Exploring the subtle differences between Bavarian and German purity proclamations and considering my own drinks Shangri-La
[raspy voice]
I want to play a game.[i]
[trike wheels creaking menacingly]
But unlike Jigsaw’s games, there are no weird contraptions you must get out of, you don’t have to make life or death choices and there no haunting Game Over’s to plague your nightmares.
No, I want to play a game in which you imagine your ideal summer’s drink for a moment. What would be the drink you have when reaching beverage Shangri-La?
Take your time and come back here once you are confident you can almost taste it.
What is it? Where are you drinking it? Are you alone or with other people? Are you on a beach? By a pool perhaps? Is it day or night-time? Are you by a campfire in the woods? Are you in a city? By a river? Can you buy it or is it imaginary? Is it a beer? A Wine? A cocktail? Perhaps a cider or a mead? Is it low alcohol? Is it still or fizzy? Pét-Nat? Are you having it out of a stoneware mug? A Champagne flute? A bottle?
I love a crisp lager on a hike through the countryside. I adore a pint of Bitter in the beer garden. I love a fruity sweet sparkling cider by the seaside in Kent and a tannic bone-dry number while watching traction engines and steam rollers parade on a showground in an Oxfordshire village. I enjoy an Austrian Riesling overlooking a picturesque harbour in Devon as much as a dry Rioja in Dorset overlooking a cove. And yes, thanks for asking – both the husband and I are still rather surprised by my interest in drinking wine. I love a glass of Cava by the beach.
But, the one that would win the crown for ideal summer drink, if indeed there was one, is [drum roll] a wheat beer.
A hearty, full-bodied, nourishing and mouth-filling wheat beer? I know you’re German and all, but indulgent banana and clove aromas in summer temperatures?
Au contraire, mons amis!
My ideal summer drink is a French Bière Blanche enjoyed either by the shoreline of Lake Geneva after a stroll around town, or on Puy de Sancy after cycling up the mountain.
Why? Because that’s where I enjoyed them last year and I’m dying to go back.
Last year, if a bar had a Blanche on tap, I would order it. If I spotted a market stall selling bottles, I’d get one. If there was a Blanche in sight, I would get my hands on it. On more than one occasion I wanted to ride 7km steadily climbing over 300m to reach a glass of the stuff in France. Not sure who was more surprised by this, the husband or me… but the point was, I’d stop at nothing to drink the hazy French stuff.
A Bière Blanche, more likely known by the name Belgians give it: Witbier, is top-fermented beer brewed with a sizeable proportion of wheat compared to the amount of malted barley used. You can typically find some gorgeous orange notes, or perhaps a more generic citrus character, some yeasty funk and some herbal qualities. Basically – It’s hazy, it’s zesty, it’s bready and it’s pure liquid refreshment.
Oh, and just in case, you’re wondering blanche, wit and weiss mean all the same thing: white, most likely historically referring to the cloudy white hues the beer has due to its unfiltered nature. Additionally, German brewers used to brew Braunbier and Weissbier, I.e. brown and white beer, depending on the malting techniques used.
“[…] A pale, hazy Belgian wheat beer with spices accentuating the yeast character. A delicate, lightly spiced, moderate-strength ale that is a refreshing summer drink with its high carbonation, dry finish, and light hopping. […]”[ii]
After casting your eyes onto the BJCP’s 2021 description above, you might instantly think “Cliché Lisa, you are so banal, so pedestrian. Oh, how bourgeois” but hear me out, it truly is exactly that: a light, hazy, refreshing beer, with a complex citrussy, spicy herbal nose, balanced light to medium body, juicy lemony kick, spice yeast notes and a crisp dry finish. And, with ABV’s typically between 4.5% and 5.5%, it is also rather sessionable.
German rules and regulations
Germans have been brewing with wheat since ca. 2000 to 1500 B.C., a long time indeed. When the Bavarian Reinheitsgebot was proclaimed in 1516, the country’s taste shifted towards the less complex crisp Pilsners for various reasons. Afterall, beer could only be made with water, hops and barley malt, according to the official decree. Wheat was somewhat “outlawed” as an ingredient. Brewers were also unaware that yeast was indeed needed to produce beer, which might explain why it was not listed as an allowed ingredient. A few years later possibly around 1572, brewers in Berlin created the first Berliner Weisse – a tart wheat beer often drunk with raspberry or woodruff syrup, but the purists amongst us drink it ohne Schuss, i.e., without any syrup. This style of beer and the brewing behind it likely co-existed quite happily and evaded the Reinheitsgebot because Germany is a rather large country and with enough distance between Berlin and Bavaria, things may have been overlooked.
