Beer Spotlight!

Aecht Schlenkerla Eiche Oak Smoked Doppelbock

$5.99 for the 500ml bottle
Doppelbock-Style Lager Made with Oak Smoked Malts

Today, beers made with wood smoked malts are outliers — odd birds, who appear in your pub muttering (in odd accents) vague stories of trees and fire. However — as we hear tell — these strange ones used to be the norm.

The story goes that since the earliest days of brewing, the only way to dry your malt was over wood fires. Of course, the fire would impart smokey flavors to the beers — flavors that brewers would try to mitigate with varying levels of success. When the Industrial Revolution offered the ability to heat malt separate from smoke, it was a new age of brewing. Smokey the Beer faded into the past … unless you were in Bamberg, Germany.

In Bamberg, the bug was a feature. It was as if Bamburg brewers said, “The smoke gives the beer flavor. What’s the big deal? That’s what beer is.” Thus, Bamburg is the home (since 1767) of Brauerei Schlenkerla, now internationally known for its Rauchbier (“Smoked Beer”).

While beech is Schlenkerla’s usual wood of choice, they smoke the malts for this Doppelbock over oak. (“Aecht Schlenkerla Eiche” = “Original Oak Guy Who Wobbly Walks Like He’s Drunk.”) Thus the smokiness is strong but not as biting and bacony as their beechwood smoked Märzens, Urbocks, and Wheat Ales. So, though it takes center stage, the smoke doesn’t muscle its way to the front to demand attention. Dreamy and divine, this dark lager is like drinking a dry Doppelbock while sitting next to a roaring fireplace.

So, maybe the moral to this story is, if it’s smoke, don’t fix it.

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