Ten Amazing Facts About Beer

When it comes to trivia nights, or a friendly game of Trivial Pursuit, our very own mixologist and sommelier Kim Spence knows something about everything. Game night starts with a fight over who gets Kim on their team because he never lets us down with the fascinating facts he knows about all kinds of stuff. So, for St. Patrick’s Day we asked him to put away the manuals, to not geek out on the science of beer, and to share some of the most eyebrow raising facts he knows about this famous beverage. Presenting (in no particular order)…

Ten Amazing Facts About Beer

Beer is the oldest known written recipe.

A poem called “Hymn to Ninkasi” from around 1800 BC contains the instructions for brewing beer.

Beer is the 3rd most consumed beverage.

Beer is the most consumed alcoholic beverage, and third overall after water and then tea.

Lager is the dominant style of beer in the world.

Lagers keep better, and are produced in huge quantities by the major US breweries and enjoyed all over the world.

Cenosillicaphobia is the fear of an empty glass.

We promise we’re not making this up.

The world’s strongest beer is “Brewmeister’s Snake Venom.”

Most beer is about 5% ABV, this Scottish brew has 67.5% ABV. It’s made with smoked peat malt, and two types of yeast.

Beer prevents kidney stones.

A study found in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology that beer reduced the risk of kidney stones by 41 percent!

World’s most expensive beer is Belgia Vielle Bon Secours.

Available at Bierdrome in London, a bottle costs $1,000 USD. It’s described as “a complex taste with citric, caramel and toffee flavours with an undertone of liquorice and aniseed.”

Japanese Sake is a type of beer, not wine.

The fermentation process uses grains, not fruit, just like beer.

The oldest still-running brewery in the world is in Germany.

Still in operation today, the Weihenstephan brewery has been making beer since 1040!

Pilgrims on the Mayflower stopped at Plymouth Rock because they ran out of beer.

Believe it or not, this one has some truth behind it.…

Craft beer: a guide for beginners

Once there was real ale. It was safe, steady and you knew where you were with it. But now ale has a hip young cousin: craft beer. It even has its own festivals, such as this weekend’s Liverpool Craft Beer Expo. So what’s craft beer all about, beyond fashionable beards and American beers? For novice drinkers, we offer this guide. The next round is on you. Cheers!

Craft beer

Real ale solely relates to live, cask-conditioned British beer or its bottled equivalent. The craft crew, however, don’t care where beer is from, how it’s made or served, so long as – bit vague, this – it’s been made with love and it tastes great. Rules are very much there to be broken.

Hop-forward

Unwieldy slang for those big, bold, tropically fruity and aggressively bitter beers, where the hops are less flavouring than high explosives. Also known as “hop bombs”.

West coast of …

America, that is, not Ireland. UK craft brewers are in awe of the US micros and their punchy, Californian double IPAs. A very healthy internationalism is central to craft beer, with Scandinavia and even Italy embraced as fellow craft hotbeds. This does lead, however, to …

Pricey halves/painfully expensive pints

Costly raw ingredients; smallscale production; export/import duties; the exploitation of gullible hipsters: there are many factors which have come together to make many craft beers bloody expensive. Bring your credit card – £3 halves and £6 pints are now common – or make sure you mix up those hop-forward speciality beers with some cheap, reliable, old-fashioned real ale.

Black IPA

From barrel-ageing, wild yeasts and smoked malts to spirit-laced ‘speers’, via stouts and porters made with oysters and passion fruit, brambles and coffee grounds (possibly all at the same time), experimentation, innovation and constant change are the hallmarks of craft beer. As are stylistic hybrids. If you want to pass as a confident craft drinker, order a black IPA. It’s black beer with a big hop payload and a residual stout character.

Craft keg

The primary bone of contention between the craft rebels and Camra traditionalists. This is good beer, but served colder and fizzier from long-life kegs, just like big brand lagers.

IBU or international bitterness units (yes, it really is a thing!)

Basically, the higher the better. The ultimate craft beer would be almost unbearably bitter, like sucking on a handful of rusty nails and paracetamol that still taste of beer.

Cans

The perfect medium or marketing chicanery? Novices probably don’t want to get embroiled in that debate. The key thing to note is that, suddenly, cans are cool and bottles are history. If you want to look the part/easily led, grab a tinnie.

Sours

Trendy, confrontationally tart beers inspired by farmhouse/saison Belgian brewing styles and usually made – drop this in for instant credibility – with Brettanomyces (or Brett) yeasts.

Single hopping

Faddish concentration on using a single hop variety in a beer, not a blend, so that you can learn about and appreciate its true character, in that slightly knobby way more commonly associated with wine drinkers. It’s fine if the hop, say citra (praise its lychee, grapefruit and gooseberry notes), can carry the beer, but often it leads to meek, one-dimensional beers.

