Drinking in Class

One of my courses in the Brewmaster program at Olds College is this little gem known as Sensory Evaluation.  And yes, this class is pretty much what it sounds like; we evaluate beers.  It is very easy to imagine that this class is a sort of circus with 26 people sitting around getting drunk and talking about beer.  The truth is, as lovely as that sounds, there is a lot going on in this course.  In fact, it is this course that makes me most nervous when it comes time for exams.  You might not believe me, but sensory evaluation is hard.  If we are going to be able to make good beer it is essential that we learn to recognize what it is that makes a beer good or bad.  It means being really critical about everything that is going on in that beautiful glass and training ourselves to consistently understand and recognize what it is we perceive.  It takes practice.

"Oh, good one." You sarcastically reply. "The homework must be arduous."  And yes, of course you are right.  Every time I take a sip, I do consider it homework, except, now that includes every drink of water, beer, wine, spirits, soda, or juice.  It is nearly impossible to just shut my brain off and enjoy a simple beer in peace.  Whats worse, sometimes we need to test things in class that are just down right unpleasant. It is arguably more important to be able to recognize the first indication of spoilage or contamination than the wonder of a perfect blend of hops. Now, this does not mean I am looking for sympathy here, I just want to make sure that you understand that sensory class is not all unicorns and rainbows.  Furthermore, I am going to attempt something waaaaay ahead of its time.  You are going to be able to detect and even rank some taints in beer samples that are invisible to the naked eye.  Over the Internet.  And even though I have already tested these samples, I promise that you will not get any of my germs.  Ready for sensory class? Let us begin.

I taste like beer!

I taste like <censored>

Here are two typical samples of beer (well, after I've tasted them that is).  One of these beers has been spiked with salt, the other has not.  Can you break the Internet and tell which one tastes like the ocean and could make you want to be sick? If you are really not sure, you can highlight the space under the picture for the answer.

You're impressed, right?  Now lets up the ante.  Each one of these beers has been spiked with a varying amount of sulphur (and yes, that tastes as good as it sounds).  Your task is to rank each sample from the lowest to the highest intensity of unpleasantness.  I was going to write some fancy html code that would allow you to actually move the samples but that would have delayed this blog by a month or more, so just do it out loud and forget whatever the people around you might be thinking.

Sulphury,        Sulphuryer,            Sulphuryerer,               Sulphuryest!

Well, there you have it.  You can actually taste beer over the Internet.  Don't you just feel like a brave, new pioneer?   Don't worry, I'll try to have something that tastes a little better next time.
Until then, Cheers!

Malterior Motives

Okay, okay, no more puns. I promise... actually, I can't promise that, but I will show some restraint in the future.

The other day our class got to take a trip to Rahr Malting in Alix AB.  I have a special place in my heart for maltsters and not just because they turn boring old barley into brewing gold.  You see, several years ago I spent an entire autumn driving a combine for a farmer.  I spent hours and hours and days and days watching that giant machine devour row upon row of wheat and canola.  At the end of the harvest I asked for a bucket of the wheat to take home with me because I was just getting into home brewing and thought, "How hard could it be to malt this wheat and make my own beer from scratch?"  Turns out- harder than you'd think.  I sprouted the wheat berries in large plastic tubs then arrested them at the appropriate time with my oven and a food dehydrator so I could get different types of malt.  Then I spent days knocking off all the little rootlets and then cleaning my kitchen of all the little rootlets before breaking the wheat up very coarsely with my coffee grinder a 1/4 cup at a time.  Did I mention this took days? Or how messy it was?  In the end I brewed a beer that...well... maybe it wasn't the best wheat beer ever, but it sure was drinkable and I was immensely proud to have taken it from the combine to the cup all on my own.  And now I was going to get an opportunity to see how the big boys do it.

On the way to Alix we stopped at a local farm and watched them harvesting wheat.  The combine was twice as big as the one I drove and totally decked out with GPS as such.   I was impressed.




 Rahr itself is impressively large although I am told it is only a fraction of the size of the facility in Shakopee, MN.


After donning our very stylish hardhats we ascended to the top of the malting tower in an elevator.  The malting tower is a cool concept because it allows a lot of the work to be done by gravity. First things first though, the grain has to get through the door.  Rahr is extremely picky about the barley that they accept.  This is really good news for brewers and is one of the reasons why a good portion of their malt is shipped to Japan (as a nation they are very particular about the quality and consistency of their malt).  Once the barley has been tested and approved it goes through a rigorous cleaning process and then is moved to one of several vessels in the top floor of the tower.  Here the grains are soaked to allow the barley to begin taking in the water it needs to germinate.  The vats of grains are filled with water and drained several times so that the barley doesn't drown and die. After a day or so, the barley from the different vessels all drops into one large tank in the floor below where the process is repeated for another day. Next, the thoroughly soaked grains are dropped into one of three very humid rooms where they are allowed to germinate- partially. There is a brilliantly complex looking computer monitoring the entire process but our host knew when the barley was ready for kilning just by squeezing the kernels in his fingers.

Barley laid out in a germination vessel almost ready for kilning- Notice the acrospire is nearly the full length of the kernel

Once the germination has reached this stage, it must be stopped so the little grain's embryo doesn't consume all of the goodies that we brewers want.  This is achieved by kilning.  The kiln is another large room that smells wonderful.  Here the barley is heated and dried.  The type of malt produced is dependent on the temperature and duration of the kilning; darker malts are kilned at higher temperatures.  At Rahr they only do pale malt which typically makes up about 95-98% of the malt in your beer.  After malting, the barley is cleaned and tested again to ensure it is good to brew then it is loaded into rail-cars and shipped out.  The whole operation takes 5-7 days and a new batch is started every single day- yep, all 365 of them.
So that's that.  Now you know how malt is made; you go have a drink and think about what you've learned.
Until next time, Cheers!