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Cellarmanship
In the late 19th century
cellarmen in the tavern at Newgate Gaol were, according to the
Oxford English dictionary "selected prisoners who could sell
candles at their own prices and got a percentage upon the
liquors consumed."
Ale in the 16th century
John Bickerdyke in his
Victorian classic entitled 'The Curiosities of Ale and Beer'
(London 1889) quotes a fascinating passage from Andrew Boorde's
Dietary published in 1542, which makes plain the criteria deemed
important for the achievement of an acceptable standard in the
ales of the time:
Ale for an Englysshe man is a
naturall drinke. Ale must have these propertyes: it must be
freshe and cleare, it must not be ropy nor smoky, nor it must
have no weft nor tayle. Ale should not be drunke under V days
olde. Newe ale is unholsome for all men. And sowre ale, and
deade ale the which doth stande a tylt, is good for no man.
Freshness and clarity need no
explanation. Ropiness refers to the viscous, glutinous or shiny
threads formed in ale so infected. Smokiness as evidence of
bacterial infection, rather than the effect of the use of malts
cured over wood fires, would have been as unwelcome in Tudor
ales as in those of today. Weft refers to streakiness or
cloudiness and "tayle" to the dregs or yeast sediment. Sourness
would be attributable to the presence of acetobacter or various
lactobacilli. Dead ale would have been flat ale without any
carbonation. The injunction not to drink ale under five days old
given its "unwholesome" nature probably refers to the inexorable
and noxious effect on "mans physik" of ingesting quantities of
fresh yeast.
From Andrew Boorde to the
present day commentators and brewers have been open in stating
what properties ale should not evince rather than describing the
virtues or desirable qualities either in technical or aesthetic
terms. Indeed, Michael Jackson has remarked that until
comparatively recently very few descriptions of beer flavour
have existed in brewing literature, an omission that he,
pre-eminently has remedied in the last twenty years.
Today we are all better
informed about the histories of beer styles and the family trees
of bottom- and top-fermented brews. However, to a large extent,
the mystery of cask-conditioned or real ale remains. What
exactly is it? What is special about it? Should it be flat, warm
and cloudy?
What is Real Ale?
The frequently quoted
definition from the Oxford English Dictionary for real ale is "A
name for draft (or bottled) beer brewed from traditional
ingredients, matured by secondary fermentation in the container
from which it is dispensed, and served with out the use of
extraneous carbon dioxide."
"Real
ale" as an expression was adopted by CAMRA (the Campaign for
Real Ale) in 1973. First known as the Campaign for the
Revitalization of Ale, its name change was an attempt to
simplify and shorten what was an uncomfortable mouthful of
letters at the most sober of times. The appellation is a
convenient campaigning device that has attracted a lot of crass
comments about the "realness" of filtered beers from some of the
pin striped, half-witted vulgarians who affect to run breweries
in Britain.
I prefer the simplicity
accuracy and nondidactic expressions "cask-conditioned" or
"bottle-conditioned" to describe beer with live yeast. The
qualitative difference, of course, between cask- conditioned
beers and filtered beers lies in the presence of live yeast,
which is able to feed on any fermentable sugars remaining in the
beer from the time it is racked into cask at the brewery and to
impart its own individual imprint of aromas and flavours as well
as life-enhancing carbonation.
However, what might be termed
CAMRA's "clause celebre" has inspired the fundamentalists of the
campaign to insist that even a non-invasive blanket of carbon
dioxide at atmospheric pressure to protect slow-selling beers
from the ravages of oxidation must be construed as an unnatural
interference with the aroma, flavour and mouthfeel of cask ale,
thereby rendering it non-real.
Their strongest claim is that
the air drawn into a cask on dispense somehow softens the palate
of the beer resulting in beneficial flavour changes analogous to
the effect of oxygen on a young red wine. The fact that not a
smidgen of evidence can be produced to support their thesis
appears not to deter them in their dogmatic determination to be
wrong and to penalize those who wish to get it right by
excluding from the listings of beers in Good Beer Guide pubs
those beers that use blanket pressure as part of their dispense
and preservation regime.
