Comments on: Beer Books You Need From Google Books

By: Evan Rail

Evan Rail — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 14:15:54 +0000

Atis, thanks, that’s awesome. Unfortunately, I have no Russian (at least not yet). But I suppose Google Translate must have been invented for some reason.

By: Atis

Atis — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 13:20:20 +0000

Always keep in mind that during the 19th century current countries of Finland, Russia, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Belarus, Ukraine and partly Poland (Warsaw was included) were a part of the Russian Empire. So most literature will be in Russian.

On the state of the beer industry in 1865, this is a good one – Обзор различных отраслей мануфактурной промышленности Россіи (http://books.google.ch/books?id=6IYuAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&hl=de#v=onepage&q&f=false). It also has comprehensive stats of beer imports from England during the most of the 19th century.

By: Martyn Cornell

Martyn Cornell — Fri, 28 Oct 2011 17:09:07 +0000

Evan, I simply couldn’t agree with you more about the need to research further into Central Europe’s (and Eastern Europe’s) brewing history. It takes a lot of time, and, of course, for us monolinguists it needs you chaps who speak Czech and/or German (and Polish, and Hungarian, and Latvian, and so on) to make sense of it for us, but if more archives are going up on the web, that’s excellent news.

Willow bark … that would have put salicylic acid into the beer, with, presumably, anti-bacterial effects, thus aiding the beer’s preservation – meadowsweet, which also contains salicylic acid, was one of the pre-hop flavouring herbs in ale, and to quote myself, “Experiments with brewing ale with meadowsweet by the Manchester University archaeologist Merryn Dineley show the plant will preserve the drink for several months.”

By: Joe Stange

Joe Stange — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 21:13:50 +0000

Whoa, Evan still blogs?

One post a year and yet still more annual value than most.

By: Craig

Craig — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 20:18:35 +0000

In response to the “what’s that?” of Albany Ale—Be careful what you ask for, as Alan knows, I’ll be more than happy to explain the significance of Albany Ale; the brewing industry in Albany, NY (my hometown); and how it affected brewing in the U.S. for sixty some odd years!

Although, If someone knows the water chemisty of Albany city water in the 1830s—letting me know would be greatly appreciated!

By: Stuff Delivered By Mail, By Email, By Courier And By Hand | beer and spirits

Thu, 27 Oct 2011 03:09:44 +0000

[...] beer fans had all this pent up emotion. I had no idea. Me, I’m not so much like that. Evan has it right. I’m just all a (Read more…) General ← Renaissance – Stonecutter Scotch [...]

By: Evan Rail

Evan Rail — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 15:01:46 +0000

Glad to be of service, Ron. While you’re at it, you should also look up Grätzer in the Brau-Lexikon. It’s surprising the importance accorded to willow bark in terms of how Grätzer tasted ca. 1867:

“Es soll seine Eigenheiten der Anwendung von Weidenrinde verdanken. [...] Die Weidenrinde enthält bekanntlich Gerbsäure und einen bitterschmeckenden Stoff, den man als Ersatzmittel der China empfohlen und Salicin genannt hat.”

By: Velky Al

Velky Al — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 13:00:26 +0000

My initial thought when it comes to oat beer is would it have been 100% malted oats? If so, I imagine a ton of rice hulls would be needed to keep the mash from getting stuck.

By: Ron Pattinson

Ron Pattinson — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 12:18:53 +0000

Thanks for the pointer to those Allgemeine Hopfen-Zeitung issues. They’re full of lovely statistics. And that Grätzer analysis. I can never get enough of Grätzer.

By: Evan Rail

Evan Rail — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 08:11:02 +0000

Exactly, Horner Bier was said to be like Broyhan, Berliner Weiße, and many of the other sour beers that were once popular in parts further north. As noted in the comments on the earlier post:

From Der Scheidekünstler im Brau- und Brennhause (Frankfurt am Main, 1816): “Das Resultat dieser Arbeit ist nun ein weißes hopfenloses Bier, ein wahrer Broihan, wie es im Hannövrischen, in allen den Ländern von Nordheim bis nach Hamburg, in Berlin, und selbst in Wien unter dem Nahmen Horner-Bier so vielen Beyfall findet.”

From Neuestes Conversations-Lexikon (Wien, 1829): “das weiße und säuerliche, in Wien beliebte, Horner Bier wird aus Hafer und Weinstein gebraut.”