While many beer enthusiasts have been waiting for the promised craft lager takeover, the rise of Pilsner, and the elevation of bottom-fermented beverages, there is little evidence that 2022 will be remembered as that year.<\/p>\n
As the dominant beer style, IPA continues to monopolize draught boards and beer coolers alike, while spawning new substyles. Meanwhile, lager styles find their way into the hearts and minds of the faithful one sip at a time through their diversity, drinkability, and adaptability.<\/p>\n
\u201cLager\u201d refers to any beer fermented with bottom-fermenting yeast, whereas IPA has a more stringent set of identifying characteristics. And while IPA shows no signs of slowing, in select spots around the U.S, a small patch of breweries has decided to place less emphasis on IPAs and their top-fermented brethren in favor of preaching the gospel of lager.<\/p>\n
Heater Allen Brewing Company was started by Rick Allen in McMinnville, Ore. in 2007 with the idea of brewing only lagers. According to his daughter Lisa Allen, who joined the brewery in 2009 as head brewer, Allen\u2019s initial focus came about because \u201che wanted to see if there was actually a market for it.\u201d Once he discovered thirsty beer drinkers eager to try his creations, he expanded from a 6-barrel brewing system to a 15-barrel system on the growth spurred by his flagship Bohemian-style Pilsner.<\/p>\n
Heater Allen\u2019s core beer is that same Pilsner, called Pils, that Allen initially brewed in 2007, with a few additions. \u201cWe still do our Bohemian Pilsner but for the most part our other beers are German-style lagers,\u201d says Lisa Allen. \u201cWe have a core Munich dunkel and a schwarzbier, which is a cross between a German- and a Czech-style.\u201d Heater Allen also has a seasonal program that follows the type of beer releases typical for Germany. \u201cWe recently released Bobtoberfest, which is our traditional M\u00e4rzen-style Oktoberfest beer. We also brew a Baltic porter, a smoked bock, and a helles lager.\u201d<\/p>\n
One of the greatest challenges in staying lager-focused, says Lisa Allen, is keeping a tight brew schedule\u2014and that means sometimes having to say no. \u201cOur beer takes eight weeks from the day we brew it to the day we release it,\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s our biggest challenge, especially during high times. I don\u2019t have an assistant brewer right now, so it\u2019s me doing most of the work.\u201d Because of the nature of lagers and their commitment to giving their beer the time it needs to condition, Allen says that sometimes means not getting the beer to everyone who wants it. \u201cI just haven\u2019t been able to brew quite as fast as I would otherwise. You don\u2019t want to say no to people, but one of those things with the business is that sometimes you have to say no as a smaller brewery.\u201d<\/p>\n
Along those same lines, staying lager-focused means making sure every beer is of the highest quality. Allen recounts, \u201cI\u2019ve had people complain on review sites that we only have six beers on tap [in the brewery taproom], and I\u2019m just like \u2018We\u2019re a small brewery, sorry.\u2019 I think most people who understand what we do and understand that stuff takes time don\u2019t mind it. I feel like what we do, we do really well. It\u2019s one of those things where I\u2019m not going to half-ass anything, so I may only have six lagers on tap, but they\u2019re all going to be high quality beers.\u201d<\/p>\n
For the Massachusetts-based Jack\u2019s Abby Brewing Company, the focus on lagers came from founding brewer Jack Hendler\u2019s passion. According to CEO Sam Hendler, the brewery\u2019s lager focus started overseas. \u201cMy brother Jack had been to brewing school in Chicago and then in Munich, and he really fell in love with lager production. He had done some extensive travel to the breweries in Europe and felt that lager was underdeveloped and underexplored in the craft brewing space.\u201d<\/p>\n
When the brewery opened in 2011, the Hendlers were cautiously optimistic. \u201cLooking back to 2011 when we opened, the feeling was that there were way too many breweries for us to possibly survive, which is obviously pretty comical now,\u201d said Hendler. \u201cThe feeling was that we needed something bold to differentiate ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n
Back in 2011, there was also a bit of stigma about lager in the craft beer space, recalls Hendler. \u201cI think a lot of brewers wanted to drink lager; you just weren\u2019t allowed to say it. And you certainly weren\u2019t allowed to let your customers know that you wanted to drink lager because most craft brewers couldn\u2019t make lager and wouldn\u2019t make lager and it wouldn\u2019t make financial sense for them to make lager.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lager was still considered \u201cfizzy yellow beer\u201d by many craft brewers and flavorful craft lagers were explored by few, similar to how canned beer was considered something only for large brewers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think from a brand point of view, a lot of brewers tried to make it a story of \u2018us versus them\u2019 and \u2018big versus small\u2019\u2014Big Beer makes lager and small craft brewers make ale,\u201d muses Hendler. \u201cThey tried to make things super simple and easy to communicate to customer between craft and macro beer, and lager kind of got thrown into the gutter from a marketing perspective because of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the thought of lagers being relegated only to Big Beer is not accurate, Hendler said. \u201cI can tell you our brewers always drank lager and the deep, dark secret of a lot of brewers is that there\u2019s a lot of love for bright, golden lagers.\u201d<\/p>\n
That doesn\u2019t always make for an easy sale, though. Hendler says that one of Jack\u2019s Abby\u2019s biggest challenges centers around the consumer\u2019s love for IPA. \u201cConsumer trends like the concentration of craft beer on IPA as a style is really challenging to cut through,\u201d he laments. \u201cIf a bar puts our House Lager on tap, it\u2019s probably not going to pull as fast as the IPA they put on next to it.\u201d<\/p>\n
But he also believes that the drinker benefits from diversified tap lists. \u201cI think it\u2019s a bad thing for craft beer if the draught lines of that bar end up with seven IPAs and a macro lager, so I think it\u2019s really important for the industry that we do carve out more space for lager and get on board with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite the challenges with India pale ale\u2019s hold on the craft beer segment, the IPA drinker is still one of Jack\u2019s Abby\u2019s best customers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe see a lot of the craft beer consumer who buys a new IPA every week, but they also grab a 15-pack of House Lager once a month,\u201d said Hendler. \u201cThat\u2019s the fridge beer that they crush with barbecue or whatever. Those are our people.\u201d<\/p>\n
