a magnificent symbiosis of brewing a beer and creating a sparkling wine.

DeuS is simply ideal for delighting your guests sometime as an unusual choice with the before-dinner nibbles and amuse-geules and perfect if you have got something to celebrate.

Every sparkling glass of DeuS is the result of a months-long manufacturing process in which the best of two methods is combined. In Belgium, the master brewer ferments the beer. After that DeuS travels to France where it is transformed into a sparkling divine drink using a centuries old technique.

“Other great beers might approach, but not quite match the delicacy of DeuS.” Michael Jackson, the Beer Hunter

Belgium: Trappist monks of Saint Sixtus abbey make unique offer through supermarkets

For the past 172 years, the Trappist monks of the Saint Sixtus abbey in Westvleteren, Belgium, have resisted the financial rewards that would have come from mass commercialisation of their distinctive beer, The Financial Times reported on November, 4.

Even though their leading brew, Westvleteren 12, has consistently topped beer ranking tables, earning it a global following, its sales are still restricted to the walls of the abbey, near the French border.

A trip to Westvleteren is akin to a pilgrimage for beer lovers, with its own distinctive liturgy: after ringing a “beerphone” at a designated hour, customers are given a time to pick up a strictly rationed quantity of beer in the tiny village. Latecomers are ritually turned away.

But the abbey’s crumbling walls have forced the monks to relent – at least partly. To help finance an ˆ8 mln ($11 mln) rebuilding programme at Saint Sixtus, a 93,000-case batch of Westvleteren 12 reached supermarket shelves on November, 3.

“It’s a one-off event – an absolutely unique offer,” the abbey’s Brother Godfried said. “There is only so much beer that we can produce, or that we want to produce. It is only for this particular situation.”

Belgians queued to discover the famed beer, with its 10.8 per cent alcohol content, without having to satisfy the monks’ requirements to purchase it on-site.

“It’s the only Trappist beer I’ve never had,” said Sandy Logan, a translator in Antwerp who grew up near Westmalle, site of another religious brewery, and who took up the offer on November, 3.

“Westvleteren has a certain mystique: one of the things that contributes to it is the fact that it’s so rare.”

Few shops had stocks left on November, 4, and whatever is left was expected to be gone by the weekend, netting ˆ2.3 mln for the monks. A grey market has formed on internet auction sites, with six-packs offered for several times their ˆ25 retail price.

“It really is a special beer,” said Joe Tucker of RateBeer.com, a US-based site whose users rate Westvleteren 12 as the world’s best. “There are figs, raisin flavours, lots of cocoa, with a creamy texture. Its rarity also makes it that little bit special.”

Saint Sixtus, which started producing beer to sustain itself a few years after it was founded in 1831, is the smallest of six monastic breweries in Belgium, and the only one to stick to antiquated sales methods.

It produces 475,000 litres of beer annually, a fraction compared with almost 40 bln litres from AB InBev, the brewing behemoth behind Budweiser, whose global headquarters are down the road in Leuven.

There will be a second part to the extramural sales of Westverelen 12: a 70,000-case batch is being brewed for international distribution next year. The US and France will receive cases, as could Japan and China if distribution deals are secured.

Once that is finished, sales of Westvleteren will once more be confined to the walls of Saint Sixtus, its brief foray into mainstream commerce over once and for all.

“There are spiritual as well as practical reasons why it must be so,” explained Brother Godfried.

Beer is good for heart and soul

According to an analysis by Italy’s Fondazione di Ricerca e Cura, moderate consumption of beer could reduce the drinker’s risk of heart disease by 31 percent.

The Italian foundation based its findings on about 200,000 people’s habits of drinking beer, wine and spirits.

Previous health studies have indicated that the antioxidants in red wine could help reduce drinkers’ risk of cancer, heart disease and diabetes.

However, it shocks some that beer could also have health benefits.

Alcohol can increase high-density lipoprotein, or “good” cholesterol levels, which can reduce the risk of hardening of the arteries and thickening of the blood, according to a Huffington Post article Wednesday. Both risks are direct contributors to heart disease.

According to the study, the best recipe for good heart health is an English pint of beer with a strength of 5 percent alcohol.

Maya Pugh-Jones, a 23-year-old sociology senior, enjoys two or three Indian Pale Ales with dinner a couple of nights a week. She said sitting back with a good beer is not only healthy physically but also mentally.

“Having a beer just takes the edge off,” she said. “It’s good for your psyche.”

A new wave in hop use

Brewers have been making beer for well over 5,000 years, but amazingly hops have only been a main ingredient for the past few hundred years. Even more incredible is that hops have only been utilized for their diverse aroma and flavor contributions – for only the past decade or two. It’s a split of a split second in terms of beer’s timeline, Examiner.com reports.

American craft brewers have recently initiated the not-so-traditional flavor and aroma characters that beer drinkers generally know as floral and fruity. But it’s far more interesting than just “fruity and floral.”

It may have begun with Michael Jackon’s ground breaking books where he describes the spicy and herbal character of such traditional hops as German Hallertauer and Czech Saaz. These are wonderful hops having fantastic herbal notes in flavor and aroma. But the issue for the beer drinking renaissance originating in the USA was that the level of hop flavor and aroma was far below the levels new beer drinkers were seeking.

Along came Cascade hops in the 1970s. This was the original citrus “fruity” hop used by craft brewers. Whether they knew what they were doing or not, they added these hops in different ways, creating hop aromas and flavors that were perceived by beer drinkers and zealously welcomed.

Higher alpha acid (more bitterness) hybrids followed such as Centennial, Chinook, Nugget – all adding to the American “citrus” hop revolution. Then in the early 2000, perhaps as early as the waning years of the 20th century, new American varieties were joined by unique hops from New Zealand. These hops, such as New Zealand Nelson B. Sauvin, Pacific Hallertauer, American Mt. Hood, Amarillo, Simcoe, Columbus, Citra, Sterling and many others were bred for their agriculture qualities and alpha acid (bitterness) strength.

But the unforeseen happened.

American craft brewers began using these hops in late additions in the brewing process and dry hopping in the fermentation and aging process. Their procedures and methodology was equally diverse.

A new way of utilizing hops emerged. Not only did it emerge, it is now a major emphasis distinguishing American craft brewers contributions to world-wide beer trends.

Grapefruit, tangerine, lemon, lime, rose, honey, nectar-floral, bergamot, passion fruit, red and black currant, gooseberry, banana, wine-grape bouquet, piney, woody, melon, lychee, geranium, apricot, peach, mango, mint, strawberry, blueberry, pineapple, water melon, peppery characters from hops are just the tip of the tail that wags hop horticulture.

Hop growers are finally beginning to understand that there are a growing number of brewers and beer drinkers who not only desire, but demand hop-character diversity in their beer. And brewers are willing to invest to assure that not only hops are grown with these characters, but want them to be sustainable. This is a complete topsy-turvy upside down way of thinking from the traditional hop growers perspective. Driven by large brewer’s desire for efficiency and hop bitter utilization, for decades it’s been completely about alpha acid yield and dollars. In short, alpha acid yield per acre has driven hop agriculture. Mostly it still is. American craft brewers brew only 5% of the volume of beer enjoyed in the USA, but they account for perhaps 30% of the hop usage. And often they aren’t just interested in plain old bitterness from hops.