Fast forward a few years to 1906, and the Reinheitsgebot becomes the law in all the land of magnificently moustachioed Kaiser Wilhelm II. It is now known as the German Reinheitsgebot and is a bit more lenient compared to its Bavarian counterpart. After all, wheat can be made into fantastic beers. With the monarchy abolished in 1918, it loses its official law status and morphs into more of code-like status. Today, German brewers may still uphold the Reinheitsgebot, but they can add adjunct to their beers if they so choose.
Germans, we love our rules and regulations indeed.
I grew up with Weizen beers readily available all year round, so I never really associated the consumption of them with any particular season. And, in all honesty, I was never too keen on drinking Wheat beers. I like them, don’t get me wrong, but given the choice I’d opt for a Pils. Back home, you can get your paws on Hefeweizen, Hefe-Weiβbier, Dunkles Hefeweizen, Kristall-Weizen, Urweiße, Leichte Weiβe, and Weizenbock. If Bavarian style Weissbier are not really, you’re thing, you can also find the previously mentioned Berliner Weisse and Berliner-Style Weisse, as well as Gose and Leipzig-Style Gose, to name a few. In addition, you can get mixed beer concoctions and cocktails made with, or based on Weizen: Colaweizen (self-explanatory), Bananenweizen (with banana nectar – yup, we go there), Weizenbier-Hugo (with elderflower syrup and mint), Wojito (or Weizenbier-Mojito), Weißbierbowle, Weizenbaumadler, … to be honest, think of anything and Germans will mix it with beer just ask the husband.
Be that as it may, the French Blanche, unlike the Bavarian Hefeweizen, yet more like the Berliner Weisse or the Gose, is light, yet creamy and smooth, with just the right amount of tartness. Belgian Lambics, are also part of this wheat beer family, but a Blanche isn’t quite as tart and often not quite as strong in terms of ABVs.
Drinking white beers in Europe
As mentioned, 2022 was the year of Blanche for me – I drunk it in Switzerland, Belgium, and France all throughout summer. And then came autumn, and it faded away and English ales moved in. Although this happened gradually, so I’m not too sure if this was down to the season’s changing or the lack of Blanche on English supermarket shelves, pubs and taprooms.
Ok, yes, you can always find a Hoegaarden, but that is only one option by my calculations. And it is most likely served in the wrong glassware, but that’s the establishment’s fault, and a story for another time.
The reason behind this perhaps weird and awkward thought experiment, came in the form of a stemless glass over the past weekend.
Last Saturday, the husband and I found ourselves in the grounds of Oxford’s first ever legal distillery[iii] on a glorious sunny day for the Big Oxford Beer Bash[iv]. We had just finished some of Hook Norton[v]’s finest ales, [ahem Old Hooky[vi]!] when I spotted All Hands On Zest[vii] – a 4.6% ABV Witbier brewed collaboratively by Tap Social Movement and Orbit Beers. Once spotted, purchased and eventually in said stemless glass, both the husband and I were right back in Geneva. The waves gently lapping up against the shoreline, boats bobbing up and down and swans gracefully traveling across the turquoise water.
All Hands on Zest is described as a “floral, citrusy Belgian Wit”[viii] made with German Mandarina Bavaria hops, known for its tangerine citrus characteristics, “crushed coriander, grains of paradise, and hand-zested blood orange”.[ix]
Are you drooling yet?
A German’s need to reach sensory Shangri-La
I’ve always loved how aromas and flavours can take me back to past events or encounters. And All Hands on Zest brought me just a bit closer to reaching my mystically ideal beer place. It reconnected me with previously cherished aromas, flavours and events. That’s why I love to take time to eat and drink. There is so much joy to be had with food and drink (someone tell my baby sis…), and that’s why I’m a huge fan of drink and food festivals! You get to try loads of quality drinks directly from the makers and brewers, or you get an awesomely curated list of options for you to indulge.
What more could my hedonistic pink stained Millennial heart want?! For anyone still playing along, it’s guided tastings obviously.
In February, I had the pleasure of attending a beer tasting with two of my favourite people – the husband and the #DesignatedResponsibleAdult.
