NYT article on Pils

March 30, 2005 BEERS OF THE TIMES Finding Gold in a Glass of Pilsner By ERIC ASIMOV FROM a strictly technical point of view, Budweiser beer is a colossal brewing achievement. It takes great skill for Budweiser to be able to make millions of barrels of pilsner each year and for it always to taste the same, no matter where you buy it. But from the beer-lover's perspective, Budweiser is good by the icy gulp on a summer afternoon when you require a cold sensation, but so flavorless and bland that, when your taste buds wake up, they might despair of the pilsner category altogether. Pilsners should be refreshing and invigorating all the time, whether you've just played nine innings in the sun or are simply watching the game. Few other beers are as crisp and nervy as a good pilsner. It should snap your mouth to attention with a clean, bracing bitterness, delicate floral aromas and perhaps a suggestion of sweetness. Unlike ales, which can be complex and even profound, pilsners make a virtue of their simplicity, offering instead an uncluttered purity and liveliness. Pilsners are a subset of lagers, which along with ales are the two main groups of beers. Ale is the older style, dating back to ancient Mesopotamia. Lager beers were not developed until the 15th century or so. Back then, before refrigeration, beer could only be brewed in the cold weather. In order to have beer in the summer, Bavarian brewers began making and storing beer in frigid alpine caves. Unlike the ales, which were ready to drink shortly after brewing, these cold-brewed beers fermented more slowly and needed time to mature before they were ready to drink. They came to be called lagers, after the German word for storage. It wasn't until much later, in the 19th century, that scientists discovered the role of yeasts in fermentation and that ales and lagers were the products of different strains of yeast. The yeasts in ale floated to the top of the brew, where brewers scooped them out to begin their next batch. In lagers the yeasts sank to the bottom. These Bavarian lagers were mostly dark, but in 1842, in the town of Pilsen in Czech Bohemia, a new golden lager was introduced. The beer caused a sensation, especially since it was only recently that clear glass vessels had become generally available and people could actually see the color of what they were drinking. The golden lager was soon widely imitated. Called pilsner or sometimes pilsener or pils, it eventually became the most popular style of beer in the world. When the Dining section's tasting panel decided to sample a selection of pilsners, we stayed away from the mass-market brands, which have as much relation to real pilsner as sliced American cheese has to a good English cheddar. Instead we sought out pilsners from the home territory of the Czech Republic and Germany, as well as from American craft brewers who are scrupulous about their beers. In all we tried 25 beers, including 11 from Germany, 8 from the Czech Republic and 4 from the United States, as well as 1 from Poland and 1 from Thailand. Thailand? Singha beer, ubiquitous in Thai restaurants, is made in the pilsner style, though our bottle lacked any sort of personality. Many popular Asian beers, like Kirin, Tsingtao and Kingfisher, are pilsners, though they tend more toward the bland side, exhibiting less bitterness and character than true pilsners. Brewers of many of these beers, as well as of mass-market American pilsner-style beers, supplement malted barley with adjuncts like corn or rice. The best pilsners only use malted barley. For the tasting Florence Fabricant and I were joined by Lew Bryson, a beer and travel writer, and Phil Markowski, brewmaster at the Southampton Publick House, a restaurant and brewery in Southampton, N.Y. We were all struck by how vibrant and alive the American brews tasted in comparison to some of the European beers. The Americans easily took the top three spots on our list of 10 recommended beers. Our top beer, the Prima Pils from the Victory Brewing Company, sounded a clear chord with its vivacity and assertive bitterness. The Stoudt Pils, our No. 2 beer, was a bit subtler but still highly