Hop breeding in the USA has been going on for decades. There has been more attention paid to breeding for hop aroma and flavor, but not enough. Now the German Society of Hop Research Advisory Board last month released a document called, “New Trends in Hop Breeding.”

The Society of Hop Research recognizes the Classical Way and the New Way:

Classical Way:

traditional fine aroma of the Hallertauer mittelfrueh and Tettnanger type new aroma varieties with a distinctive aroma profile, such as Saphir, Opal and Smaragd

New Way:

trend started by the US craft brewers
search for unhoppy, fruity, exotic flavors derived from hops
developing hops with these aroma notes.

Cross breeding programs are underway in what is called the “H?ll Aroma Breeding” program. Key hop compounds have been identified such as:

citronellol = citrus like
limonene = citrus like
linalool = citrus, flowery like
geraniol = flowery, rose like
4-mercapto-4-methyl-pentan –2-on = black currant like
isobutyl isobutyrate = green apple like
2-methylbutyl isobutyrate = apricot flavour

But with a special note they justifiably recognize that knowing the above essential oils of dried hop cones does not mean it is easy to predict aroma and flavor notes in beer. That is very true. Why?

Getting hop flavors and aromas into beer depends on many variables.

When the hops are added if added late in the brewing process

Density or strength of the beer/wort
Variable during dry hopping period
Level of alcohol
Yeast in suspension (they interact with oils)
Alcohol
Beer style
Malt ingredients used
Temperature
Type of circulation
Time in contact with beer
Condition of hops and recognizing that qualities change with time

What are they cross breeding with various H?ll hop varieties? Mostly American Cascade hop, along with Fuggle.

These are interesting times for beer drinkers. The horizon looks promising, but it will take time for hop breeds to be ready for actual cultivation. Some varieties might have fantastic qualities, but are susceptible to disease and pests. It takes time. While beer drinkers anticipate, brewers will need to invest time, effort and support hop growers in their endeavor to pursue sustainable harvest of hops that offer a diverse variety of aromas and flavors. Why? Because beer drinkers want these exciting characters in their beer.

God is good to have given us yeast

For centuries, before the invention of the microscope, yeast was a largely unknown ingredient in beer. What was known was that during each fermentation a light-colored, creamy substance was produced and was taken from the tops of fermenting beer and added to the next batch, Azcentral.com reports.

Some stories go that the substance, which caused the beer to ferment, was simply referred to as, “God is good.”

Of course, with the invention of the microscope, that creamy stuff was classified as yeast.

Yeast is a single-celled microorganism that is responsible for metabolizing sugar and, as a result, producing alcohol, carbon dioxide and various other aromatic and flavor compounds. It is classified as a fungus and has been given the scientific name saccharomyces, from the Greek for “sugar fungus.”

Brewer’s yeast, or saccharomyces cerevisiae, was thought to come in two varieties: top-fermenting ale yeast (s. cerevisiae) and bottom-fermenting lager yeast (s. pastorianus). However, a recent reclassification has listed all beer yeasts as s. cerevisiae, making lager yeast a hybrid of that classification.

Historically, ale yeast was fermented at warmer temperatures and would tend to congregate at the tops of fermenters. Lager yeast was fermented cooler and would tend to drop out to the bottoms of fermenters.

But with today’s modern cylindroconical fermenters, most yeast has been “trained” to drop to the bottom. It makes for easier transfers and cleanup without changing the flavor characteristics of the yeast.

So what is the difference? Essentially two things: temperature and diet.

Warmer fermentation temperatures tend to favor faster fermentations, which produce the more fruity, estery aromas and flavors found in ales. Colder temperatures produce smoother, less fruity aromas, and some people say lagers have a drier character because lager yeast can metabolize melibiose, a type of sugar produced from malt, which ale yeast cannot.

Of course, nothing is cut and dried with yeast. You can certainly make a good beer by using ale yeast at cooler temperatures. And you can also make fine beer using lager yeast and fermenting it warm.

The bottom line is that without yeast the other ingredients don’t amount to much, neither do brewers for that matter.

Bruges – the capital of the finest chocolate in the world

Belgian chocolate is the finest in the world, so why not plan a getaway to the charming medieval city of Bruges, the capital of this delicacy, during ‘Choc’in Brugge’, a celebration of all aspects of the sweet delight, Hello! posted on November, 4.

From November 6th to December 8th, at Choc’in Brugge, you can meet the best master craftsmen, visit the Chocolate Museum, enjoy themed menus in high-class restaurants, participate in workshops and tastings, sign up for a chocolate beauty treatment, or take a tour to discover the history of the love affair between the city of Bruges and everybody’s favourite sweet temptation.

The links between Bruges and cocoa go way back: it all began in the late Middle Ages, when some of the city’s families started to look for new products in which to trade. They already traded in sugar cane from Madeira, and when the Spanish brought cocoa from the New World in the sixteenth century, they soon learned to mix it with sugar. And so began the first chapter of a long story to which new pages continue to be added today as master confectioners create new treats for the sweet-toothed and new ways are discovered to enjoy and use the age-old delight. Visit the beautiful chocolate-box setting of Bruges while Choc’in Brugge is underway, and let yourself be tempted.

Bruges is a true chocolate lab thanks to over 50 expert chocolatiers, some long-established as well as other exciting new talents. So may experts in one place means there are a thousand ways to enjoy chocolate in the city, from traditional crafts to the most innovative creations. Just take a stroll around and look at the confectioners’ windows and you’ll see that no other city in the world offers more choice or higher quality chocolate products. Depla (Mariastraat, 20), Dumon (in Simon Stevinplein square) or its smaller, more traditional sister establishment in Eiermarkt Street will set your mouth watering. Don’t miss other such as Guillaume (Grasdreef, 19), Roose (Steenstraat, 47), Spegelaere (Ezelstraat, 92) and The Chocolate Line, one of just three chocolate shops that rate a mention in the Michelin Guide.

The Chocolate Museum has the answers to all your questions about cocoa and its 4,000 year history. The sensorial museum shows how the sweet treat has evolved through the centuries, how the tropical seed is processed and chocolate is made, and, of course, it offers visitors plenty of opportunity for sampling. During the celebration of Choc’in Brugge the museum is also hosting special workshops for adults and children. In short, it’s a perfect place for chocoholics to indulge their addiction under the guise of a cultural visit!

Over a dozen fine restaurants – boasting six Michelin stars and nine Gault Millau mentions between them – including Danny Horseele, Zeno, De Jonkman and Kwizien Divi join in the sweet celebrations to offer creative menus dedicated to chocolate.

Some of the best restaurants in Bruges – Bristo De Amand, De Mangerie, La Tache – play their part, too, with fascinating workshops for small groups, where the chefs show how chocolate can be combined with fine gastronomy.

To coincide with the sweet celebrations, until December 8th, on Saturdays, Sundays, Mondays and Wednesdays, there’s a two-hour guided tour of the city available which will let you discover the places and the stories, the aromas and the flavours that have influenced the history of Bruges chocolate.