I could actually leave it at that, as it was a great experience, but it wouldn’t make for very good reading, so I shall elaborate a little:
We tasted 5 beers in total, 4 of which I knew and had before countless times. (Un)surprisingly, depending on where you stand, I enjoyed all of them. Spending some time dissecting what was in the glass before me was fantastic, especially as I had such an intimate familiarity with all but one of the liquids.
Most of my tasting these days is exploring new alcoholic and no/low liquids, be it wine, beer, cider, perry, mead… I hunt new aromas and flavours like a bear looking for food fresh out of hibernation. Oh, there is something I have not had before, let me try. I like to think of it as palate training, but if I’m honest, it is pure hedonism. And I’m not even ashamed of it.
Yet, returning to a well-known taste profile was eye-opening. Why was I drawn to this beer over and over again? Some of the beers had changed since I last had them – tiny tweaks in recipes due to quality/ price/ availability of ingredients (delete as appropriate) and/or markets/tastes/customer preferences (again delete as appropriate) and you were able to tell the difference, while others stayed the same and welcomed you back. This afternoon was rather special, not simply because the tasting was at a great venue I hadn’t been to in a while, or because I spent some quality time with friends.
My love for beer had actually taken a backseat recently, and it felt good to reconnect with craft beer. For last half of 2022, I was mostly exploring fruit wines, first apples and pears, then grapes, and the grains slowly slipped away. Strange how we bumble through life, travelling new and old routes, stopping for lunch at questionable services stations, turning back on ourselves, getting caught in a traffic jam and ending up down one-way streets the wrong way. But I digress…
As we sipped our way through the five offerings, hearing what we might smell and/or taste in them, a love for the liquid was rekindled.
When you have something over and over again, you become familiar with it. And, familiarity is great, don’t get me wrong, but familiarity can also mean you miss subtle changes or special moments.
If all fails, my go-to beer is Guinness. If I find myself in a pub and am not keen on any of the offerings for whatever reason, I can normally rest assured and order a Guinness. Yes, I had badly served ones before, but if it is a toss between a mass-produced-overly-chilled-so-no-aromas-and-flavours-remain lager and a Guinness, the stout wins! That is not to say that I only drink it because all the other beers are a worse choice. I love Guinness and truly enjoy it – it’s almost like a palate-cleanser, a return-to-base kinda beer, and more to the point: it is familiar. I can usually buy a pint anywhere in the kingdom and it should offer the same creamy and dry familiarly I am used to. And I take this for granted. I don’t swirl and sniff and sip my way through it. I simply drink and enjoy it, which is a perfect way to enjoy a beer.
But, as such, unfortunately, I don’t have any special Swiss lakeshore or French mountain top memories associated with it.
Essentially, Guinness has as much right to be included in my beer Shangri-La as All Hands on Zest has – it’s my ideal place after all.
And with that newfound awareness, I’ll leave you and just remind you of your homework for this summer: find your Blanche moment! Drink a Guinness! Keep on dancing to your own beat!
Santé
xxx
[i] Scary catchphrase by John Kramer, aka the Jigsaw Killer, aka Jigsaw, in the Saw franchise https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0495241/ [Accessed 25/05/23]
[ii] Beer Judge Certification Program 2021 Style Guidelines, Beer Style Guidelines https://www.bjcp.org/bjcp-style-guidelines/ [Accessed 23/05/23]
[iii] The Oxford Artisan Distillery https://www.theoxfordartisandistillery.com/ [Accessed 23/05/23]
[iv] Oxford Brewers, Big Oxford Beer Bash, http://www.oxfordbrewers.org/event/big-event/ [Accessed 23/05/23]
[v] Hook Norton Brewery https://www.hooky.co.uk/ [Accessed 23/05/23]
[vi] Hook Norton Brewery, Old Hooky (4.6% ABV) https://www.hooky.co.uk/product/old-hooky-abv-4-6/ [Accessed 23/05/23]
[vii] Tap Social Movement and Orbit Beers, All Hands on Zest (4.6% ABV) https://www.instagram.com/reel/Cp2mNqsovWw/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igshid=MmJiY2I4NDBkZg== [Accessed 23/05/23]
[viii] Untappd.com All Hands on Zest https://untappd.com/b/tap-social-movement-all-hands-on-zest/5273366/photos [Accessed 24/05/23]
[ix] ibid.
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