Yay! Green Hop Day!

These little devils are very nearly just right.

Remember what fun we had with Green Hop Day 2010? Well, this year it's double trouble: 2500 litres of GHA brewed here, on GHD1, followed, 24 hours later (GHD2), by 5000 litres of GHA brewed with my friend Big M at his rather flash place in the Dutch countryside.

Once Humphrey the Hop Grower has decided the exact day he's beginning the harvest (anytime between tomorrow & Monday next), and the exact order (some varieties must be caught at the right moment, others are more forgiving) then we'll know the date of GHD1. My guess is Tuesday the 6th, one week from now.

For those of you snoozing during last year's lecture allow me to recap: hops are normally dried to preserve them. They are harvested in early September and grow in the Kent countryside, some of the finest barely 7 miles from here. So, each year we tank it over to the picking shed at dawn and rob Humphrey the Hop Grower of 50 kg of fresh, bright green un-dried hops. Then tank it back to the brewhouse and chuck the lot into the copper: the place smells divine, I have a weep and we all drink beer. Ten days later we're sat in any decent East Kent pub pulling on foaming pints of what is probably the freshest beer in the world. Just because we can.

Only this year, after my annual weep, I'll tank it right back to the picking shed, stuff the back of the pick-up with 100 kgs of bright green, fresh wet hops, and head for the Chunnel. Quick kip through the Manche and up the road to Rotterdam and beyond. Another quick kip at chez Olivier & we're up early to brew twice. That's probably another two weeps too. Then a restorative glass of ale, a kip, and the drive home.

More on that later.

DoppelHop

Steins, Fräuleins, Football & Frankfurters - my favourite album of all time. It captures the very essence of life, all the necessities, all the luxuries, and the entire cultural cannon required to keep the soul satisfied. And that's just the title, which is just as well because the music is crap.

Anyhow, it'll be Oktoberfest in Munich in just a few weeks time, where many thousands will gather to celebrate this simple sentiment and, since we're all stuck in East Kent, we've brewed a beer so that you & I can be there in spirit, if not body.

Our DoppelHop is a pale Bock Bier brewed, of course, in full accordance with the Bavarian purity law (the Reinheitsgebot - actually pretty much all our beer is brewed in accordance with this anyway) whereby the only ingredients allowed are water, yeast, malt & hops. As with many Oktoberfest Biers it is slightly on the strong side. But unlike most it is dryish, and very hoppy. We've used proper imported Bavarian Pilsner, Vienna & Munich malts to give the beer a full body, allowing us to hop on the 'refreshing' side. Mittelfrüh & Brewers Gold varieties, grown in the Bavarian hop region of Hallertau, are joined, in a very big way, by the mighty, noble, Saaz hop. A long, cool fermentation combined with an even longer, cooler lagering period will result in a gorgeously balanced, strong, pale amber, hoppy caricature of a lager.

Prost!

Serving Suggestion.

I'm not really using this artwork, it's just too sexist, she's too damn cute and people various would, quite rightly, not let me get away with it. I probably shouldn't get away with using it here, truth be told.

last word.....

OK, let's clear up a few lose threads from our KeyCask/KeyKeg experiences.

1. We re-did the cask vs KeyCask with yet another beer (costing me a fortune in ale this is), but this time aged for only 3 weeks, the average age our beer would be if you drank it in East Kent. The difference was minimal, if there at all. I conclude from this that we will not be swapping our stainless steel casks for KeyCasks for use in our local market, anytime soon. Costs of ownership & cleaning our casks are half the costs of the KeyCasks.

2. We re-did the test at the GBBF and held a taste trial in the Volunteer Arms, the staff-only bar. Three samples were blind pulled: regular KeyCask, cask and KeyCask with a semi-permeable bag, designed to allow a small amount of oxidation during serving, such as is deemed important by many an expert. The beer was 3.8%, hoppy & 7 weeks old. Here's me right, a lover of fresh stuff, feeding CAMRA's most faithful with old beer, at their premier event. And I put my name on it. I must be mad. But I digress, where were we? Oh, the test. I nailed it from 2" inches above each glass. But I don't know how the rest did, as I haven't seen the results (there was some bloke giving 'clarity' a 2 out of 5 - the beer was absolutely gin bright so I reckon his glasses were a bit greasy).

So, KeyKegs can be used effectively as casks and will keep beer fresh for longer, both during storage and dispense. Costs preclude it from replacing stainless casks in the local market, however, they are ideal for wider distribution.

There's a few competitors out there now so look for continued innovation in the beer container market.

And another thing.....