expressive of the Bohemian pilsner style, while our No. 3, from the Great Lakes Brewing Company, was much fuller-bodied than the first two, fitting for a beer emulating the German Dortmunder export style. Mr. Bryson, as much as he liked the Great Lakes beer, said it was quite a bit bigger than a Dortmunder beer would ever be. "A German would throw his kids in the river if he brewed a beer like that," Mr. Bryson said. It's a pity that we could not find many American craft beers made in the pilsner style. It may be that American beer fans (including most craft brewers) were weaned on the pallid mass-market beers and hence gravitated toward more full-flavored styles. Or it might be the difficulty of making good pilsner. "It is a beer of great finesse," wrote Garrett Oliver in his book "The Brewmaster's Table" (Harpercollins, 2003). "Brewers sometimes refer to pilsner, with some trepidation as 'naked,' meaning that there's nowhere for imperfect flavors to hide." Unfortunately for some of the imports, lack of freshness was a real problem. Beers that I have loved in the past, like the brisk, bitter Jever from northern Germany, seemed stale and dead. It was paradoxical, to say the least, since an attraction of the early lagers was how stable they were in comparison to ales of the day. "They made me remember why I stopped drinking bottled imported beer," Mr. Bryson said. Unless you have a trusted retailer who keeps beer refrigerated, imported beers may best be enjoyed on tap, with the additional proviso - they never end! - that the bar carefully tends to its draft apparatus. Nonetheless some of the imports were exceptional, like the W�rzburger Hofbr�u from Germany, exactly what I'd want at a ballgame or after mowing a lawn. The Radeberger, too, had plenty of character. The Czech beers did less well than the Germans, which Mr. Markowski suggested was because they were less familiar and therefore sat on shelves longer, losing freshness. The two that made our list were the most familiar Czech names. Pilsner Urquell is the original pilsner, still brewed in Pilsen, and if our bottle was not as lively as we would have preferred, it still showed its pedigree. Our other Czech beer, Czechvar, also has a proud heritage. It comes from the town of Budweis, and in Europe it is called Budweiser Budvar. In this country it is not permitted to use the name Budweiser, as Anheuser-Busch has prior claim to it, or even Budvar. So it is called Czechvar instead. No matter. Its malty, lingering flavor could teach our Budweiser a thing or two. Tasting Report: Fresh, Lively Flavors With a Welcome Bitterness Victory Prima Pils, Downingtown, Pa. $1.40, 12 ounces *** 1/2 Alive in the mouth, with citrus aromas and a fine bitterness. Stoudt Pils, Adamstown, Pa. $1.40, 12 ounces *** Lively and refreshing with brisk, subtle flavors. Great Lakes Brewing Dortmunder Gold, Cleveland $1.30, 12 ounces *** Full-bodied, with fresh fruit and floral aromas and a lively bitterness. W�rzburger Hofbr�u, Pilsner, Germany $1.40, 11.2 ounces *** Crisp, bracing and balanced, bitter and malty. Importer: St. Killian Importing, Kingston, Mass.) Radeberger Pilsner, Germany $1.40, 12 ounces ** 1/2 Malty and bitter, with a fresh, lively character. (Binding Brauerei, Norwalk, Conn.) EKU Pils, Germany $1.80, 11.2 ounces ** 1/2 Lean yet substantial; assertively bitter. (Shelton Brothers, Belchertown, Mass.) Dinkel Acker CD, Pils, Germany $1.40, 12 ounces ** 1/2 Citrus aroma and a soft malt character. (Spaten, Little Neck, N.Y.) Pilsner Urquell, Czech Republic $1.50, 12 ounces ** Spicy bitterness but also an unexpected sweetness. (Pilsner Urquell, Washington, D.C.) Pinkus Organic Ur, Pils, Germany $3.25, 25 ounces ** Hazy, unfiltered appearance; lingering bitter aftertaste. (Merchant du Vin, Tukwila, Wash.) Czechvar Lager, Czech Republic $1.40, 12 ounces ** Apple aromas, soft lingering flavor. (Distinguished Brands International, Littleton, Colo.) -- ------------------------------ * * Dr. James Lee Ellingson, Adjunct Professor jellings(a)me.umn.edu * * University of Minnesota, tel: 651/645-0753 fax 651 XXX XXXX * * Great Lakes Brewing News, 1569 Laurel Ave., St. Paul, MN 55104 *