Beer and Brewer Magazine

Brad Rogers takes a look at the hop-driven pale ale and how we're making it our own...

I know in the past few issues we've spoken about strange brews that are right out there. I thought this edition I would bring it back a little - right back to the basics of our raw materials, and specifically the HOPS!

There's no better beer style in the world to showcase the complexities of hops than the pale ale - be it the American version like our Alpha Pale Ale or Little Creatures' version - or the classic English pale ale or India pale ale, and we've all tasted a heap of those.

Pale Ale Background

Pale ales have had a long and illustrious history, starting their lives many hundreds of years ago in the UK. More recently American pale ales have taken the world by storm. You would have to travel a long way in the US to find a brewery that isn't brewing one, that hasn't brewed one, or isn't about to start brewing one. Everyone knows the style, full of hop aromatics, hop flavour and hop bitterness - with a few more hops added in or good measure.

What are pale ales? For me, they are defined by hop character, whether it's an English India pale ale, an American imperial IPA or an Australian pale ale. That's not to say they are one dimensional, rather their reason for being is about the hop and how it is used.

It is the relationship of these hops with the malt characters, alcohol content and the residual or un-fermentable malt sugars. In a word it's about ‘balance', it's about drinkability and it's about "do I want to buy another one?"

The Brewers Association technical style description in the World Beer Cup style guidelines suggests that the American-style pale ale should be "characterized by fruity, floral and citrus-like American variety hop characters, producing high hop bitterness, flavour and aroma" and goes further to clarify the hop usage by noting, "the floral and citrus-like American-variety hop character is the perceived end, but may be a result of the skilful use of hops of other national origins."

The hop characters mentioned above can be sourced from a selection of Pacific Northwest American hop varieties, the champion of them all has been the Cascade hop. He does have some brothers and sisters, such as Amarillo, Centennial and even hops like Mt Hood play a role in giving these beers their floral, citrus-like aromas and flavours. Hop growers, especially in the Pacific Northwest, have tried over the years to clone and cultivate a large number of hops in order to give similar characters to the honoured Cascade hop with varying success. The great thing for brewers around the world is that other hop growing nations have also been trialling the growth of their own ‘versions' of this great hop.

Terroir

These traditional growing regions have their specific environments including micro-climates and soils. The French use the term terroir to describe these specific conditions. The term is not well understood, however my take on it is that it is simply about a sense of place, where the local environment produces certain attributes including aromas and flavours in the grapes. It's the sum of the soil, the climate, the geography, the air - everything associated to the growing area or even down to the individual vineyard. With hops different conditions do translate to different flavours.

The Cascade hops grown in the Pacific Northwest and the Cascade hops grown in Tasmania's Bushy Park may be the same variety, however they will display different attributes because they are growing under very different conditions.

The "new" New World

Traditional hop varieties and their perfectly brewed beers will always be respected but, as times change, the new world brewers need to ensure we all keep up. Changes are already being noted in the beer industry with the 2008 WBC guidelines including an International pale ale class for the first time to accommodate beers from countries including Australia and New Zealand.

Australian craft and specialty beer drinkers have certainly come a long way over the last 10 years. They have been taken on a journey they probably did not know they were on. They have more choice these days from just over 100 breweries producing some amazing beers; some with true dedication to the style, others with their own flare and personality of style. Australian craft consumers have an increased knowledge about their beers and with that knowledge comes a thirst for even more information about the beers they want to drink and enjoy. For the Australian brewers that thirst for information is also at an all time high. You just have to look at the ever increasing number of brewers travelling the world to explore and gain insights to bring home as offerings to their own beer drinkers.