Article written in collaboration with Alexandra Berry.
In the middle of OKtoberfest, it's the perfect time to revisit the history of Lager and to give a glimpse of the beautiful family of variations that has been created over the years around this most convivial of drinks!
What is lager?
Lager is perhaps the best known, most popular and best selling beer style in the world. With a color that can vary from a clear blond to a coppery amber, with a light carbonation and topped with a white head, Lager offers a thirst-quenching balance between a slightly biscuity malty roundness and a herbaceous bitterness. With an alcohol content between 3 and 5 degrees, Lager is divided into several different sub-styles developed over the years, the terroirs and the technological evolutions. Lager is ideal for producing thirst-quenching beers, festive beers or ceremonial beers.
High fermentation VS low fermentation
Although the origins of beer go back almost 7000 years, Lagers only appeared in the brewing world around the 16th century in Germany.
From the verb lagerein which means "to store", this style of beer was born from a tradition brewing technique which consists in fermenting beer at low temperature and storing it at a temperature between 5 and 12 degrees. This technique followed several German edicts aimed at improving the quality of beer.
In 1516, Duke Wilhelm IV of Bavaria imposed the Reinheitsgebot, a purity law limiting beer making to four ingredients: water, malt, hops and yeast (although yeast was not known at the time).
This law of purity had a profound effect on German brewing culture. Wilhelm's successor, his son Albert V, continued to shape this legacy. As the quality of beer was often poor despite the strict selection of ingredients, brewers realized that heat tended to increase the risk of infection. The weather in Bavaria promised relatively warm summers and cold winters, encouraging Duke Albert to proclaim a new edict in 1553 that allowed beer to be brewed only between September 29 and April 23. This allowed the brewing of beer in optimal conditions and temperatures. This edict will not only modify the calendar of the brewers but will also condition a new type of brewing.
The birth of the Lager
In fact, despite the variations in Bavarian temperatures, the limestone cellars of the region offer rather homogeneous conditions throughout the year. In addition, the low temperatures and humidity have favored the profusion of yeast that proliferates at the bottom of the barrel rather than on top, and this is how the very famous style of Lager was born. This bottom fermentation takes at least five weeks, which explains the name of the process lagerein, which means "to store" in German. This is also due to the yeast strains available, especially Saccharomyces Pastorianus.
Unlike Saccharomyces Cerevisiae found in Ales, this strain likes cold and ferments happily at about 4° Celsius rather than 21°. Producing less esters, acidic and phenolic components, and therefore less aroma than S. Cerevisia, Pastorianus favors the transformation of all residual sugars for relatively dry beers with a nice carbonation.
Once this yeast spread through the Bavarian breweries, two main beer styles were recognized: top-fermented beer (Ale) and bottom-fermented beer (Lager). Lagering became a brewing process that became part of the brewing tradition.
*Barely 50 years later, Cologne banned the Lager process in 1603 and to this day both Cologne and Dusseldorf are known for their production of top-fermented styles: Kolsch and Altbier.
The Evolution of Lager
Dunkel Lager
The dominant sub-style of the Lager family in Germany until the 18th century was Dunkel, "dark" in German. Indeed, during the Renaissance and until the Enlightenment, the only malt available was heated in direct cooking over a wood fire, thus producing a rather dark and smoky malt. The beers thus reflected this rich and complex character. The aromas of these Dunkel Lagers, which can still be found today, are therefore rather greedy with toasted notes and touches of caramel.
The Bock Bier
Other styles came to accompany the Dunkels, such as the Bock or the Doppel Bock. The Bock has its origins in the town of Einbeck and their origin dates back to the 12th century. These beers were similar to cervoises, brewed with a lot of malt and therefore sweeter and often stronger in alcohol. This high alcohol content made it possible to preserve and distribute the beer throughout the country while maintaining the quality of the brew.
Traditionally, Bocks were served seasonally from the1st of May, and mainly for breakfast!
*Their origin gave birth to their name: when fans ordered a beer from Einbeck, ein- Beck, mutated to become ein Bock, which also means "goat". As a result, you'll regularly find images of goats on German Bock bottles 😉🐐
DoppelBock
Doppelbocks first appeared around Munich in 1635, more precisely created by Benedictine monks of the Paulaner order. Also a seasonal beer served from the beginning of April, this beer was even stronger than its sister (Doppel means Double in German) and designed to help the monks through the period of Lent and their fasting.
*Created to help the monks during their complicated fasting period, it was nicknamed Salvator. You will see many Doppelbocks with the suffix -ator: the Celebrator by Ayinger, or the Maximator by Augustiner.
These beers are much rounder than bocks, sweeter with a hint of hop bitterness and were considered luxury beers.
When the Lager fades
Lagers were therefore generally amber and caramelized beers. In 1818, the invention of a British man revolutionized this popular drink. Daniel Wheeler, following the principle of coffee roasters, invented a process to dry and roast malt by indirect cooking, with pulsed heat rather than wood smoke. This results in a pale malt, without the strong smoky accents that were previously present. In addition to its pale color, this technique ensures consistency in the cooking of the malt from batch to batch.
*This innovation was introduced at a time when glass and crystal were replacing stoneware and clay containers. A beer with an opaque color and never constant does not seduce the masses... On the other hand, a golden beer with a beautiful white foam is much more attractive in a beautiful glass engraved with cereals and hops!
The Lager then transforms into an elegant straw or golden colored beverage, with much more delicate and subtle cookie aromas; the hop bitterness comes out here with more freshness.