So Bert wanted us to test his invention. He maintained that his KeyKeg could be used as a cask and would be just as good. He even began calling it a KeyCask. We were game, if sceptical.

Casks and KeyCasks were filled with the same beer, direct from racking tank, as is usual. Rather than send them out the following week for you lot to enjoy we tucked them away in the corner and allowed their shelf life to expire (8 weeks). This was done with two beers, one a 2.8% tiddler, the other, Seasider. Now we run a clean gaff here (I just got the latest, spotless lab results back) so I would not expect the beer to 'spoil' in anyway - it is sitting in sterile, hermetically sealed containers at a low temperature (12ºC). I would, however, expect a diminution of hop aroma and a lack of zinging freshness on the nose.

Prior to test day the vessels were vented for 48 hours and the casks tapped. I hooked them up in the cellar to two, freshly cleaned beer lines. Bert poured samples in the bar, not knowing which was which. It was a 'double blind' test. The moment had arrived - I was presented with three glasses of beer and challenged to sniff the odd one out. "Look, I'm happy to do this for you, but I will not offer an opinion on which is best, if there is a difference" I said to the Dutch genius. Immediately I sniffed the samples I changed my mind - I snorted the odd one out a mile away, plain as my nose. We repeated the exercise with the Seasider and again, there was a massive difference.

The cask versions were just a little tired on the nose, lacking bright, fresh zip, the individual components melded into one.

The KeyCask version was a different prospect entirely - bags of freshness, as if it were a week old, in youthful its prime.

There you go then, a vessel designed as a keg, used as a cask and superior to a cask in terms of retaining beer quality.

Put that in your pipe ans smoke it.

More keg debate

Sometimes, for one reason or another, we brewers send our beer beyond its natural homeland (20 miles for us). And in some cases we want to remain fresh and tasty beyond its natural youthful and tasty lifespan (6 weeks for most of our gear). Traditional 'cask' packaging does a job in these circumstances, but could there be something better? Well, I came across an alternative and decided to find out.....

KeyKeg: I've been using these little babies for over a year now, filling them with West Coast IPA and sending them down to Italy for the pleasure of the SPQR. We fill an impermeable bag contained inside a rigid plastic sphere with beer and off it goes. I confess that in this case the containers are filled with beer that hasn't been allowed to fully vent during fermentation and so has an elevated carbonation level. There remains a lowish level of yeast in it (0.1 million cells per ml) and a little residual fermentable sugar for secondary fermentation. It's a 'fully hopped' style of beer, served cold, fizzy and delicious. And it remains tremendously fresh throughout its 3 month lifespan, thanks, in great part, to the packaging. Make no mistake now, West Coast IPA served from KeyKeg is "real ale":

Real ale is a beer brewed from traditional ingredients (malted barley, hops water and yeast), matured by secondary fermentation in the container from which it is dispensed, and served without the use of extraneous carbon dioxide.

Here is a 'keg' being used to package, transport and serve delicious, fresh and tasty ale and doing it better, in the circumstances, than the cask.

Come on, lay right into me. But beware, I'm not stupid enough not have more up my sleeve.

Keg debate?

You know me, I like my beer fresh. It's tastier that way. Luckily I own a brewery and have 24/7 access to as much of the stuff as I could drink in a lifetime. That's me sorted then, but what about you? I want you too to enjoy the daily experience of bright, gorgeous flavours. But you don't work here, so how do I get it to you without it turning old, oxidised and stale?

Well, if we keep live yeast in the beer it will keep it in good nick for a few weeks, so long as we exclude oxygen from every part of the process (saving, of course, at the very beginning of fermentation when the yeast uses the stuff the create sterols for growth). Oxygen, you see, is my arch enemy: it forms the precursors to staling and thus shortens the time I have available to get my lovely fresh ale to you, for you to enjoy.

Keep yeast in, keep oxygen out. That's about it. Oh, except keeping the light out. Well, certain wavelengths of light. But that's another story and not strictly relevant to this discussion. So, no oxygen, plenty of lovely yeast. That's pretty much all. And I can rely on packaging to provide these. Doesn't matter what packaging, so long as it does the business.

As it happens, for economic reasons, I use stainless steel casks. They can be cleaned and sterilised with ease, filled quickly, sealed up and rolled down the road to the pub, where the landlord recognises the format and knows how to get the beer out. Great.

There are other options available. There are kegs. These are no different to casks, within our terms of reference as explained above. They keep oxygen out and let me include yeast with my beer.

But, for some reason, they have the added, and unusual, ability to make people angry.

I don't understand.

Can anyone explain?