Julian is correct in that all lagers are beers, but not all beers are lagers.
Lagers can be fantastic beers. Pilsener style beers are lagers, and can be fantastic. Aromatic Saaz hops, lovely refreshing bite. Just the thing for an Australian summer, in my opinion.
Don't judge lager by mass market lagers, though. Australian lagers you buy in Britain are bound to be pretty awful.
At 11:46 PM +0100 2/12/03, jlord_at__MXU2EeamD0FvTInNtjbXyMKruf0eSCGllLLZ1NrKDbj4G-jhp0RsUBDUSYVHyjwqrex4A.yahoo.invalid wrote:
> > As I recall it is (at least in part) to do with whether the beer
> > is "Top Fermented" or "Bottom Fermented"
>
>Actually it's high & low fermentation, not top & bottom.
>
Its either. Most of the references I have suggest that top and bottom is more common.
The word does apparently come from
lagern, German for to store, though. Its all from
the medieval era, and doesn't make as much sense
in the modern world.
The thing is that top fermenting yeast is still quite active. So in the times before refrigeration, ales with active top fermenting yeast would continue to ferment, especially in the summer, and had to drunk pretty quickly or they would spoil. Bottom fermenting yeast is less active, especially when stored pretty cold, so could be stored a lot longer. Of course, now we have refrigeration, is doesn't really matter.
At 11:46 PM +0100 2/12/03, jlord_at__MXU2EeamD0FvTInNtjbXyMKruf0eSCGllLLZ1NrKDbj4G-jhp0RsUBDUSYVHyjwqrex4A.yahoo.invalid wrote:
>Triple fermentation, where high fermented beers are
>bottled with a dose of yeast, and re-ferment in the bottle.
The Triple and Double designations refer to strength, not actual multiple fermentations. You just need more sugar and particularly hardy yeast (getting up to using champagne yeast for really strong ones). Really strong fermentation tends to produce nasty beer unless done just right, though, so its best left to master brewers like Belgian Trappist Monks.
Fermenting in the bottle is not at all restricted to Doubles, Triples, etc, but is the traditional method of making beer carbonated.
While in this modern age beer is all too
often carbonated using some barbarous scientific
method not unlike that used to put the bubbles in
Coco Cola, its not that long ago that if beer had
bubbles in it it was because of bottle
fermentation. Pretty much every home brewer uses
bottle fermentation still.
You don't need to actually add yeast if its a real beer, either, as there will still be live yeast at the end of primary fermentation - you just need to add something for it to ferment, something along the lines of a spoonful of extra sugar or so.
>
>Think cellar-fermented Chimay Grand Réserve ... yummmmmm !!!! :-)
Well, Julian is totally correct that the Chimay Grande Réserve is a truly heavenly beer, like unto nectar of the gods. The rest of the Chimays are not too bad either. And bottle fermentation and a nice long maturation process is part of its appeal.
Cheers
Dave
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