While all the preparation for opening
Hawksbill Brewing Company
is rolling along – we’ve had to push our opening back to March due to a few
hitches while we await our licenses – I’ve been exploring beer styles to
broaden my appreciation for the craft side of what we’re planning to do. I also picked up a book recently,
FarmhouseAles: Culture and Craftsmanship in theBelgian Tradition, but Phil Markowski, which digs into the beer styles of
Belgium and Northern France.
I should say that my study of this topic has been fortified
by the discovery of Schlafly’s
Biere de Garde
offering, which I found at my local,
Bethesda Market. In addition to the excellent deli, they take
care to stock an extensive collection of beers.
They’ve contributed in no small part to my beer education – thanks Jay
and Sonoo!
Also contributing to my interest in the style is the
creative farmhouse approach that our neighbors at
Pen Druid Brewing are taking
with their beers. I’m overdue for a
visit (they
visited the hop yard last year, and I went to the
soft opening), but it’s clear from their social media posts that their exposure to
these beers, stemming from years of touring in Europe, led to some aspirations –
as Markowski says, “Brewers of this region consider themselves artists, first
and foremost, and the vast range of beers reflect this approach.”
The history of Northern France and Belgium is complex and especially
tragic due to its central location during the two World Wars. Someday I’d like to visit and absorb that
part of the story in person, but today my plan is to have a look specifically
at Northern France’s
Biere de Garde;
in a future post I’ll circle back for a quick study of the Belgian
Saison style.
Markowski sets up the discussion of biere de garde, to which he dedicates about 20 percent of the book,
with the following: “The French have a little-known tradition of beer
appreciation. While they don’t begin to
rival the Belgians in the sheer range of flavors and styles, they have a rich
beer culture, particularly in the regions of Nord, Pas-de-Calais, and Alsace.” He goes on to note that in 1905 a British
brewer found that there were 1,800 breweries in this region, typically
producing less than 3,000 barrels per year, but industrialization of the
industry there led to the kind of homogenization that we have experienced in
the United States during the 20th Century.
Right there on the label of the Schlafly version is their
tribute to the beers of this region. The
modern style is roughly defined by a deep copper color, balanced hop character,
and a higher alcohol content of between six and eight percent by volume. The term “de
garde” refers to provisioning beer for later consumption, which was done by
either increasing the hops or alcohol content – my sense of it is that the
Belgians went in the direction of more hops, while the French went in the
direction of more alcohol, but neither went so far as to compromise the
character of their local ingredients.
The book goes briefly into the farmhouse tradition in the
region. These beers were created for
sustenance, which is why they have such a robust malt bill; but they also were
likely produced with a lower alcohol by volume most of the time, since they
were meant to provide refreshment for all of the farm laborers. Stronger beers were brewed later in the
spring brewing season, with the intention of storing them for consumption
later.
Thinking about Pen Druid’s commitment to the style, obviously
based on their travels, I don’t recall much exposure to biere de garde during my own nearly five years in Europe. I was in Amsterdam a couple of times, but
these country ale styles weren’t prevalent there; also a few weeks at various
times in Paris – again, it’s not likely I experienced these beers and we were drinking
a lot of French red wine, anyway; and also a weekend in Brussels on the way
back from Moscow in the 1990’s. I
probably encountered these beers somewhere in the course of all of that, but
simply can’t remember, and thus, I can’t attribute liking them so well to
memories.
At this point in the development of Hawksbill Brewing, the
goal of research like this is to determine whether it’s feasible to have a go
at brewing these beers in Luray.
Markowski says they need four weeks of secondary fermentation and conditioning
at temperatures in the 32 – 35-degree range.
Committing one of our four fermenters to this process doesn’t seem
economically prudent at this point, but perhaps we can have a go at keg
conditioning a batch to see if our customers appreciate the beers.
As an alternative, there is the concept of a
biere de Noel (note the page is in French) which adds specialty
grains to the process. It’s fermented
more quickly, on a pace that is more typical of the beers we’ll have on
standard rotation. As a fall back, at
least we can do something like that seasonally with the style, as we build on
our experience and skills.
