Rattlesnake Mountain Brewing

Archive for November, 2007

Just like any other pale ale that is made from ale yeast and pale malts, India Pale ale (IPA) or sometimes called Bitter are just some of the most popular pale ale made with the same ingredient and a higher alcohol content.

India Pale ale (IPA) or bitter also contains plant infusion or extract such as hops (flowers). Hops (Humulus lupulus) acts to stabilize beer and also confers the bitter taste of IPA. Since malt produce sugars that may give India pale ale its sweet taste, hops balance its sweetness and confer its characteristic bitter taste.

IPA has been in the market since the early 1700’s and was thus created because of British brewers’ efforts to combat beer contamination. When pale ale is exported, particularly to India and other territories, the beer often experienced contamination. The contamination was due, in part, to fluctuating temperature conditions. This apparent temperature fluctuation allows bacteria and other microbes to compete with the fermenting yeast which, along the process, produce acids that spoil the entire brewing process. This then gives the beer its sour taste.

Brewers during that time discovered that hops flower extracts and alcohol could prevent microbes from competing with yeast in the consumption of sugar in the brewing medium. By doing so, brewers concluded that such process resolved the outstanding issue of spoilage but were able to discover another variety of beer with characteristic bitter taste of hops, i.e. IPA.

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Amber Ale
Lager

Amber ale, or more frequently called Amber, is a kind of beer that is included in the pale ale beer tree. These types of beers use ale yeast (Sacharomyces cerevisiae), popular kind of yeast that is primary used for brewing and baking, and pale malts as their primary ingredients in the production of amber ale and any type o pale ale version produced in every country where pale ale is consumed and produced in great quantity.

Countries which produce amber ale in bulk for commercial purposes use the same ingredients, although with slight variations and have evolved to have their own identity in them such as Altbier (alt, old in German; bier, beer) for Germans, American pale ale for the United States and most countries in America, Bière de Garde for France which is brewed during the winter season to keep the yeast from fermenting due to unstable and unfavorable weather during the summer season.

Amber ale is particularly the pale ale produced in North America. The color may vary from near light to dark copper color. French people use almost the same term, Ambrée, although North Americans produce a wide variety of amber ale with varying degree of bitterness. The most recommended or common pairings for amber ale is usually sea food dishes, grilled or fried, and or hamburgers.

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Rattlesnake Mountain Brewing

Porter is a kind of strong, dark-colour beer that is made with malts (dark malts in particular) and special kind of yeast. And there were some historians’ accounts that the original name of beer is porter.

Porter has been made popular in London during the 18th century since the beer can be produced quickly and can be brewed by almost everybody evident by the number of microbreweries in London during that time. Porter was also one of the beers of choice in the United States during that time but breweries saw a decline in its production on the succeeding years.

However, porter was seen to have made a revival for the past 15 years since macro and microbreweries alike are starting to produce such beer due in part, to its low production cost, great sweet taste and fast to produce and taste can be from strong (bitter), medium to sweet.

Strong porter, known as stout, was seen to be very dark due to the concentration of malt in it hence making it more concentrated than a regular porter. Among porter’s popular brand are Fuller’s London Porter, Anchor Porter by Anchor Brewing Co. and London Porter by Arcadia and Samuel Smith’s, The Famous Taddy Porter.

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Rattlesnake Mountain Brewing
Beer Styles

Germany has the second largest number of breweries in the world with more than 1300 registered breweries, right behind the United States’ 1,500 breweries. Germans are notorious in terms of beer consumption and are the worlds top quality producer of beers.

Hefeweizen is just one of the most popular beers in the region and is known due to its marked streaks or indistinct masses of yeasts in it. Hefeweizen is literally translated as ‘yeast wheat’ since the word hefe would mean ‘yeast’ in German and the word ‘weizen’ means wheat in that region.

The quality of Hefeweizen production gives the beer its cloudy look since the remaining yeasts that are used to ferment the wheat during the production are not removed or filtered. The yeast then stays in the beer and gives the beer its cloudy appearance every time you pour it on a bottle or container. Perhaps, one may see that during Oktoberfest shown on TV or any type of advertising program.

Hefeweizen are somewhat sweet in taste and sometimes infused with other types of yeast that alters the white beer’s distinct taste. Due to its nature, the Germans usually call Hefeweizen “weissbier mit hefe” or white beer with yeast.

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Rattlesnake Mountain Brewing
Beer Styles