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Brewing beer is a great job, believe me. I enjoy attending beer festivals, and organizing beer degustation, food and beer tasting.
Thirsty people always approach me in a good mood asking for a great beer. Some of them, who have probably already started their beer degustation session, turn to me with memorable funny phrases. One guy once proudly stated: ‘I stopped drinking beer yesterday, but tonight I am celebrating my return” and another in a more serious tone: ‘If I saved all the money I spent on beer… I would spend it on beer’. These words of honest truth and humor touch my beer-sensitive heart and I am overjoyed to offer that special artisanal beer.
The first point is to choose desired artisanal beer style.. Then follows the question: bottle or glass? I usually respect every choice of my new friend. However, I always want everyone to have the best possible experience when it comes to beer tasting. For this reason, I am always ready to share some suggestions on how to best appreciate an artisanal beer. Even a few small tips can make a big difference and improve the beer tasting experience, without holding a beer sommelier diploma or sophisticated barware.
What is best: bottle, can or glass? The answer is simple: it depends.
If you happen to have a beer, usually from big brands, that tastes neutral, believe me: drink it cold, direct from the fridge, from its container, bottle or can. These beers are brewed as pure refreshment and lose all their refreshing properties as soon as they become a little warmer than the temperature of the fridge. Beer tasting will not improve with warming, whatever glass is used. Therefore, my advice is not even to pour it into a glass.
If you happen to have a tasty, good artisanal beer, then things start to get more interesting, and some attention can make your beer degustation experience amazing. The small effort of serving your beer in a glass, will always elevate the experience because it frees the flavors from the beer’s surface.
But which glass to choose from? Many beer styles have their preferred type of glass. In Belgium for example, several breweries even provide their own glass to maximize the beer tasting experience.
A unique “beer degustation“ glass has been designed for beer sommeliers to conduct professional tastings. It is called “Teku“ , named after its two inventors, Teo Musso and Lorenzo ‘Kuaska’ Dabove, two beer experts who were inspired by wine tasting and designed a glass that can offer a beer tasting experience similar to that of wine, where the aromas of the beer remain in the glass.
Alternatively to the Teku, a wine glass can also be very useful in facilitating the beer degustation and allowing you to fully appreciate it. The stem of the glass will also allow you to hold it without warming the beer too much. I usually use a white wine glass für leichtere Biere (z.B.: Weizen, Pilsner, malziges Amber Ale) and a red wine glass with a wider opening for stronger beers (e.g., Stout, Honey beers, etc.).
To maintain a good beer foam, the glass must be cleaned after each drinking session with warm water only. Detergent can damage the foam formation, even if the glass is well rinsed after washing. Do not freeze the glass because ice crystals forming on the glass walls damage the beer foam formation. Before pouring your artisanal beer, it is a good idea to rinse the glass with water.
5 - 8 C
7 - 13 C
10 - 15 C
I love British beers and I have an English friend who kindly offers me traditional amber ales every time I visit him at home. He takes a bottle of artisanal beer straight from the living room shelves, opens it, and serves it in a pint glass. Strange as it may sound, I find that the beer tasting experience improves this way, especially for those English beers that are very floral and need to be consumed “warm”.
It is essential to have some knowledge in the area of beer temperature. The optimal temperature for a great artisanal beer degustation ranges from fridge temperature for neutral blond beers to around 12-16°C for dark and strong beers.
The principle is that extremely low temperatures mask the flavour of the beer, the excellent taste but also the imperfections that the beer may have. In contrast, higher temperatures allow the artisanal beer’s flavours to emerge.
For example, for a better beer tasting experience, we recommend serving our Fermento Amber Ale at 10-12ï‚°C. I suggest taking it out of the fridge 15-20 minutes before consumption. When I forget to do this or feel like a beer soon, I use the trick of rinsing the beer glass with hot water. This way the temperature of the beer quickly rises to 10ï‚°C when I pour it into the preheated glass.
Glass type for beer degustation
Teku glass for all beers
White wine glass for Pilsner, Weizen, IPA, malzige Amber Ales
Red wein glass for Stout, Honey beers
The first objective will be to pour the artisanal beer into the glass to obtain a consistent and long-lasting foam. At the same time, we want to avoid excessive foaming or, even worse, clumsily plunging our lips into the glass to sip the beer spilling out of the container.
Hold the beer glass by the stem (if using a wine glass) or the bottom of a beer glass. The artisanal beer should be poured into the glass at a 45 Grad angle, pouring slowly over the side wall of the glass and avoiding foaming up to ca. three quarters of the way up the glass. Next, turn the glass completely upright and pour more quickly into the middle of the glass to allow air to mix with the liquid, producing ideal conditions for foam formation and stabilisation. For a better beer degustation, the foam should be between 2 and 4 cm. (1″).
Over time, pouring an artisanal beer in the glass will become more and more familiar to you. The more you practice, the better foam of your beer will appear in the glass and the better your beer tasting experience will be. Keep pouring!
All is ready to be enjoyed. Appreciate now the color of your artisanal beer by holding the glass up toward a light source or simply against a white surface. Next, appreciate the flavors, by deeply breathing in the aroma from the beer surface. Unlike wine, there is no need to swirl. The glass is practically full of beer and you have to think about maintaining the foam and bubbles rather than destroying them. Finally, take a first deep sip nehmen and enjoy!
If you stopped drinking beer yesterday because you had enough of those neutral-tasting beers, today you can celebrate your return: you have everything you need to know to prepare your glass for the best artisanal beer tasting .
Let us know in the comments below how your beer tasting experience goes after following our tips.
