In it, the two authors Thomas Kraus-Weyermann and Horst Dornbusch, internationally known and renowned experts in brewing and malting, deal exclusively with one of the oldest types of beer in the world: dark lager.
This group of beers owes its origins to a combination of climatic, biogeographical, biogenetic and political coincidences that occurred in the Bavarian foothills of the Alps during the late Renaissance.
In "Untergärig und Dunkel," the authors embark on a historical search for clues to the emergence of dark beers.
To the modern beer drinker and brewer, it may seem self-evident that, in addition to the light beers mainly brewed today, there are also dark beer styles, as is natural. Natural? - Far from it, if you look at the origins of beer brewing.
Indeed, one can assume that the ancient beers - for lack of color sources - were all light. The color of beer is mainly linked to malting technology. And color first came into beer when people began drying their malt with direct-fired kilns.
This was first done around the 9th century in advanced monastery breweries.
However, the historical development of dark lagers is only an introduction to the subject - which is thrilling in a detective story way; in further chapters, the authors provide basic biochemistry and comprehensive information on the ingredients.
The book gives the brewer a total of 41 recipes, all of which were designed specifically for this work.
Half of them come from large and small craft breweries in the U.S. and Canada, the other half from the Weyermann® Malzfabrik brewery in Bamberg - some of them on specially made medieval brewing equipment replicas.
Available in German language.
Deutsch
English