Eating chocolate can brighten your spirits, but it has its uses as a beauty treatment, too, as it’s an excellent skin tonic. Five of the city’s most famous beauty parlours are offering exclusive chocolate therapies. So, how do you fancy a choco body scrub? Or a hot chocolate skin wrap? These are just two of the indulgent options available for your pleasure.

Do you know that?

For more than a century now, the Bavik Brewery has been part of the landscape of Bavikhove in Flanders, Belgium.

Behind the success of this independent brewery stands the De Brabandere family.

Today the fourth generation of the family of brewers produces a wide selection of excellent beers.

In addition to traditional Lager, the Bavik Brewery has lots more to offer.

The range of table beers, Bavik Dinner Beer, for instance. With its two different flavours, Blond and Faro (Alc. 1,5% vol.), Bavik sits well on any kitchen table.

The family is completed with Bavik Triple Bock (Alc.3 % vol.), Bavik pony-stout (Alc. 5,2% vol.) and Fancy (Alc. 0,5% vol.).

Cheers!

Belgium: Beer consumption increases in restaurants to the detriment of wine – study

Beer remains a significant part of the Belgian lifestyle, a survey conducted by Beer & Society Information centre in collaboration with Dernière Heure, La Libre Belgique and Het Nieuwsblad in late July shows.

In restaurants, beer is ordered by 27.2% of consumers to the detriment of wine (24.6% in 2010 and 18% in 2007). In cafes, beer is the drink of choice for 94.1% of visitors (93.8% last year). At home, 26% drink beer during a meal (40% last year) and 67.9% open a bottle of beer in front of the TV (71.7%). During family holidays, beer is served in 58.3% cases (55%). Out of home, 85.3% of respondents choose beer (84.8%). About 48.9% of respondents like beer cocktails (24.6% last year), the study found.

Traditional Pilsen beer is the favourite type of 38.4% of respondents, though its popularity was seen as decreasing when the previous three reports were published (41% in 2007, 38% in 2009, and 36.5% in 2010).

Craft (or special) beers are preferred by an increasing number of consumers (48% in 2010 and in 2009, 39% in 2007). Abbaye beers are the most popular among special beers – 14.7%, followed by strong blonde beers (13.5%), Trappist beers (12.9%) and Regional beers (8.8).

The majority of respondents said that they stayed loyal to their preferred brands and their choice was not influenced by advertising.

Beer is the best source of silicon for your bones and cardiovascular system

Older women could boost their bone health by drinking a glass of beer a day, Express.co.uk reports.

According to a new study ale is a good source of dietary silicon which is a mineral important for the formation of new bone.

In a healthy body bone is constantly lost and reformed and silicon is vital for helping renew it and for the health of collagenous tissue such as nails, hair and skin.

Silicon is found in many foods including fruit and vegetables but is most easily absorbed from beer. It is found in the hops from which the drink is made.

Studies have shown a direct link between the amount of silicon in a person’s diet and their bone mineral density.

Cambridge University researcher Professor Jonathan Powell studied the effects of beer on bone formation and found that ethanol which is also present in alcohol helps prevent bone loss while silicon encourages the growth of new bone.

“Silicon needs to synergise with the hormone oestrogen to produce a beneficial effect and as women age their oestrogen levels fall so as they get older it is important for them to take in a good daily amount of silicon,” says Professor Powell.

“There is also evidence that it can help to reduce hypertension (high blood pressure) and in future it may well be regarded as a new nutrient.”

Professor Powell says dietary silicon has a crucial role to play in preventing the bone disease osteoporosis but only about nine per cent of women drink beer.

It is difficult to evaluate the effects of a high silicon intake on women but studies on animals have shown evidence of its metabolic role.

Professor Powell has also carried out a study on the effects of the mineral on cardiovascular health and found that a silicon deficiency leads to a reduction in the size of the aorta which is the body’s largest artery and runs from the heart to the abdomen.

The circumference of the aorta was generally smaller in subjects that lacked silicon.

Studies have shown moderate consumption of red wine (one to two glasses a day) can help guard against cardiovascular disease through resveratrol which is present in the skins of grapes.

However Professor Powell argues we should be looking at the benefits of a high silicon intake in reducing diseases such as osteoporosis, heart disease and tissue disorders.

He is now looking at whether men and women with osteoporosis have a reduced silicon content in their bones which would provide firm evidence of the mineral’s role.

Dr Clare Gerada, chairwoman of the Royal College of General Practitioners, says: “GPs are not killjoys. We want people to make the most of their lives and moderate drinking in a social setting will help raise the mood of most people which is a health benefit in itself.

“Studies such as this are interesting but they should be viewed with caution and not taken as an excuse for increasing the amount you drink or for drinking certain types of alcohol excessively.

“The Government advises that people should not regularly drink more than the daily unit guidelines of three to four units of alcohol for men (equivalent to a pint and a half of four per cent alcohol beer) and two or three units of alcohol for women (equivalent to a 175ml glass of wine or a pint of beer).”

Italy: Craft beer gaining ground with confidence since the mid-1990s

Italian craft brewers are creating a thriving scene in a country regarded as a beer backwater, The Guardian reported earlier this week.

The country is still dominated by two huge bland lager brands, Peroni and Moretti. In the last decade, however, there has been a huge change. Craft beer has taken off in a big way. Italy now has 360 microbreweries and, from nothing, craft beer has come to account for 2% of total Italian beer sales.

This is some turnaround considering that in the mid-1990s there was almost no craft beer brewed commercially in Italy. Pioneers Birrificio Lambrate, Birrificio Italiano and Le Baladin’s influential owner Matterino “Teo” Musso only started brewing in 1996. Now, a new microbrewery opens every few weeks; 140 were founded between 2008 and 2010.

Davide Bertinotti, secretary of Movimento Birrario Italiano (MoBI), a consumer organisation, says that there are many reasons why craft beer has taken off:

“[It] originally started in 1995, when the Italian parliament passed a bill that made homebrewing legal and simplified some procedures for brewpubs. The explosion came from many factors: a shift from high alcohol – wine – to lower alcohol but flavourful drink consumption, and a new awareness of avoiding drinking and driving; searching for healthy and genuine food and drinks; and the fact that, in Italy, we do not have a beer tradition. What’s new is also fashionable!”

Beer is great with food and in it

Beer has its place in the kitchen – in a cold glass to sip while you are cooking and in marinades, braising liquids, soups, stews, sauces, batters and baked goods.

Beer’s versatility is due to its variety and the complexity of its flavor profile. With so many beers available these days, it’s fun to experiment.

Use heavier beers like stouts and porters with hearty dishes like braises and stews, and lighter beers like pilsners, pale ales and wheat beers with more delicate dishes like fish, chicken and vegetables.

Don’t overdo it, especially when using bitter, hoppy beers, because the bitterness will wipe out the food’s flavors. By the same token, avoid light beer in cooking because it’s just like adding water. Remember that the alcohol evaporates in cooking and that the flavor of the beer gets stronger the longer a dish is cooked, so adjust the strength and amount of beer accordingly.

