Though Jørn Utzon isn’t exactly a household name outside of Denmark, you are almost certainly familiar with his work. He is the architect behind one of the twentieth century’s most iconic buildings, the Sydney Opera House.
The late Utzon was born in Copenhagen, but he spent most of his childhood in Ålborg, which is now home to the Utzon Center, a museum of modern architecture and art designed by the man himself, in cooperation with Finnish architect Alvar Aalto. Ålborg is also home to the ambitious Søgaards Brewery, whose range encompasses a variety of international styles and includes some unusual experiments. The Søgaards brewmasters have taken inspiration from the places that inspired Utzon’s architecture to brew two beers for the Utzon Center: Blond and Dark. The label on Utzon Blond explains:
This beer follows Utzon’s footsteps from Australia, where we have gathered the herb lemon myrtle; across Asia for the refreshing character of kaffir lime leaves and ginger; to Spain, where we have selected an orange flower honey to round off the beer and add a light floral flavor. The noble conclusion comes from the Middle East’s delicate and luxurious spice saffron.
Pretty neat. These ingredients may sound weird, but remember that before hops came into favor around the turn of the fifteenth century, bouquets of herbs and flowers called gruits were used to add flavor and bitterness to beer. Dandelion, heather, ginger, burdock, nutmeg, juniper and spruce were common. So while this beer is cosmopolitan and contemporary in its selection of international ingredients, this method of flavoring also recalls ancient brewing traditions. Especially interesting is the inclusion of honey, since the vikings were fond of a sort of mead-beer hybrid that was also flavored with odd spices and herbs.
Utzon Blond is an amber-gold ale with a pillowy white head, and it actually does hit all the notes described on the label: Australian lemon myrtle and kaffir lime leaf provide a pleasantly soapy, citric top note, while the honey gives the beer a sweet foundation. Floral, savory saffron floats by in the background. All around it is very fruity, slightly tangy and rather robust – probably not as arresting as Utzon’s designs, but just as intriguing and unique!
Most Danish craft beers, just like most craft beers from any country, are ales. So it is very vexing to me when I hear somebody say, “I don’t like ales.”
Unfortunately, the actual definitions of “ale” and “lager” are not widely understood in the UK outside of beer geek circles. Come to think of it, they are probably not widely understood in any country, but the problem in the UK is that people think they know what they mean because of a functional familiarity with certain kinds of ales and lagers that have come to dominate pubs and bars throughout the country.
Ale and lager are simply the two main categories of beer based the two main types of yeast used in brewing. (Wild yeasts, like those used to ferment sourdough bread, are also used to brew obscure styles in Belgium and America, but nevermind those for the moment.) To put it simply, ale yeasts are top-fermenting, which means that the yeast rises to the top during fermentation, whereas lager yeasts are bottom-fermenting. Ale yeasts also ferment more quickly and at a warmer temperature than lager yeast; typically ale takes three to four weeks to brew to completion, while lagers can take two months or more.
Broadly speaking, these two types of yeast produce different characteristics in finished beer. Because it ferments longer and more slowly, lager yeast tends to produce drier and lighter-bodied beer because it has time to eat up more sugar. It also leaves a lighter yeast footprint in the beer, allowing malt and hop flavors to stand out. Ale yeast tends to leave beer somewhat sweeter and fuller-bodied, plus it leaves more of its own character behind in the form of esters. Esters are organic compounds that create fruity, spicy, or earthy aromas, including the classic banana-and-clove notes of Bavarian wheat beers.
But beyond these very general characteristics, there is no real way to differentiate between ales and lagers based on flavor alone. This is because brewers can use any ingredients they want in their beer, regardless of what kind of yeast they’re using. Consider the Schwarzbier. Schwarzbiers are a variety of black lager from Germany that use dark-roasted malts to produce flavors of toast, coffee, chocolate, and sometimes smoke. However, if one were to start off making a Schwarzbier, but then pitched in ale yeast instead of lager yeast, what you’d get is something like a porter or stout. And in practice, stouts and Schwarzbiers are actually quite similar – the main difference is that Schwarzbiers tend to be somewhat lighter-bodied.
