Weissbier in America
alan mead
like beer except that wheat is substituted for one of the ingredients
(barley, I think). It was very smooth--my wife even liked it and
she doesn't like beer.
Do we brew such a thing here in the US? If so what is it called?
Thanks.
-alan mead : am...@s.psych.uiuc.edu
Joni J. Johnson
Yes there are weissbiers in America and they are USUALLY called wiessbier.
There is Schell Weiss for one (which I didn't like very well), but my
favorite was Anchor Wheat. The Anchor products are all good, and are mass-
marketed so you should have little trouble finding it.
Another beer your wife should try, if she doesn't like beers, is one of
the Lindemans' range, for example, Lindemans Kriek or Framboise. These are
Belgian fruit beers (lambics, but we won't go into that) and are good beers
for people who don't like beer and for people who like beers as different from
Old Milwaukee as possible.
Another note about weiss beers-I've always enjoyed mine with a twist of
lemon. Enjoy!
--
-------------------------------------------------------------
j...@ccadfa.cc.adfa.oz.au
"Don't mess with me-I'm a scientist!"
-I speak for no one but myself (except when I'm channeling).-
Catweazle
>like beer except that wheat is substituted for one of the ingredients
>(barley, I think). It was very smooth--my wife even liked it and
>she doesn't like beer.
>
>Do we brew such a thing here in the US? If so what is it called?
>
I suspect some of the smaller breweries like Anchor might make a weissbeer,
but almost any bar with any pretention of having german or austrian affiliations
should carry it. Watch out for people drinking from an oversize pilsner glass
(16oz/ .5 litre) with some lime in it.
I recall (but not clearly) drinking weissbeer in Lafayette Ind, Chicago,
St Louis and Peoria, some 10-12 years ago. I'd be surprised if there wasn't
somewhere around Champaign that you couldn't find it.
Dave Peak
"Every man should believe in something"
"I believe I'll have another drink !" - W.C. Fields
Catweazle
John DeCarlo
am >On a recent trip to Germany, we sampled "weissbier" which is made
am >like beer except that wheat is substituted for one of the
am >ingredients
am >(barley, I think). It was very smooth--my wife even liked it and
am >she doesn't like beer.
am >Do we brew such a thing here in the US? If so what is it
am >called?
I don't believe that weissbier is usually made with 100% wheat, but something
more like 60% wheat and 40% barley.
Most American products, as well as products imported to the U.S., have the
word "wheat" on them somewhere, to explain to us that these are wheat beers.
I make at least one wheat beer every year (just getting ready to bottle a
blueberry wheat beer). But I don't follow any style guides, so I just call it
wheat beer.
My wife, who doesn't like the smell or taste of beer, thinks wheat beer smells
just fine, more like wine.
* Origin: Cluster Point, McLean, VA (1:109/131.109)
Tim J. Ihde
>like beer except that wheat is substituted for one of the ingredients
>(barley, I think). It was very smooth--my wife even liked it and
>she doesn't like beer.
The one I remember having in Bavaria was pronounced "Weizen" or something
like that. It was quite strong but very mild tasting. While we were there
it was served as part of a traditional Bavarian breakfast, with a white
sausage. (We wanted to try having this combination for dinner once, because
we liked it so much -- our hosts were horrified that we would think of such
a thing.)
This beer came from the local brewery, and was delivered weekly by the
beer man (what a country!)
There is also a "Weiss" beer from the Berlin area, usually served with a
rasberry liquer, I believe. I've seen this type in the US fairly often,
but the Bavarian Weizen (sp?) is hard to find.
tim
--
Tim J Ihde
t...@nynexst.com | t...@bdsgate.uucp | t...@tomcat.bdsi.com
Rebecca M Hendrick
>On <Jun 18 18:10>, alan mead (am...@s.psych.uiuc.edu ) wrote:
>
>Do we brew such a thing here in the US? If so what is it
Here in Milwaukee, where most bars serve at least one German beer on tap,
we have a smallish wonderful brewery called Sprecher. They make a Weiss
beer, an Amber, an Ocktoberfest and a Dark Bavarian. Randy Sprecher
even made a deal with an owner of a local jazz bar to brew an exclusive
beer for his bar-- called Jazzbrau. I understand that Sprecher will
be available in the Chicago and Minneapolis areas soon. If you like
Weiss, wheat, Stouts and darker german beers, check out this stuff. Its
brewed according to the German purity laws and so must be refridgerated.
Also, I've always seen Weiss served here in a large pilsner glass. In
fact they almost "shoot" the beer into the glass by putting the bottle
directly into the glass upside down-- never poured slowly. As you can
imagine, this creates quite a head and one must be patient to allow
the head to subside before drinking. I always assumed this was to remove
bitter gasses from the beer.