Stout

Forget Guinness. Serious craft drinker have to be across stout’s many milk, imperial, baltic, export and chocolate stylistic variations. Or at least pretend to be. Drinking good stout is a rite of passage, a sign that the craft drinker has graduated from the nursery slopes of sunny pale ales and frivolous IPAs.

Experimental & collaborative beers

Breweries creating limited-edition beers, often in collaboration with other breweries, is one of the craft scene’s defining characteristics. It’s a boon for the blagger, as there are far too many to keep up with. “Have you tried that Kernel/Marble oak-smoked barley wine? Or the Thornbridge/Magic Rock mint chocolate stout?” you can ask, confident that, if that beer doesn’t exist now, it soon will do.

Boring brown bitter

The ‘classic’, nondescript English bitter that your dad drinks. Brewed by a big regional brewery. It’s everything that craft beer drinkers hate, basically. Although, complicating matters, several micros, such as Marble, Grain and Liverpool Organic, now brew their own excellent best bitters.

Tasting sticks

No, not a stick you lick, but three third-pints on a handy carrying device, so you can taste several beers in small quantities and pretend you’re a connoisseur, not a beer monster.

Name-dropping

If you want to impress craft nerds, you need to name-drop creatively. You can’t just big up Brewdog because you’ve seen its beers in Tesco. Mikkeller, a roving Danish brewery possibly imagined into life by Franz Ferdinand and David Shrigley, is the last word in indie cool, but for that very reason you’re probably best avoiding it. It’s a bit obvious. Instead, drop in a few lesser-known foreign brewers (fellow Danes Evil Twin, America’s Left Hand, Italians del Borgo) or a niche British barnstormer (Red Willow, Summer Wine). You like Brooklyn lager? Fine, but best keep it to yourself. It’s 2013, not 2009.…

Beer Types and Styles

So, you want to know more about beer… Well, pour yourself a cold one and get comfortable because there’s a whole lot of great stuff to learn about your favourite beverage.

Beer Types

Ales

Brewed with top fermenting yeast at cellar temperature, ales are fuller-bodied, with nuances of fruit or spice and a pleasantly hoppy finish. Generally robust and complex with a variety of fruit and malt aromas, ales come in many varieties. They could include Bitters, Milds, Abbey Ales, Pale Ales, Nut Browns, etc.

Ales are often darker than lagers, ranging from rich gold to reddish amber. Top fermenting, and more hops in the wort gives these beers a distinctive fruitfulness, acidity and pleasantly bitter seasoning. Ales have a more assertive, individual personality than lager, though their alcoholic strength is the same.

Ales are 30% of all beer sold in Canada.

Lagers

Lager originates from the German word lagern which means ‘to store’ – it refers to the method of storing it for several months in near-freezing temperatures. Crisp and refreshing with a smooth finish from longer aging, lagers are the world’s most popular beer (this includes pilseners).

A lager, which can range from sweet to bitter and pale to black, is usually used to describe bottom-fermented brews of Dutch, German, and Czech styles. Most, however, are a pale to medium colour, have high carbonation, and a medium to high hop flavour.

Lagers are 56% of all beer sold in Canada.

Stouts & Porters

There’s very little distinction between a Porter and a Stout, but they do have their differences.

Porter is a dark, almost black, fruity-dry, top fermenting style. An ale, porter is brewed with a combination of roasted malt to impart flavour, colour and aroma. Stout is also a black, roast brew made by top fermentation.

Stout, not as sweet to the taste, features a rich, creamy head and is flavoured and coloured by barley. Stouts often use a portion of unmalted roasted barley to develop a dark, slightly astringent, coffee-like character.

Malts

Generally dark and sweeter in flavour, malts contain hints of caramel, toffee, and nuts. They can be light to full bodied.

Beer Styles

In addition to type, a beer’s character can be described by its style. Listed below are some of the many different styles of beer carried at the Beer Store.

Amber

A very versatile beer, Amber beers are full bodied malt aromas with hints of caramel, these beers could be either lager or ale.

Blonde

Blonde ales are very pale in colour and tend to be clear, crisp, and dry, with low-to-medium bitterness and aroma from hops and some sweetness from malt.

Brown

Dark amber or brown in colour, brown ale have evidence of caramel and chocolate flavours and may have a slight citrus accent or be strong, malty or nutty, depending on the area of brewing.

Cream

A very mild, sweetish, golden style of ale.

Dark

Dark ale is a British type beer, combining hops, yeast and a blend of malts. It’s a medium chestnut brown colour, with a delicate fruity smell and robust, malty character.

Fruit

Most fruit beers are ales however, they typically do not carry an ale character. In order to allow for the fruit flavor to come through nicely, the malt’s flavor is not dominant and there is a low bitterness level to the beer.

Golden

First developed in the UK, Golden ales are straw coloured with a slight hint of citrus and vanilla. The beer can sometimes contain spicier flavours.

Honey

A full-bodied beer with a creamy texture and copper colour. Honey beers are slightly sweet with hints of caramel.