Beer is an excellent batter ingredient because the alcohol causes the batter to more quickly dry and form a crisp outer layer, which reduces moisture loss and fat absorption. Beer also acts like yeast in helping the batter to rise and creates a light and delicious crust.

Here are more ways to cook with beer:

• After you’ve browned the meat for your chili or stew, splash some beer into the pan (as you would wine) and scrape up all of the browned bits to start a rich sauce.

• Use beer as part of the liquid for paella.

• Spike cheese sauce (for dip, soup or macaroni and cheese) with a splash of beer.

• Slow-braise meat or steam mussels or shrimp in an inch or two of beer.

• Replace part (or all) of the liquid in a bread recipe with beer.

Chocolate consumption good for heart health

A sweet tooth isn’t necessarily bad for your health – at least not when it comes to chocolate, Reuters said on October, 11 citing a new study.

Researchers studying more than 33,000 Swedish women found that the more chocolate women said they ate, the lower their risk of stroke.

The results add to a growing body of evidence linking cocoa consumption to heart health, but they aren’t a free pass to gorge on chocolate.

“Given the observational design of the study, findings from this study cannot prove that it’s chocolate that lowers the risk of stroke,” Susanna Larsson from Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm said.

While she believes chocolate has health benefits, she also warned that eating too much of it could be counterproductive.

“Chocolate should be consumed in moderation as it is high in calories, fat, and sugar,” she said. “As dark chocolate contains more cocoa and less sugar than milk chocolate, consumption of dark chocolate would be more beneficial.”

Larsson and her colleagues, whose findings appear in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, tapped into data from a mammography study that included self-reports of how much chocolate women ate in 1997. The women ranged in age from 49 to 83 years.

Over the next decade, there were 1,549 strokes, and the more chocolate women ate, the lower their risk.

Among those with the highest weekly chocolate intake – more than 45 grams – there were 2.5 strokes per 1,000 women per year. That figure was 7.8 per 1,000 among women who ate the least (less than 8.9 grams per week).

Scientists speculate that substances known as flavonoids, in particular so-called flavanols, may be responsible for chocolate’s apparent effects on health.

According to Larsson, flavonoids have been shown to cut high blood pressure, a risk factor for stroke, and improve other blood factors linked to heart health. Whether that theoretical benefit translates into real-life benefits remains to be proven by rigorous studies, however.

Nearly 800,000 Americans suffer a stroke every year, with about a sixth of them dying of it and many more left disabled. For those at high risk, doctors recommend blood pressure medicine, quitting smoking, exercising more and eating a healthier diet — but so far chocolate isn’t on the list.

Special Event

On Thursday, November 17th, we’ll be debuting Idiot’s Drool from 5 – 8 pm at the brewery. Idiot’s Drool is an Old Ale that has spent 4 1/2 years in oak barrels.

Head Brewer, Chris Wilson says, “It’s a full-bodied, deep burgundy ale with an incredibly complex character. Extended aging has imbued this beer with notes of vanilla, oak, leather and sweet sherry. A mild acidity and subtle carbonation rounds out the palate. Truly fantastic!”

There are only 840 bottles available, so it is a Brewery Only release. Idiot’s Drool is only available in 750 ml cork and cage bottles, with a max of 6 bottles per customer. Since our license only allows us to sell a case of 12 of the 750 bottles, you can choose from our selection of available 750 bottles: Merry Monks, Double Simcoe or Rapture. That’s right – Rapture!! We have another 60 cases we’ve held back just so they would be available at this event. Idiot’s Drool is $23 per bottle, ABV is 12%. Our brewers will be present at this special event to answer all queries.

Chris Wilson, Head Brewer:
Here comes the light of an autumn moon. You can enjoy that Imperial Pumpkin Ale now, he he he! AutumnFest is out there as well. It seems these beers are getting more and more popular. Get out there and find ‘em while you still can.

I hope all of you made it out last month for the release of our new American Wild Ale, Rapture. I know many of you did because it was a great success! Outside of a slight (ok, more than slight) register problem, everything went great. We had a great night, a great crowd and a great response to Rapture. Thanks to all who made it to the brewery and helped us celebrate our newest beer and for being patient during our register issues. Also, thanks for keeping our parking lot clean (except for that one car, you know who you are).

We have a nice addition to our Brewer’s Select Series, Sierra. This velvety black Milk Stout is full-bodied, yet drinkable and delicious. We have used an intricate mix of 7 malts to yield aspects of coffee, bitter cocoa and toasted oats. Then just as you might add cream to your espresso, we add a dose of lactose sugar to balance out the roasted flavors. This combo gives you a beer that is chocolaty and creamy. Delicious!

Winter Ale will be hitting the shelves very soon as well. I think there is enough of a chill in the air (at night at least) to make it feel just right. QUAD is on the horizon too!

Don’t Run, Don’t Rush, Just Flow,
Chris W.

New Easton Brewfest Event
In past years, Weyerbacher has attended the Lehigh Valley Brewfest hosted by Equi-librium. This year, they will be hosting a new event and we are looking forward to it. We hope you can attend to help this very worthy cause:

NEW PAIRINGS EVENT SET FOR NOVEMBER 6 IN EASTON
 

Easton, PA — Equi-librium is pleased to announce the premiere of a new and unique event in the Valley: The Pairings; fine food, wine & beer. During this event, Lehigh Valley chefs will pair food and drinks for the best culinary results — it will go one step beyond a traditional wine or beer tasting event. The non-profit organization has almost ten years of experience with craft beer tasting events, having hosted Lehigh Valley Brewfest since 2004.

The Pairings will be held on Sunday, November 6 from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m. at The Bank Street Annex in Downtown Easton. Food tastings will be matched with a wine and a craft beer, starting with hors d’oeuvres and ending with dessert. Chefs participating include ones from Sette Luna, Pearly Baker’s, Wegmans, Vintage, Bethlehem BrewWorks, Gala Gourmet Catering, Balasia, diLorenzo’s, Warm Sugar and more. Wines from the vineyards such as Hermann Weimer and craft beers from breweries including Weyerbacher and Bethlehem BrewWorks will be matched during this event.

All proceeds will go to support Equi-librium’s therapeutic riding and driving programs for local children, youth and adults with special needs.

There will be only 300 tickets to this event, allowing all attendees to have a chance to talk with the chefs and other providers. The cost per ticket will be $80 prior to the day before the event, and $85 at the door. Attendees must be 21 or older. Registrations can be made through the web site: www.thepairingslv.org, or by calling 570-992-7722.

Do you know that?

Fourteen generations of the Sterkens family have been brewing top-fermented beers in the village of Meer in the North of Belgium since 1651.

Until 1990, the Sterkens brewery mainly distributed its beers to over 500 restaurants and pubs in Belgium. In the past 15 years, however, the brewery has increasingly shifted its focus to the export market and at present, some 95% of production is sold abroad.

The distinct packaging in ceramic crocks and ornamental bottles have given the beers of the Sterkens Brewery a unique image.

Hoogstraten Poorter, one of the company’s beer masterpieces, is a strong beer with a sweet aroma, bittersweet full flavour, and velvety aftertaste.

