Friday, September 10, 2010

A Pondering Of Brown Ale

It's that time of year again. Time for all the legitimate and interpretive Oktoberfest biers to hit the shelves and the taps at your favorite watering hole. However, from a seasonal beer point-of-view, the end of summer and beginning of fall brings more than just Oktoberfest biers (although I believe these still dominate in the association of beer to falling temperatures and the arrival of the Munich Oktoberfest, which I was very fortunate to have been able to attend in 2009).

The inspiration (probably more of a catalyst than an inspiration) for this post comes from sitting here enjoying Sierra Nevada's fall seasonal called 'Tumbler'. 'Tumbler' is described on the label as an "Autumn Brown Ale". I have to say this is a beer that is probably going to move into the upper part of my list of favorite beers. When I first tasted it a couple of weeks ago, I thought to myself, "now this is what a Brown Ale should taste like!" I love its smooth palate and flavor highlighted by caramel notes, a slight roasty character and just enough hop bitterness to offset the sweetness of the malts. This is one highly drinkable beer.

'Tumbler' is brewed with Two Row Pale Ale Malt, Crystal Malt, Chocolate Malt, and what is described by the brewery as "Smoked" malt. The latter really surprises me as I don't detect much of a smoky character. Maybe we've hit on something here - a way to add smoked malt to the grist without it overwhelming the flavor as is the case in so many beers using it (and don't get me started on the topic of using Smoked/Peated Malt in Scottish ales!). It is bittered with Challenger hops and finished with Challenger and Yakima Goldings hops. This may explain part of the reason I like this so much. Challenger is widely used today in all Scottish and English ales and Yakima Goldings is a derivative of perhaps the most widely used English hop, in the truest definition, East Kent Goldings. Both of these are mainstays in my own home brewery.

Now, while I sing the praises of this beer and continue to appreciate the mastery of its balance (balance having become my most sought after attribute of a beer) I ask myself, as I so often do upon first tasting a beer, is this a Brown Ale as advertised? Is it really true to style? In the case of Brown Ale, this innocuous question (or so it may have seemed) turns into a somewhat complex query. Exactly what is a Brown Ale?

Brewing historian, Martyn Cornell, writes in his excellent book, Amber, Gold & Black, that brown ale or brown beer was the top beer style in London at the end of the seventeenth century. However, it's reputation was somewhat dubious and the style all but died out with the rise in popularity of porter and stout, to be followed later followed by pale beers. The brown beer style also traveled to America with the early British settlers and was brewed for some time but, like in the UK, died out for the most part (more on this in a bit).

Cornell tells us that the first 'modern' interpretation of brown ale was formulated and then bottled as Mann's Brown Ale in 1902 (possibly 1899) by Thomas Wells Thorpe of Mann, Crossman & Paulin's Albion Brewery in Whitechapel Road, London. This beer was sweeter due to a low attenuation even though it had an OG of 1.033. The beer style took awhile to grow but eventually many other British brewers had no choice but to follow suit. In the BJCP style guidelines, Mann's beer would be classified as a 'Southern English Brown'.

With little doubt, the most recognized brown ale in America (and many other places in the world) is Newcastle Brown Ale, developed in the northern England city of Newcastle-Upon-Tyne by Newcastle Breweries at the end of the 1920s. Newcastle would be classified as a 'Northern English Brown' beer and is more attenuated, maltier, and stronger than that of Mann's. Another example of the northern style is Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale.

Now, back to America. It is generally accepted that a somewhat new style of brown ale began in the mid- 1980s when former silicon valley techy and homebrewer, Pete Slosberg, developed Pete's Wicked Ale. Pete's new introduction to the US brewing scene was a big hit and the beer won many awards in a very short time. Pete first had the beer brewed under contract in California but it has subsequently been bounced from micro-brewery to micro-brewery at various locations throughout North America. I didn't start developing my appreciation for beer until about the time Pete's was introduced. In my mind, Pete's Wicked Ale sits up there with Samuel Adams Lager, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale, and Anchor Steam as the elite in those early days of rise of the US micro-brewery scene. I remember tasting my first Pete's Wicked Ale and I was blown away with the depth of flavor. It is still a great beer to this day.

If you want to know more about the history of brown ale, I'd highly recommend getting a copy of Martyn Cornell's book, Amber, Gold & Black. Martyn also has a highly successful and always enlightening blog, Zythophile. Another great and highly detailed source of historical information on English brown ales (and a plethora of other styles) is Ron Pattinson's blog, Shut up about Barclay Perkins.

Yours Aye!
Neil