Marzen & Vienna Lager
In 1833, two very influential brewmasters also made their mark on the history of beer in Germany. Gabriel Sedlmayr of the Spaten Brewery in Munich and Anton Dreher of the Dreher Brewery in Vienna traveled to England and adopted Wheeler's invention upon their return to Germany.
Producing in their turn paler lagers, Sedlmayr returns to Spaten and in 1841 inaugurates the Marzen during the Oktoberfest. The Märzen, although paler than the beers produced until then, retains greedy accents of caramelized malt.
Dreher innovates with its new Vienna Lager, using pale malt from Vienna, now known as Vienna Malt. It will also reveal rather toasted aromas and biscuity notes in the mouth.
Although lighter than Bocks or Dunkel, Märzen and Vienna Lager are still quite coppery. Their clear color also has amber reflections and is usually topped with a beige foam.
The creation of the Pilsner
The biggest revolution in the lager family did not take place in Germany but in a neighboring country, in Bohemia, in the region Saaz, (now in the Czech Republic), with the invention of the Pilsner.
In the early 19th century, the people of Plzeň (Pilsen) were fed up with their local beer and in 1839, the city asked two Bavarians, architect Martin Stelzer and brewer Josef Groll, to create a qualitative and innovative brewery, inspired by Bavarian styles.
On November 11, 1842, their first brew was presented for the St Martin's Day and was an immediate success! Indeed, its golden, clear color, its malty and biscuit-like roundness, its hoppy aromas, its lively and dry finish... everything is aligned to seduce beer lovers! This beer was named Pilsner Urquell, Urquell meaning " original source " in German.
Josef Groll wanted to recreate a beer of tradition and bohemian terroir in his "Pils", and water is the first and perhaps most important ingredient. The water from the Radbuza River was very soft, ideal for this new style of pale ale. He added local Moravian barley to his brew, which he malted using the famous technique borrowed from the English. He went a step further with an even lighter malt that would later become known as Pilsner Malt, ideal for producing golden, clear bottom-fermented beers.
He then selects hops that he finds in Žatec, the SaazHe then selected hops from Žatec, the noble hops that offer herbaceous and spicy aromas with floral touches.
To top it off, he chose to ferment with a Lager yeast to produce a dry, crisp bottom-fermented beer with little residual sweetness and a nice, fine carbonation.
Not only will this beer appeal to international beer lovers, but Groll is introducing a new, slightly more bitter sub-style of lager, unique to the Bohemian region: Pilsner.
An international export
The invention of refrigerated systems will greatly help the growth and export of lager styles around the world. Invented by Carl Von Linde in 1873, this creation will allow the brewing of lagers throughout the year and the control of fermentation temperatures for the brewers.
Technological advances in transportation will also have a major impact on the brewing landscape.
In 1847, Jacob Christian Jacobsen founded the Carlsberg brewery in Copenhagen. In 1855, Frederick Miller opened the largest lager brewing plant in the world at the Miller Brewing Company (USA) and in 1864, Gerard Adriaan Heineken founded the eponymous brewery in Amsterdam. Adolf Coors followed suit and opened the famous Coors Brewing in the USA in 1873.
The Lager finds its place as a queen in the brewing industry and becomes a so-called "industrial" beer by dint of being mass produced. With more and more brewing titans concerned with financial gain, many shortcuts are taken with lagers that end up being produced from corn or syrups. So much so that until about ten years ago, Lager had become synonymous with "industrial", mass-produced and without respect for taste or tradition brewing.
The renaissance of the craft lager
It was not until the end of Prohibition, the two world wars and the revival of craft beer in the United States that the Lager regained its title of nobility!
One of the pioneers in re-branding beer was Jim Koch, founder and brewer of the Boston Beer Company in 1983. In 1985, he introduced the beer that would become the flagship of his brewery: Samuel Adams Boston Lager. Created from a recipe of his great great grandfather who brewed in St Louis (future brewery of AB INBEV). He insists that this beer is brewed in accordance with the German Reinheitsgebot, using natural and carefully selected ingredients. His Sam Adams Lager would become one of the best-selling craft beers in the United States.
California Common
One last little descendant of the Lager is the California Common, also nicknamed Steam Beer. This hybrid is a fusion between the two major fermentation families: a Lager yeast that ferments at temperatures around 20 degrees!
This creation has its roots in Anchor Brewing Company, a brewery founded in San Francisco in 1896 which broke the codes of the Reinheitsgebot by taking the recipe of a classic Lager with a mixture of pale malt and caramel malt, some hops and yeast fermented in open vats at room temperature of about 20 degrees. The steam escaping from the vats gave the name to the beer: Anchorsteam Beer.
Taken over in 1965 by Fritz Maytag, he wanted to recreate this flagship beer and revolutionized the craft market with his Anchorsteam beer!
Now classified as California Common, this style of Lager/Ale should have a clear color, with good carbonation. On the palate, the malty accents should highlight a typical American hop bitterness, carried on citrus with a little spice.
California Common, or Steam Beer, is a beautiful representation of a tradition brewing repurposing. The style, as it has traveled the world, has metamorphosed to represent a new terroir. A great example that the respect and transmission of tradition can also inspire new techniques and creations!
And if you feel like it, some ideas of hops HOPSTORE to create your own Lager: Strisselspalt, Spalter, Aurora, Saphir, Callista 😉
Sources
https://www.anchorbrewing.com/blog/a-history-of-lager/
https://aeronautbrewing.wordpress.com/2020/05/14/history-of-lagers/