The aroma is primarily dark fruity sweetness with a uniquely rugged grassy component in the background. The taste is a malty sweetness (some caramel and dark fruit) mixed with toasted nuts. The mouthfeel is medium bodied with a higher level of carbonation, which leaves a mild but pleasant sweet/dry mix.

Alcohol: 6.50 %

Cheers!

World: Budweiser, Corona and Heineken named world’s most valuable beer brands in 2011

Budweiser, Corona and Heineken are listed as the world’s most valuable beer brands by the recently published Interbrand 2011 Best Global Brands report.

AB InBev’s Budweiser is ranked the 29th brand of the top 100, its value being estimated at USD12.252 bln. While the brand’s growth in Brazil saw some slowdown in 2011, it continues to build its presence in Latin America and China, which both represent huge growth opportunities, Interbrand experts believe. Budweiser, however, has added zero points vs. its value last year.

Grupo Modelo’s Corona holds the 86th position with a value of USD3.924 bln (+2% vs. last year). The number one beer in Mexico and the number one imported beer in Australia and North America is linked to a laid-back lifestyle, vacation, and relaxation, through its somewhat iconic lime wedge and beach. This is captured at every touchpoint, whether it is social media or more traditional advertising. The brand has been able to evolve this message—even inviting fans to “find your beach” in recent campaigns. This year, Corona announced its biggest retail sweepstakes promotion yet—a chance for its customers to win one of 100 trips to Mexico.

Heineken’s series of acquisitions in fast-developing markets continued this year, following 2010’s purchase of Femsa Cerveza, which rebalanced the portfolio from a steadily declining European base. Notably, this year the brand has been eyeing Africa, acquiring additional brewery capacity in Nigeria, and entering the South Sudan market after buying two Ethiopian breweries. Additionally, it remains steady in Brazil where it has had a presence for many years.

According to the annual survey, Heineken’s brand value increased 8% over last year and more than 60% since 2005 to USD3.809 bln.

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Belgium’s strong golden ales

Belgium’s strong golden ales are high-fermenting beers of pale golden color with a long-lasting foam, and a very high alcoholic strength ranging from 6 to 9%.

What differentiates them from ‘Triple’ is the paler and clearer colour, simpler taste, a flavour more on the malt and hops side and no distinctive yeast character. Some complexity arise from the high ABV. A fruity and spicy character may be present, from either warm fermentation or actual spice additions.

The most famous example in this category is the classic Duvel, one of the flagships of Belgian beer worldwide. The name of this beer is an alteration of the word “duivel” which means “devil” in Flemish, and most beers produced after this model have similar demonious names. But all of them are not copies of the most renowned brand, and many are excellent beers, acclaimed by experts.

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Belgium & India: Duvel Moortgat to launch its Duvel and Liefmans beers in India

Belgian specialty beer maker Duvel Moortgat has lined up the launch of its namesake beer brand in India, local media reported on October, 3.

Joining Duvel in the country will be the brewer’s Liefmans brand, Duvel Moortgat confirmed late last week. Both beers will be available in Delhi and Mumbai, with both retailing at around INR450 (US$8.90) per bottle.

Cerana Imports will handle the brands’ importation and distribution.

The brewer took control of Liefmans back in June 2008, after Liefmans had been declared bankrupt six months earlier.

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Belgium & UK: SABMiller surges in London trading on unofficial report of takeover talks with AB InBev

SABMiller Plc, the world’s second- biggest brewer, surged in London trading after Brazilian news website IG reported that the beer maker is in talks to be bought by larger competitor AB InBev NV, Bloomberg reported on October, 6.

The stock rose as much as 11 percent, the steepest intraday gain since Nov. 24, 2008, after Guilherme Barros, a columnist at the Sao Paulo-based website, said a deal could be worth about $80 billion. He didn’t say how he obtained the information.

Nigel Fairbrass, a spokesman for London-based SABMiller, and Marianne Amssoms, a spokeswoman for Leuven, Belgium-based AB InBev, declined to comment on the report.

SABMiller traded up 140 pence, or 6.7 percent, at 2,240 pence at midday, giving the company a market value of 35.6 billion pounds ($54.5 billion). AB InBev fell as much as 2.2 percent in Brussels and was down 44 cents, or 1.1 percent, at 39.19 euros at 1 p.m. local time.

SABMiller, the maker of Grolsch and Peroni, agreed to buy Australia’s Foster’s Group Ltd. for about A$9.9 billion ($9.6 billion) on Sept. 21.

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Chocolate lifts up mood

Devouring a bar of chocolate might make you forget your sorrows for those sweet moments it takes to melt on your tongue. But the mood-boosting benefits of chocolate pass as quickly as the experience of eating it, a new study has found, according to Los Angeles Times.

In order to assess chocolate’s supposed antidepressant qualities, the study reviewed all the research findings ever produced on the relationship between chocolate and mood .

The temporary relief may come from eating chocolate, according to the study, led by Gordon Parker, a professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia. There is no evidence that eating chocolate removes feelings of depression, the scientists found. At last, while people crave chocolate, chocolate cannot cause the type of chemical addictions that alcohol, cigarettes or drugs do, the report determined.

A professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, Janet Polivy, conducted a chocolate-craving study published last year in the International Journal of Eating Disorders. She deprived patients of either chocolate or vanilla. Those deprived of chocolate had a much harder time.

Do you know that?

Belgian Huyghe Brewery was started by Léon Huyghe in city of Melle in East Flanders in 1906.

The brewery has expanded on several occasions since the founding of Huyghe. Its most well known beer is Delirium Tremens, a blonde, Belgian-style trippel. However, let’s taste today its fruit beer series.

The production of fruit-beers of the “Floris” range was started in 1993. It contains, for example, beers made from cherries, raspberries or apples.

Later, 3 more beers were added to that range. Next to the Floris wheat beer, there is also Griotte, Fraise, Passion, Honey, Chocolate and Ninkeberry (a mixture of 5 tropical fruits).

The Floris range also includes Floris Kriek (3.6% ABV) of deep red colour, slightly cloudy because of the used wheat beer. The beer has a very nice scent – wild sour cherries and cherry stones.

Floris Kriek is a soft and sweet fruity beer with a touch of nuts (cherry stones) and a sourish aftertaste, coming from the sour cherries. An excellent balance between the wheat beer and the wild sour cherries.

Cheers!

World: Beer market growth to reach 2.5% this year – report

Growth in the world beer market is set to reach around 2.5 percent this year in a “two-speed” recovery driven by emerging markets, while mature economies are set for more meagre advances, industry research group Plato Logic said on September, 19.

“Globally, the beer industry continues to show resilience in the current economic climate; we are forecasting some further recovery in 2011 to near ‘normal’ growth rates,” said Plato director Ian Pressnell.

The 2.5 percent volume growth forecast for this year – largely reflecting the increasing taste for beer among emerging market consumers – compares with 1.6 percent growth in 2010 and an 0.4 percent advance in 2009.

For this year, the research group predicts 1 percent growth in Europe and America and some 4 to 5 percent in the emerging regions of Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

For 2010, there was no change in the ranking of the world’s five biggest beer markets, with China increasing its lead over the United States to be nearly twice as large, having consumed some 450 million hectolitres of beer, Plato’s figures showed.

Those two nations stay well ahead of Brazil, Russia and Germany.