The Art of Cellarmanship -
Cask Conditioned Ales
Cellarmanship in the broadest
sense covers the gamut of drinks sold by retail outlets and
requires a detailed technical manual. The purpose of this short
piece, though, is to set out the general principles for the
successful management of cask- conditioned ales.
An avaricious brewer may
define cellarmanship as the art of serving a continuous supply
of saleable beer with the least financial loss. Here,
compromises will be made on quality in order to fulfil the
primary requirement of profit maximization.
My view on the primary goal of
cellarmanship, which, incidentally has not changed since August
1981, is the following:
To promote the most beauty in
each cask of beer by developing the most interesting range of
sound aromas and flavours; by nurturing wherever possible high
levels of natural carbonation consistent with each beer style
and, moreover, by serving each beer in a manner and at a
temperature that enhances its aroma and flavour profile and
creates an appropriate mouthfeel.
The above must follow the
disciplines of good husbandry continuity of supply and speedy
turnover in order to keep the beer in each broached cask as
fresh as possible.
The Techniques of
Cellarmanship
1. Setting a Stillage
Securing a cask of beer: A
stillage is the name given to any solid object that enables a
cask of beer to be laid down and prevented from moving by means
of the insertion of wooden wedges (also known as scotches or
chocks). It is important that casks be set horizontally with the
shive pointing straight at the ceiling (see diagram). If a cask
is stillaged with a forward tilt, sediment will fall to the
front of the cask and be concentrated at the tap, leading to
fouling of the tap and the need to draw off three or four pints
of beer before the clarity and quality of the cask's contents
can be judged accurately. If the cask is tilted backward,
problems of unstable yeast and finings slurry slipping forward
may arise when the cask is tilted in order to decant the final
few gallons.
2. Conditioning
The purpose of conditioning is
to reduce the level of carbon dioxide in the cask to enable a
good finings action to occur and then to build up the level of
carbonation appropriate to the style of beer.
Venting excess CO2 is achieved
by inserting/hammering a porous peg ("soft peg" made of soft
wood, usually bamboo cane) into the sealed shive tut causing a
sudden escape of gas and the immediate emergence of fobbing
beer. This procedure should be carried out in a controlled way;
i.e., the contents of each cask should be chilled to 52 to 55
degrees F in order that a relatively calm and nonexplosive
purging of excess CO2 can take place.
It is also important that upon
soft spiling, the cask should have an even distribution of
finings and yeast. It is sensible to roll each cask vigorously
before stillaging, securing and venting. The time taken for the
beer to "work" through the soft peg will vary according to each
yeast strain, the concentration of yeast cells per millilitre,
and the yeast's general friskiness, along with the amount of
residual sugar/primings in the cask and the temperature/state of
agitation of the cask. In the case of exceptionally lively
beers, it may be necessary to replace the soft peg every hour
for a day or more. The pegs sometimes become blocked with yeast
and, occasionally a plug of dry hops may form underneath the
soft peg, preventing the release of gas.
The rule on the amount of time
to soft peg beer is that there is no rule. It is entirely
dependent upon the yeast fining regime adopted. The object of
soft pegging is to reduce the amount of CO2 to the point at
which the finings will prove effective.
But do not over vent. You are
preparing the yeast for a marathon journey not a short sprint,
hence the need to vent at low temperatures and avoid exhausting
the supply of sugars. The tension to be observed is the need to
produce clear beer and the imperative to stimulate good to high
levels of CO2 in solution.
Flat, clear beer is the norm
in Britain. We drink with our eyes and then jazz up flat beer by
forcing it through a tight sparkler. We cannot put our
well-conditioned pale ales through a sparkler at the White Horse
without substantial wastage due to the relatively high level of
CO2 in solution.
Hard pegging should occur when
a cask has "worked" to the point where it takes 3 to 10 seconds
for the fob to re-form on top of the soft spile after being
wiped clean, again depending upon the style and strength of the
beer, the yeast/finings regime, and when the beer is required
for dispense. The soft peg should be replaced with a nonporous
hard spile to prevent the escape of any more CO2 and to slow
down yeast activity.