My point is that both ales and lagers encompass an incredibly broad range of styles and flavors, and ales and lagers really have a lot in common. But in the UK, “ale” has come to denote what is actually “real” ale, or cask-conditioned ale, which is served only slightly chilled and has natural, soft carbonation produced by living yeast in the cask – causing many drinkers to complain that British beer is “warm and flat.” On top of this, the vast majority of cask-conditioned ales found at British pubs are bitters or pale ales; both are fairly hop-forward styles and tend to be unpopular among drinkers unaccustomed to noticeable bitterness in beer. Of course, ales can be quite mild in bitterness, and they can also be cold, sparkly and refreshing – it just depends on the ale in question, and how it is stored and served.
Similarly, ale aficionados tend to turn up their noses at “lagers,” meaning the international but virtually interchangeable array of Pilsner-derived fizzy yellow beers that have depressingly come to dominate the beer market. There is such a dearth of variety among lagers that people have come to associate the term with that one, overwhelmingly prevalent lager style. And this is why people generally tend to place themselves in one category of beer drinker or the other – because they just haven’t been exposed to the whole range of ales and lagers. When people say “I don’t like ales” or “I don’t like lagers,” what they ought to be saying is “I don’t like cask-conditioned English bitters” or “I don’t like mass-produced imported Pilsners” – because in general, that’s what they mean. It would be very unusual to find a bona fide beer geek who claims to dislike either ales or lagers – and I wouldn’t take that beer geek’s advice anyway.
Last night my company hosted a Danish beer tasting event at Skandium, a Scandinavian design store in Knightsbridge. The event was a success – eyebrows were raised, beer was enjoyed, people were made slightly tipsy. I tended bar along with two waitresses, who sampled the beer so they could talk about it with the crowd. One of them, who confidently told me she didn’t like ales, was amazed to discover that her favorite beer of the evening, Hvid from Indslev, was an ale and not a lager. Hvid is a Belgian-style wheat beer, unfiltered and cloudy, soft on the palate and very refreshing with restrained hops and a light spicy-citric edge from the addition of lemon zest and coriander. It is crisp and effervescent, low in bitterness but still quite dry – it fits the accepted definition of “lager.”
Both waitresses also thoroughly enjoyed one of the stars of our lineup, Ærø No. 5 from Rise. No. 5 is a brown ale brewed with walnuts, and it has a mellow, maple syrup and raisin flavor. There is no question it is delicious – and the self-professed ale-haters were perhaps more impressed with it than anyone, surprised at how sweet and drinkable ale can be.
Hold your judgement. If you are told ‘they are all this’ or ‘they do this’ or ‘their opinions are these’, withhold your judgement until all the facts are upon you. Because that land they call ‘India’ goes by a thousand names and is populated by millions, and if you think you have found two men the same amongst that multitude, then you are mistaken. It is merely a trick of the moonlight.
Zadie Smith, White Teeth
Independence Day has always been my favorite holiday. Here’s why:
Sunshine.
Pork.
Beer.
Fireworks.
Of course, just about any Japanese summer festival also features this same happy quartet. And Japanese festivals are fun, too, but they just aren’t the same. I like Independence Day partly out of nostalgia, but I also like it because it’s uniquely American. It’s a holiday I can call my own.
We Americans don’t have a lot we can call our own. Apple pie? Dutch. Hot dogs? Austrian. Mexican food? Mexican. Sure, we have jazz, Pixar, and Mr. T, and as for holidays, we have Labor Day, Memorial Day, Martin Luther King Day, and a smattering of other minor holidays. But all of them are pretty lame. When was the last time you threw a party and lit sparklers for Washington’s Birthday?
So it’s nice have an American holiday that’s actually fun. Thanksgiving is fun, too, but it’s in November, a month that burdens the human soul with an inescapable air of doom and melancholy. Thanksgiving food is arguably better (and perhaps less ordinary), but Independence Day is no slouch when it comes to cookery: ribs, burgers, bratwurst, and potato salad are pretty stiff competition for turkey and stuffing.