China’s Snow beer retained its top spot in the world’s leading beer brands in 2010, according to Plato. The beer, brewed by a joint venture involving the world’s second-biggest brewer SABMiller, was followed by Bud Light, Budweiser and Brazil’s Skol, all brewed by the world’s biggest brewer AB InBev in an unchanged top four from 2009.

Chinese beer Tsingtao jumped to fifth spot, swapping places with Mexico’s Corona, while AB InBev’s Brazilian brew Brahma stayed in seventh position. Another Chinese brand Beijing Beer jumped over Heineken to make eighth spot, while Coors Light remained the 10th best-selling beer brand.

New study confirms health benefits of moderate beer consumption

The Brewers of Europe welcome the outcomes of the 6th Beer and Health Symposium where top European scientists and researchers showed that moderate beer consumption among adults can be consistent with a healthy adult lifestyle.

The Symposium highlighted the potential health benefits of moderate beer consumption ranging from a lower risk for cardiovascular disease to positive effects on bone mineral density to benefits accrued from nutrients specific to beer.

“Research presented at the Symposium shows that moderate consumers have a lower risk of mortality than both abstainers and excessive consumers” commented Prof. Frans Kok, head of the Division of Human Nutrition at Wageningen University, Chair of the Symposium.

Prof. Kok added, “It is important to emphasise that beneficial effects are conferred only by moderate consumption and that the pattern of consumption and the associated diet and lifestyle are also important.” He stated that misunderstandings about the health impact of beer persist among citizens and said, “As scientists active in researching these areas, we have a role to play in addressing these myths, supported by the latest scientific findings.”

Welcoming the scientific conclusions, Pierre-Olivier Bergeron, Secretary General of The Brewers said, “It is important for policymakers to have the full picture when considering approaches to tackling alcohol misuse.” He added, “EU citizens, who are exposed daily to stories of alcohol abuse and often misinformation about moderate beer consumption’s relationship to health, should also be informed of the benefits, not just risks.”

The current EU policy framework to reduce alcohol-related harm, which Europe’s brewers support, is targeted at alcohol misuse and the minority who abuse alcohol. “The Symposium reconfirmed that the problem is harmful drinking, not individual products.” Bergeron continued, “This is extremely important when it comes to identifying what are the best approaches to tackling alcohol misuse.”

The results are based on the definition of moderate drinking as outlined by the World Health Organisation: one small glass of beer for women or half a pint, and up to a pint for men.

Among many other findings scientific experts discovered the benefits of moderate beer consumption include positive effects on cardiovascular diseases, improvement in bone health and as a source of antioxidants and vitamin B.

Other scientists sought to deal with the negative stereotypes surrounding beer consumption and revealed beer bellies are not first caused by drinking ‘liquid gold’ but by other factors such as mental stress, lack of sleep, certain medications or smoking.

“To our surprise, it’s tobacco smoking that seems to be the main contributor to the beer belly so that the fat you have… Smoking is simply getting the fat to move towards the belly so it’s changing the fat distribution and that’s probably due to the stress hormones that are released due to smoking,” Professor Arne Vernon Astrup from the department of human nutrition at the University of Copenhaguen said.

It’s high season to drink saison beers

Saison (French, “season”) is the name originally given to low-alcohol pale ales brewed seasonally in farmhouses in Wallonia, the French-speaking region of Belgium, for farm workers during harvest season, Wikipedia informs. Modern-day saisons are also brewed in other countries, particularly the USA, and are generally bottle conditioned, with an average range of 5 to 8% abv, though saisons at the more traditional 3.5% strength can still be found.

Although saison has been described as an endangered style, there has been a rise in interest in this style in recent years, with Saison Dupont being named “the Best Beer in the World” by the magazine Men’s Journal in July 2005.

Historically, saisons did not share identifiable characteristics to pin them down as a style, but rather were a group of refreshing summer ales. Each farm brewer would make his own distinctive version. Modern saisons brewed in the USA tend to copy the yeast used by Brasserie Dupont, which ferments better at blood warm temperatures (29 °C (84 °F) to 35 °C (95 °F)) than the standard 18 °C (64 °F) to 24 °C (75 °F) fermenting temperature used by other Belgian saison brewers.

“Saison” is French for season, because these ales were traditionally brewed in the autumn or winter for consumption during the late summer harvest for farm workers who were entitled to up to five litres throughout the workday during harvest season. Today they are brewed year round. As the saison style originated before the advent of refrigeration, Belgian brewers had to brew in autumn or winter to prevent the ale from spoiling during the storage period. After brewing, the ale was stored until the late summer harvest. Although now most commercial examples range from 5 to 8% abv, originally saisons were meant to be refreshing and thus had alcohol levels less than 3%. Because of the lack of potable water, saisons would give the farm hands the hydration they needed without the threat of illness.

The ale had to be strong to prevent spoilage during the long storage, but at the same time could not be so strong as to incapacitate the workers. Additionally, these beers were strongly hopped, as hops act as a preservative and have antiseptic properties. Saisons brewed in early spring would often be blended with saisons brewed the previous autumn, or even blended with lambic beers to increase the refreshing acidity of these beers. Blending also occurred to reduce the abv, and thus increase its refreshment value.

The type of malt determines the colour of the saison, and although most saisons are of a cloudy golden colour as result of the grist being mostly pale and/or pilsner malt, the use of darker malts results in some saisons being reddish-amber. Some recipes also use wheat. Spices such as orange zest, coriander, and ginger may be used. Some spice character may come through due to the production of esters during fermentation at warm temperatures.

How barley malt was produced for the first time

Once upon a time, a very long time ago, somebody left an earthen bowl of harvested barley out to dry in the sun. There was a brief summer shower and the barley kernels absorbed the water – starting to germinate. When the sun came back out, the air, the ground and the earthen bowl warmed up and stopped the germination process of the grain. This is how Examiner.com recently described the production of the first malt.

This two-stage malting process of moistening the grain and then heating it breaks the some of the starches of the kernel down into sugars – specifically maltose – a form of glucose. Other starches in the kernel are converted into soluble starches and enzymes.

Any grain can be malted. So why do brewers primarily choose barley for beer? One reason was the early availability of barley. Barley is in the grass family; it is self pollinating and grew wild in the Fertile Crescent. It was easily made into flour for bread, was feed for animals and once somebody accidentally turned it into malt, barley became the first grain to be turned into a manufactured beverage.

Also, barley is the backbone of many brew recipes because the grain is particularly good at the malting process and for the beer itself. The high concentration of converted sugars simplifies the process of fermentation in ales. Along the barley shaft are spiklets, one fertile spiklet paired with two reduced spiklets. This is known as a 2-row barley; it offers a lower protein/higher sugar content that allows for shorter steeping and produces a clearer beer.

There is also a 6-row barley, higher protein/lower sugar content, that is often used in many lagers along with unmalted grains such as corn, rice and wheat. Some brewers use this method as a cost reduction for brewing; however, there is also the side benefit of head retention in this combination.