Dropping bright will now occur
and is, in my experience, greatly assisted by a rising
temperature. Again, it is a matter of trial and error with the
yeast strains used, but I have found that taking the ambient
cellar temperature from 52 to 54 degrees F up to 58 to 60
degrees F for about 8 to 12 hours produces consistently bright,
polished results across the range of ale yeasts used in Britain
today. Dropping bright times from hard pegging vary from four
hours to four to five days.
Carbonating should now take
place after a spell of warm conditioning at 58 to 60 degrees F.
It is important to chill back down to 52 to 55 degrees
depending upon the temperature that your yeast is happy with.
The lower the temperature tolerated by the yeast, the greater
the level of carbonation possible.
Bass yeast remains one of the
liveliest and most tolerant of yeast strains in Britain and will
work happily at 50 degrees. After a four-week maturation period
in the cellar at 50 to 52 degrees F our pale ale has the most
glorious, mouth caressing effervescence that one could wish for.
3. Maturation
This part of the process of
cellaring beers, sadly, is seldom given much attention in
practice. However, aging beers not only allows the appropriate
level of carbonation to be generated but also allows the beer to
dry out the effects of krausen or priming additions, thus taking
away any insipid qualities from the palate of the beer. The
fresh kiss of yeast, the hallmark of cask-conditioned ale or
unfiltered lager, develops further impact and complexity during
the process of maturation, be it in a lagering tank or in a
cask. Aging also enables the effects of dry hopping to achieve
maximum impact after two weeks or so in cask, developing its own
particular grace and delicacy of aroma.
For beers such as low-gravity
dark milds, we would expect to put the beer on dispense in the
shortest time possible, perhaps only four or five days after
racking, in order to promote the slightly sweet, fresh malt
character of this supremely quaffable style. We cellar ordinary
1040 original gravity pale ales, such as Harvey's Sussex Best
Bitter, for two weeks in order to extract the succulent malt
characteristics and earthy Sussex hop flavours, but stop before
the dual strain, spicy, clove-like yeast imprint becomes
dominant. A period of two weeks also enables us to build up good
levels of carbonation to provide the complementary mouthfeel so
sought after.
Draught Bass we keep for three
to four weeks as described above. Old ales have been cellared
successfully by us for months; two months for Highgate Old (1050
og.) this past winter to a year in the case of Traquair House
Ale and Adnam's Tally-Ho (1075 og.).
4. Dispense
The key areas to get right
here are:
Temperature, ideally 50 to 55
degrees F depending upon the style of beer and the ambient
temperature. Please don't excessively chill a rich, biscuity,
malty Scotch ale or an ester-laden, vinous barley wine.
Therefore, pay attention to insulated beer lines (and beer
engines) carrying beer from your cellar or chill cabinet behind
the bar to the customers' glass.
Use either tap-fed gravity
dispense or beer engines. If you use beer engines, decide which
beers benefit from the use of sparkler attachments in order to
produce a tight, creamy head. Stouts and dark milds can be
enhanced by the use of sparklers, but think carefully and
experiment before you connect a carefully crafted IPA to an 'Angram
Pip'.
Each cask broached and put on
dispense should be consumed as quickly as possible; ideally
within 24 to 48 hours unless a cask breather is used. It is not
just a question of oxidation and acetification setting in, but
the loss of CO2. In all but the most carefully prepared casks,
such loss will result in a notable loss of freshness and
vitality, which matter a great deal to me.
For those of you who are
preparing pale ales for cask-conditioned dispense, the following
quote from the head brewer of Marston's in 1899 provides a rare
insight into his perception of quality and indicates just how
far brewing techniques had advanced from the 16th century:
An ideal glass of ale should
evidence stability, "star" brilliancy, absence of deposit or
floating particles, a foaming, tenacious, creamy head, with
beads of carbonic acid gas adhering to the sides of the glass;
the ale when first poured out being as cloudy as milk,
subsequently slowly clearing as the gas in solution rises to the
surface of the liquid, forming the close head already mentioned,
the flavour also being that suited for the district where it is
to be consumed.
To paraphrase the late, great
Bill Shankly, pioneering manager of Liverpool Football Club,
cask-conditioned ale is not a matter of life and death-it's much
more important than that. |