Becca
Mike McNally
|> Also, I've always seen Weiss served here in a large pilsner glass.
Weissbier glasses are not large Pilsner glasses; they're weissbier glasses.
They *look* a little like Pilsners, but they are really pretty different;
they don't have a stem, for one thing. If you're served weissbier in a
Pilsner glass, smash it immediately and demand authenticity.
|> In
|> fact they almost "shoot" the beer into the glass by putting the bottle
|> directly into the glass upside down-- never poured slowly.
This would be a big mistake with a good German bottle-conditioned weizen.
You would fill the glass with foam before you got 1/3 into the bottle. Not
good. The technique used by skilled German beertenders is to pour the beer
slowly down the side of the moist glass (swirl water in it before pouring),
building the head gradually as the bottle nears emptiness.
|> I always assumed this was to remove bitter gasses from the beer.
No, it's probably to get a decent head from a second-rate weissbier.
--
* "In the Spirit as my automatics, * Mike McNally
* Lystra and Zelda were one third * Coolie
* as large as the infinite Cosmos." * DEC Western Software Lab
* --- D. S. Ashwander * mcn...@wsl.dec.com
Jon Binkley
>Rebecca M Hendrick writes:
>|> In
>|> fact they almost "shoot" the beer into the glass by putting the bottle
>|> directly into the glass upside down-- never poured slowly.
>This would be a big mistake with a good German bottle-conditioned weizen.
>You would fill the glass with foam before you got 1/3 into the bottle.
Wrong, hops breath!-)
The technique Rebecca mentions actually works well. The trick is to get
the mouth of the bottle beneath the surface of the beer immediately. There's
foam initially, but the rest of the beer comes out below the surface with
very little foam.
> Not
>good. The technique used by skilled German beertenders is to pour the beer
>slowly down the side of the moist glass (swirl water in it before pouring),
>building the head gradually as the bottle nears emptiness.
The above technique is used by equally skilled Bavarian bar maids.
>|> I always assumed this was to remove bitter gasses from the beer.
>No, it's probably to get a decent head from a second-rate weissbier.
You're both wrong. It's to get unwitting American tourists to try it
at home and make fools of themselves (as I've done on several occasions).
Seriously, the waitresses at the Spaten brauhaus preformed this trick-
hardly a second rate weizen.
Jon Binkley
Dan Hall
writes:
>In article <1991Jun18.1...@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> am...@s.psych.uiuc.edu (alan mead) writes:
>>On a recent trip to Germany, we sampled "weissbier" which is made
>>like beer except that wheat is substituted for one of the ingredients
>>(barley, I think). It was very smooth--my wife even liked it and
>>she doesn't like beer.
>>
>>Do we brew such a thing here in the US? If so what is it called?
>>
>>Thanks.
>>
>>-alan mead : am...@s.psych.uiuc.edu
>
>Yes there are weissbiers in America and they are USUALLY called wiessbier.
>There is Schell Weiss for one (which I didn't like very well), but my
>favorite was Anchor Wheat. The Anchor products are all good, and are mass-
>marketed so you should have little trouble finding it.
> Another beer your wife should try, if she doesn't like beers, is one of
>the Lindemans' range, for example, Lindemans Kriek or Framboise. These are
>Belgian fruit beers (lambics, but we won't go into that) and are good beers
>for people who don't like beer and for people who like beers as different from
>Old Milwaukee as possible.
> Another note about weiss beers-I've always enjoyed mine with a twist of
>lemon. Enjoy!
At the American Homebrewers Convention last week in Manchester, NH, some 15
or so New England brewers held an expo to provide samples of their products.
The Boston Beer Company (Samuel Adams) had a wheat beer that was the best
American wheat I've had yet, and the closest any American brewer has gotten
to the real thing. It had that wonderful clove flavor that seems to be
absent in all the other American wheats I've tried. Jim Koch gave samples
to homebrewers again at the brewery in Jamaica Plain, MA, this time straight
from the finishing tank.
It was being sold on tap at Doyle's Pub in JP, and I think by the bottle at
the Sunset Tap and Grill in Brighton. It isn't being mass marketed yet,
but look for it in the next month.
Regarding lambics: Koch mentioned that his cranberry lambic is no more.
He said that even the folks in Seattle found it 'too wierd'.
Too bad - I liked it.
--
=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=
Dan Hall | Digital Services / Network Connectivity
Digital Equipment Corporation | ARPAnet: ha...@buffa.enet.dec.com
Digital Drive | EASYnet: BUFFA::HALL
MS MKO1-2/H10, PO Box 9501 | Usenet : ....!decwrl!buffa.dec.com!hall
Merrimack, NH 03054-9501 | NET : (603) 884-5879
=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=_=