India Pale Ale

A hoppier version of pale ale. Originally brewed in England with extra hops to survive the journey to British troops stationed in India.

Light

Extremely light in colour and mild in flavour. Light beer has fewer calories and/or lower alcohol content.

Lime

Typically light in flavour with a refreshing lime taste. The intensity of the lime can differ from very subtle to strong.

Pale

Pale ale has a fruity, copper-coloured styler. It originiated from England. Pale ales are robust beers that can be enjoyed with strongly spiced foods.

Pilsner

Made with neutral and hard water. Tend to be golden in colour with a dry, crisp, and somewhat bitter flavour. Pilsner stands out from other lagers due to its more distinctive hop taste.

Red

Red ales can either be red or light brown in colour. They are moderate to heavy in flavour and contain hints of caramel that is offset by the predominant hop characteristic of the beer.

Strong

This is a broad grouping that can describe any beer over 7% ABV. Strong beers are typically dark in colour, some are almost black. Different styles can include old ales, double IPAs, and barleywines.

Wheat

Light and easy to drink with very little aftertaste. Wheat provides a soft character to beer and is sometimes hazy or cloudy with a touch of spice notes.…

Everything about Icelandic Beer

Many visitors to Iceland are surprised to discover a plethora of Icelandic breweries and artisan micro-breweries, seemingly, an impossible number for such a small population. There is even an Annual Icelandic Beer Festival.

My personal favorite? Einstök Hvítt, an award-winning craft white ale, brewed in Akureyri by Ölgerðin Egils Skallagrímsson. I no longer have to miss out when I travel overseas, some discerning bars in the UK and other countries are selling this refreshing beer with a subtle orange tang. I even found it in Sennan, one of the remotest villages in South West England!

Icelandic beers have won some impressive prizes at the prestigious World Beer Awards:

• Boli by Ölgerðin Egill Skallagrímsson won 1st prize in the lager category (2017)
• Bríó by Borg Brugghús won 1st prize in the German-Style Pilsner category (2012)
• Sólveig by Borg Brugghús won a prize in the wheat beer category (2013)
• Gull by Ölgerðin won 1st prize in the standard lager category (2011 and 2015)

10 Popular Icelandic beers

1. Kaldi 5% alc./vol. Pilsner

The first blonde beer Kaldi brewery made. Sold mainly in bottles or on tab (very hard to find), the original Kaldi is a blonde lager beer but brewed in the famous Pilsner tradition, so it is classified as such. The beer is a blonde copper golden color with a soft filling of roasted malt, slightly bitter but very gentle.

2. Úlfrún 4.5% alc./vol. SESSION IPA

This beer has a very distinct fruitiness to it, infused with Sorachi Ace, Centennial and Simcoe hops, the result is a tropical delight of mango with a hint of pineapple.

3. Einstök White Ale 5.2% alc./vol. White Ale

Wheat malt, pilsner malt, oats and Bavarian noble hops spiced with coriander and orange peel. Best served with a slice of orange, it really brings out the orange flavor of the drink. The perfect summer drink!

4. Einstök Pale Ale 5.6% Pale Ale

Brewed with a combination of Cascade, perhaps the most quintessentially American hop, and Northern Brewer and Hallertau, which add a more English and Central European vibe. Kind of a mix of an American-style pale ale, English-style pale ale and a European-style pale ale or lager. In the flavor department, pale and light caramel malts form the essence, while hops contribute to a profile which is well-balanced among those floral & citrus Cascade notes and earthy, woody, and herbal tones.

5. Bríó 4.7% alc./vol. Pilsner

Has a light malty flavor but the main feature of this beer is a crisp, bitter hop flavor with a little citrus fruit, like an orange peel. It has won numerous awards and it was the very first beer Borg Brewery made!

6. Garún 11.5% alc./vol. Icelandic Stout

Chocolate, licorice and coffee taste, a rich dark beer with an aroma to match. The fresh Icelandic water plays an important role in giving this damsel its smoothness, and the double fermentation infuses it with a taste that is at once pungent and mild. An unusually light dark beer!

7. Víking Gylltur 5,6% alc./vol. Classic Premium Lager

A classic lager beer, brewed in the Old-school tradition of craftsmanship. Proven brewing methods make it a refreshing premium beer with a refined finish

8. Pils Organic 5,0% alc./vol.

A super-light delicious beer recommended in the summer. Made from 2-row organic spring barley. The Pilsners flavor is usually described as slightly nutty and biscuity.

9. Úlfur 5.9% alc./vol. India Pale Ale

Úlfur meaning Wolf, is dry hopped with American hops that give a bitter yet fruity aroma. The beer has a citrus fruit (particularly grapefruit) kind of taste and a delightful crispness. This is the winner for many Icelanders!

10. Ástríkur

Every year Borg Brewery makes a new queer beer for the Reykjavík Pride Festival so we can’t put out any alcohol level or even define it by type! Every year it’s new and every year we try to love! We recommend you do the same!…