While brewing lager is personal for every brewery that undertakes the style, for Tampa\u2019s BarrieHaus Beer Co., the style is in head brewer Jim Barrie\u2019s blood. Barrie\u2019s great-great-great grandfather, Phillip Kling, came to the United States from Germany in the 19th century and started the Ph. Kling Brewing Company in Michigan.<\/p>\n
Kling\u2019s daughter carried on the brewing tradition. She married Louis Schimmel, and the couple founded a brewery in Detroit, Mich. called Tivoli Brewing. The brewery\u2019s Altes Lager became one of the most popular beers in the state. Tivoli survived Prohibition by making near-beer, allegedly running beer to speakeasies, and shipping to Canada.<\/p>\n
Barrie and his wife, Brittney, drew on this family history when they established BarrieHaus Brewing with the tagline \u201cEstablished in 1863, reinvented in 2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
The duo decided to follow in the family\u2019s footsteps and establish a brewery in Tampa\u2014 the beating heart of craft beer in the Sunshine State. While there were well over 90 breweries in the counties that call Tampa Bay home, Jim and Brittney saw plenty of opportunity for the kind of lagers they wanted to make.<\/p>\n
Tampa Bay may be saturated in terms of breweries, but \u201cnot for someone who\u2019s making 99 percent lagers,\u201d believes Jim Barrie. \u201cI feel like it\u2019s not even close to what it will be in five years. If you look at Denver, there are three lager breweries in the city among 300 breweries.\u201d<\/p>\n
When BarrieHaus opened in 2019, it was Jim and Brittney\u2019s love of lagers that was displayed on the draught board, inspired not only by Jim\u2019s family, but the couple\u2019s own experience of lager culture.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a really transformative trip when we went to Germany on our honeymoon,\u201d recalls Jim Barrie. \u201cTo drink fresh German lager was a game-changer for both of us. When we came back, [lager is] all I\u2019m doing pretty much.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brittney Barrie says the camaraderie among all the brewers making world-class beer helped them through their first two years in business.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose relationships have meant the world to us; it allows us to be who we are in the heart of Tampa,\u201d she said. \u201cIt really has been an incredible beer community in Tampa and in St. Pete as well. Seven breweries within a mile radius. They\u2019re all right here and they\u2019re all making really good beer. They all have their thing and they\u2019re all happy that our thing is lagers.\u201d<\/p>\n
It can be hard to convince craft beer drinkers\u2014who are used to seeking out the newest innovations from craft brewers\u2014to try lagers, since many of the styles are brewed with traditional methods and ingredients.<\/p>\n
But Lisa Allen says that innovation can be found in switching up beer ingredients and challenging mindsets instead of looking for adjuncts to add.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of [innovation] has been on the hop side, using hops that are not traditional for lagers and different hopping techniques, like dry-hopping,\u201d she said. \u201cWe did an Italian Pilsner that we actually dip-hopped\u2014you put the hops in the fermenter and you essentially knock out into the fermenter on the hops. It was a collab with Wayfinder and Modern Times and one of them suggested it.\u201d<\/p>\n
While dip-hopping proved an interesting experiment, Allen says that lager, as a style, can do much more than it gets credit for. \u201cLager yeast is very versatile, and you can make pretty much any style with it. With lagers, it\u2019s like thinking within the box, rather than thinking outside the box. What can I do within this realm of malt, hops, yeast, methods, and process?\u201d<\/p>\n
At BarrieHaus, innovation comes to the taps with twists on the lager tradition. Beers like Endless Zest\u2014brewed with local Florida oranges\u2014shows off some of the innovation in the lager space, using complementary ingredients in the beer. \u201cI personally prefer the little twists, like the citrus zest in our lager,\u201d says Brittney Barrie. \u201cThere\u2019s fresh orange zest but it still tastes like an American lager.\u201d<\/p>\n
For a traditional lager brewery, BarrieHaus has shown it is open to experimentation within the lager space when it comes to adjuncts\u2014usually, Brittney Barrie says, while working with other breweries. \u201cWe\u2019ve done collabs before where their thing is pastry or lactose. We\u2019re not afraid to do some fun stuff like that at their location.\u201d For example, the brewery has collaborated with Georgia\u2019s Pontoon Brewing. \u201cThey\u2019re making beer that tastes like margaritas, and creamsicles, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
For Jack\u2019s Abby, innovation comes in many forms. \u201cWe\u2019ve played with lager in a ton of different ways,\u201d said Hendler. \u201cWe\u2019ve done hazy hoppy lager and we will continue to do so. We love kellerbier and something that\u2019s a lot of fun for us is experimenting with extremely traditional techniques that aren\u2019t commonly used in the U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sometimes, too, innovation in the lager space comes from learning more about the brewing origins and traditions of lager.<\/p>\n
\u201cJack is going to Germany every year to source ingredients,\u201d said Hendler. \u201cIt\u2019s not just about the next new thing and innovation. When we build a House Lager consumer, that is a more loyal consumer than the brewery who got someone to buy one four-pack of a new IPA.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
IPA continues to monopolize taps and shelves, but lager styles are winning hearts and minds one sip at a time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5459,"featured_media":112607,"sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"sticky_collection":"","_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"94115,29058,37597,1784,111760,54941","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[676,4812],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-112605","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-editors-picks","category-full-pour"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n