New offering from Leonidas – praliné chocolates with speculoos or cranberry

This autumn, Belgium’s famous chocolatier Leonidas is extending its selection of chocolates with a limited edition of praliné chocolates, and as always, they will be a mouth-watering combination of traditional recipes and natural products. So allow yourself to be tempted into a praliné encounter, with a delicious blend of speculoos or cranberry!

New praliné chocolates mean new ideas for chocolate delights and innovations in taste. A journey of discovery…

According to Master Chocolatier, Claude Sénèque, Leonidas traditional praliné chocolates, which are based on very old recipes, form an indispensable part of every box of chocolates. But he has decided to bring in new flavours in order to introduce a hint of originality and to create a more contemporary product. Everyone will find something to their taste, depending on how they feel and their personal preferences, of course!

Mr. Sénèque has opted for a delicious blend of Belgian specialities in golden brown colours and mouth-watering flavours. This means chocolate and… speculoos! The chocolate contains scrumptious pieces of biscuit and a praliné filling enriched with the natural light flavour of cinnamon. This little delight – designed by Leonidas – is then coated in milk chocolate; it is both crunchy and smooth in texture, and it will be a favourite with those who love refined flavours.

Leonidas chocolates can be enjoyed at any time, morning or night, and they can be savoured on any occasion, among friends or family. They are also timeless, because they are a blend of both the past and the future, in view of our traditional recipes and our constant search for innovation. They also make a delicious present of epicurean indulgence; we also see them as a symbol of generosity and pleasure.

Do you know that?

The Boon Brewery (Brouwerij F. Boon) is a Belgian brewery situated in Lembeek, near Brussels, that mainly produces geuze and kriek beer of a fairly traditional variety.

Other products of the brewery include Faro beer and Duivelsbier, the traditional beer of Halle.

The head of the brewery, Frank Boon, is considered by many to be one of the main driving forces behind the fairly recent revival of the traditional geuze and kriek beers.

Cheers!

World: Beer consumption to rise by 3% a year until 2015 owing to Asia and Africa

Global beer consumption is forecast to rise by approx. 3% a year until 2015. If this comes about, worldwide beer consumption could top the 2-billion-hl mark as soon as 2013, Canadean reports.

Growth rates are to be highest in Asia and Africa, where some 5% more per year is expected in each case. Asia would then have a share of 38% of world beer sales by 2015, Canadean experts said.

Annual growth of 3% is expected in Latin America and 1.5% in Eastern Europe. The West European beer market is the only market that is to stagnate until 2015. Whereas declining beer consumption is calculated for Germany, the Netherlands, France and Great Britain, beer still has potential in Finland, Italy, Norway, Portugal and Spain.

A brief history of beer in Europe

Beer is one of the oldest drinks in the world, with evidence suggesting it has been brewed and enjoyed as far back as the 6th century BC, Norh Wales Chronicle posted on August, 18.

It was certainly alive and kicking in around 450BC, when the Greek writer Sophocles wrote a piece about the importance of moderation when drinking beer (not much has changed, then). The Greeks saw beer, or zythos, as an important part of their daily diet, and brewed it from a barley mixture following a process they probably learned from the Egyptians. Ancient Rome also had beer by the barrel, although it’s widely believed that they preferred wine as their beverage of choice. They used the Celtic word cerevisia for their brews, which were made with rye and were extremely thick.

While beer was a popular beverage amongst ancient civilisations, it really came into its own with the rise of Christianity. Bizarrely, monasteries were one of the earliest organisations to brew beer as a business venture, and there’s a fair few Christian saints who are considered to be the patron saints of brewing (including Saint Nicholas, Saint Augustine of Hippo and Luke the Evangelist). This early beer was known as ale, and instead of being flavoured with hops was mainly flavoured with ‘gruit’, a powerful mixture of herbs that gave it an extremely distinctive taste. Oats, barley or wheat went into the ale, depending on what was readily available in the area, and the drink often provided vital calories to poor farm workers who didn’t have a great deal of food to eat.

Unfortunately, the gruit wasn’t able to preserve the alcohol for very long, meaning that the brews couldn’t be exported and often spoiled quickly. By the 9th century, brewers in Germany were perfecting the art of adding hops to the ale, with the Weithenstephan monastery cultivating acres of hop fields around their area. This monastic brew has almost certainly influenced the way beer is brewed today, and the Germans were among the first to import and export the beverage across the continent.

Soon, two distinctive types of brew were being produced: ale (no hops) and beer (hops). Indeed, in England it was illegal to manufacture both, meaning that brewers had to choose which one to work with and stick to it. Huge breweries were also being opened, increasing jobs and widening the beer market across the continent.

The next big beer development came in Bavaria in the 19th century. Brewers had found that storing beer in cold cellars for months at a time produced an exceptionally mellow, light liquid, completely different to the heavier brews of the past. This new ‘lagern’ soon caught on across the continent and the range of experiments led to the creation of many different beers. The Austrians came up with an orangery Viennese beer, and the town of Plzen in the Czech Republic has the honour of the being the first to produce the golden beer, or Pilsner, thanks to their soft water and local barley crops.

Nowadays, the list of various brews is endless, from fruity beer to the heavier beers found across northern Europe. As techniques have been perfected and new recipes tried, this ancient beverage has been reinvented over and over again, and only time will tell what the brewers come up with next. Let’s drink to that.

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Lager yeast origin found in Argentina

Lager yeast appears to have originated on beech trees in southern Argentina. But how did it get to Europe 600 years ago?

After pondering the question for decades, scientists have found that an elusive species of yeast isolated in the forests of Argentina was key to the invention of the lager beer 600 years ago, Los Angeles Times reported on August, 23.

It took a five-year search around the world before a scientific team discovered, identified and named the organism, a species of wild yeast called Saccharomyces eubayanus that lives on beech trees.

“We knew it had to be out there somewhere,” said Chris Todd Hittinger, an evolutionary geneticist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a coauthor of the report published last month in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences.

Their best bet is that centuries ago, S. eubayanus somehow found its way to Europe and hybridized with the domestic yeast used to brew ale, creating an organism that can ferment at the lower temperatures used to make lager.

Geneticists have known since the 1980s that the yeast brewers use to make lager, S. pastorianus, was a hybrid of two yeast species: S. cerevisiae — used to make ales, wine and bread — and some other, unidentified organism.

Searching through collections of wild yeasts from Europe, researchers — including Hittinger and his collaborators — tried to identify lager’s missing link but again and again were stumped. “There were a few candidates, but none fit particularly well,” Hittinger said.

So he and his colleagues began “sampling more systematically,” collecting soil and bark, sap and abnormal growths called galls from trees on five continents.

Team member Diego Libkind of the Institute for Biodiversity and Environment Research in Bariloche, Argentina, found S. eubayanus in galls on southern beech trees in Patagonia. The galls were particularly rich in sugar, which yeast like to colonize and consume.

Patagonian natives used to make a fermented beverage from the galls — a definite clue that the scientists were on the right track, Hittinger said.

When the team brought the yeast to a lab at the University of Colorado and analyzed its genome, they discovered that it was 99.5% identical to the non-ale portion of the S. pastorianus genome, suggesting it was indeed lager yeast’s long-lost ancestor.

“The DNA evidence is strong,” said Gavin Sherlock, a geneticist at Stanford University who has studied lager yeast but was not involved in this study.