When I lived in America, it was the specific customs of Independence Day that I enjoyed (like the food and the fireworks – the parade, never really excited me). Its Americanness was immaterial, extraneous, unnecessary – I just liked hanging out with my friends and family, stuffing myself and watching things explode in the sky. But now that I’m a minority in a strange, inscrutable island nation, the fact that the Fourth of July is a distinctly American celebration is suddenly crucial. I feel as though I must assert my culture against the indifferent shrugs of British hegemony!
It’s not like I’m some kind of patriot. Alright, maybe I am some kind of patriot, but I’m not the gun-totin’, Limbaugh-lovin’, “Never Forget” kind of patriot. This bit of Fry and Laurie pretty much sums up how I feel about that sort of thing:
I can’t even really say I’m proud of America, or proud to be American. I can’t take credit for the achievements of other Americans, and my nationality is mostly a geographical accident. I am also not proud of America in any political sense, although the Constitution is pretty brilliant, and this Obama character seems fairly capable. But if I’ve developed a certain affection for America, I think it is a direct consequence of my expatriation. For one thing, I’m just nostalgic for America – I miss it. I miss my friends and family, but I also miss very particular American things, like In-N-Out burgers, enormously wide roads, the LA skyline, honeycrisp apples, and cheap ska shows. So there’s that sort of homesick aspect to my patriotism, but then there’s also a defensive quality to it. America gets picked on a lot – rightly so, in most cases. But sometimes criticisms of American culture are provincially ignorant; I am reminded of those French girls I met who dismissed all American cheese as abhorrent yellow trash. (Then again, I suppose the fact that processed cheese is usually labeled “American cheese” doesn’t help our reputation.) When confronted with attitudes like that, my reaction is “Hey, wait a minute! America isn’t all bad!” But of course, what I’m really saying is “Hey, wait a minute! I like America!” or even “Don’t tread on me!”
So as I trawled the world wide web for Fourth of July celebrations in London, I was thrilled to discover an event that will let me celebrate American cultural autonomy, indulge in one of my favorite American specialties, and subvert certain misconceptions about said specialty all at the same time! I’m talking about beer, people. American beer. The White Horse, an airy, elegant, ale-centric pub in Parsons Green, is having an American beer festival this weekend, coinciding with Independence Day. They boast the largest selection of American draft beer ever seen in the UK – and while some pubs would be satisfied to fill their lineup with any number of InBev-distributed, mass-produced lagers, the White Horse has corralled an impressive lot of craft beers from across the USA. Some of the featured breweries are Stone, Flying Dog, Victory, Sierra Nevada, Goose Island, and Dogfish Head.
These are some of America’s finest breweries, and it’s exciting to have them represented in England not only because their beer is delicious, but because it provides an opportunity for Londoners to glimpse the innovation and diversity that have become hallmarks of American craft brewing. Like American cheese and American politics, American beer is misunderestimated abroad – few people are aware that the United States produces anything but Bud, Miller, and Coors. I see this festival as an exposition of beer that has the potential to change perceptions about American gastronomy, at least in some small way. I also see it as a chance to drink dangerous amounts of Stone Smoked Porter with Vanilla Beans… mmm.
American Beer Festival at The White Horse
3 July – 5 July 2009
Or, how I learned to stop worrying and completely lose respect for proponents of Intelligent Design theory.
I found this disgusting little monster stuffed and safely caged behind class at the charmingly out-of-date Horniman Museum the other day. I tried my best to draw it accurately because I thought it was so weird. It is called a tenrec, and it is an ACTUAL ANIMAL that EXISTS on PLANET EARTH! Ugh!
In the Wikipedia entry, the tenrec isn’t so bad looking. It’s actually kind of cute, in a pitifully ugly kind of way. But the real thing that I beheld at the Horniman (which actually may have been a different species) was utterly demonic. Why oh why would God – whoop, I mean why would an intelligent designer ever think to make something so hideous?! There are two explanations:
The creator of all life on earth is cruel, disturbed, and/or artistically impaired.
This site began as an exploration of Japanese food culture inspired by the Japanese word vaikingu, meaning "all-you-can-eat." It continues in its present form as a London-based resource for Danish beer, food, and culture.
