Greeting from Minneapolis, where we’re spending my birthday week. The Beer Hall at Surly Brewing is a ten minute walk from our Airbnb. There’ll be a couple of Twins games, Hmong cuisine and the Minneapolis Institute of Art. As for this week’s beer column, it is inspired by a question I’ve received several times since the launch of Common Haus earlier this year. As always, thanks for reading.
I remember the day, many years ago, when my German friend drew a line in the sand.
We were debating the merits of a blueberry chocolate stout, long before such hybridized stylistic creations became the daily norm in craft beer.
“It just isn’t right,” he said.
“According to the Reinheitsgebot, you must use only grain, hops and water to make beer—not berries, chocolate, pumpkins, chili peppers, or coffee!”
My German friend was correct, insofar as he understood the present day applicability of the Reinheitsgebot, or Bavarian Beer Purity Law of 1516.
However, he also was mistaken, for at least two good reasons.
For starters, cultural relativism in beer has existed since the beverage’s ancient beginnings. The planet’s brewers have always experimented with a multitude of fermentable materials, additives and flavoring agents, based on their specific locale and available raw materials. Barley and hops might be the best choices, but they’re not the only ones.
Perhaps more surprisingly, the Reinheitsgebot itself seldom measures up to close scrutiny in exactly the way its adherents claim. As an example, the Bavarian Beer Purity Law of 1516 wasn’t widely known by the name “Reinheitsgebot” in non-Bavarian regions of Germany until the time of the post-WWI Weimar Republic (1919-1933).
Long before, at its inception 500 years prior to the Weimar period, the beer purity law was a pre-industrial omnibus regulatory document. It addressed the beer market in broad terms by the prevailing standards of the day, defining competitive terms, fixing prices, and establishing taxation rates.
During a historical era when one’s “daily bread” often meant “daily minimum for survival”, the Reinheitsgebot delineated grains suitable for brewing (barley) and those better reserved for baking (wheat and rye), the intent being to keep these grains in their respective spheres of preparation, and to ensure the Bavarian royal subjects were both fed and watered.
But today we know the Reinheitsgebot only for the small section specifying the permissible brewing ingredients of barley malt, hops and water (modified subsequently to include...Read more