But Sherlock wondered how S. eubayanus could have traveled the nearly 8,000 miles from Argentina to Germany.

“We all know that in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue,” he said. “Lager was invented in the 1400s. It’s not really clear how that progenitor would have gotten from South America to Europe.”

Scientists may yet find colonies of the yeast in Europe, he said. Another possibility is that lager yeast originated a bit later than previously thought, added Barbara Dunn, a senior research scientist who works in Sherlock’s lab.

“It certainly could have existed somewhere else,” Hittinger acknowledged. “Just because somebody hasn’t found it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.”

The beech forests where the team found S. eubayanus are cool, with an average year-round temperature of 43 to 46 degrees Fahrenheit, Hittinger said.

Genes that permit the yeast to thrive in such a chilly environment probably provided S. pastorianus’ ability to ferment at relatively low temperatures — conditions not too terribly different from those prevalent in the Bavarian cellars where monks created the golden brew in the 15th century, Hittinger said.

The researchers compared the DNA of the wild Patagonian yeast with that of lager yeast used in breweries to see what changes had evolved over the years. They found changes in genes that regulate sugar and sulfite metabolism, processes that contribute to the fermentation and preservation of beer.

Scientists could exploit such knowledge to improve biofuels, Hittinger said.

And, of course, tinkering with yeast genes might make wine or beer taste better too, said Hittinger, who is “a lager man” himself. Coauthor Mark Johnston, a molecular biologist at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, prefers ales.

“Even though we both stand by our original preferences, we both have a new appreciation for where lager came from and the complexity of the processes that made it what it is today,” Hittinger said.

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Nonalcoholic beer is an excellent recovery beverage for marathon runners – study

A new study reports that beer is an excellent recovery beverage for marathon runners. But you may not want to start a raucous celebration just yet. The beer was effective only if it was non-alcoholic, New York Times reported on August, 24.

Running a marathon is, of course, punishing to the body, causing muscle soreness and inflammation. Grueling exercise can also weaken the immune system, making athletes susceptible to colds and other ills in the weeks after the event. Some athletes, particularly in Europe, long had downed nonalcoholic beer during hard training, claiming that it helped them to recover, but no science existed to support the practice.

To study the matter, researchers at the Technical University of Munich approached healthy male runners, most in their early 40s, who were training for the Munich Marathon, and asked if they would — in the name of science — be willing to drink a considerable amount of beer. Two hundred seventy-seven men agreed, even when told that the beverage would be nonalcoholic. Only half of the group received the alcohol-free beer, however; the other half got a similarly flavored placebo. No one knew who was drinking what.

All of the runners downed a litre to a litre and a half of their assigned beverage every day, beginning three weeks before the race and continuing for two weeks afterward. The scientists, meanwhile, collected blood samples from the men several weeks before the race, as well as immediately before to the start, at the finish line and on select days afterward. (These were an exceptionally obliging group of racers, it seems.) They monitored levels of various markers of inflammation in the men’s blood, to see whether beer helped to blunt some of the immediate damage from running.

For the next two weeks, the men continued to dutifully swallow their nonalcoholic beer or other brew. They also reported any symptoms of colds or other upper respiratory ailments that developed during that time.

The men drinking the nonalcoholic beer reported far fewer illnesses than the runners swallowing the placebo beverage. “Incidence of upper respiratory tract infections was 3.25-fold lower” in the nonalcoholic beer drinkers, the scientists reported, in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. They also showed significantly less evidence of inflammation, as measured by various markers in their blood, and lower counts of white blood cells than the placebo group, an indication of overall better immune system health.

These effects matter, said Dr. Johannes Scherr, lead author of the study, because if a marathon runner’s body is less sore and inflamed after a race, and he doesn’t develop the sniffles, he can recover and return to training more quickly than he otherwise might have been able to. “It can be speculated that the training frequency could be higher (with shorter breaks after vigorous training sessions)” in those drinking beer, he wrote in an e-mail response.

Just how nonalcoholic beer eases the ravages of strenuous marathon training and racing is still being investigated. But, said Dr. Scherr, it almost certainly involves the beverage’s rich bouquet of polyphenols, chemical substances found in many plants that, among other things, “suppress viral replication” and “influence the innate immune system positively,” all beneficial for fighting off a cold.

Alcoholic beer happens to be drenched in polyphenols, too — “even more than nonalcoholic beer,” Dr. Scherr said — but has the signal disadvantage of being alcoholic. “We do not know whether the side effects of alcoholic beer would cancel out the positive effects caused by the polyphenols,” he wrote. “Furthermore, it is not possible to drink one to one and a half liters of alcoholic beer per day, especially not during strenuous training.” We all knew that, right?

Of course, other substances containing polyphenols have shown early promise, and then underperformed in follow-up studies. Quercetin, for instance, a polyphenol derived principally from apple skins, was widely touted by endurance athletes several years ago after studies found that large doses allowed untrained lab mice to run for far longer than untreated animals. But the supplement has largely failed to show benefits in human athletes. An analysis of 10 human studies of the supplement presented at the American College of Sports Medicine annual meeting in June concluded that quercetin supplementation “is very unlikely to provide an endurance performance advantage.”

But the beer experiment did not begin by looking at mice. It began with human marathoners completing a punishing, unsimulated race, and showed demonstrable benefits, in terms of minimizing postrace damage.

All of which is good news as the fall marathon season approaches. Asked if he would recommend that serious marathon runners add nonalcoholic beer to their diets, Dr. Scherr said, “When I look at the results of our study, I would have to answer ‘Yes.’”

It’s possible to get large amounts of polyphenols from other foods, he added, like those training-table staples chokeberries and mangosteens, as well as pomegranates and grapes. “But with these foods you do not consume the minerals, fluid and carbohydrates,” he said, “so nonalcoholic beer seems to be optimal” for everything, perhaps, apart from your well-deserved celebratory carouse after the race. For that, at least, the beer can be full-potency.

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Chocolate reduces risk of developing heart disease

New research recently presented at Europe’s biggest medical meeting suggested chocolate consumption might be associated with a one third reduction in the risk of developing heart disease, Reuters reported on August, 29.

Just why there should be such a link was unclear, the European Society of Cardiology congress was told.

There has been a string of scientific studies in recent years showing a potential health benefit from eating chocolate. Dark chocolate, in particular, contains compounds called flavanols thought to be good for the blood system.

In an attempt to paint a clearer picture, Oscar Franco and colleagues from the University of Cambridge pooled results from seven studies involving 100,000 people.

Five of the studies showed a beneficial link between eating chocolate and cardiovascular health, while two did not.

Overall, the findings showed the highest levels of chocolate consumption were associated with a 37 percent reduction in cardiovascular disease and a 29 percent reduction in stroke compared with the lowest levels.

Franco said there were limitations with the pooled analysis, which did not differentiate between dark and milk chocolate, and more research was needed to test whether chocolate actually caused better health outcomes or if it was due to some other confounding factor.

“Evidence does suggest chocolate might have some heart health benefits but we need to find out why that might be,” said Victoria Taylor, of the British Heart Foundation, who was not involved in the research.