Saturday 7 October 2017

German Dunkles in 2014

Generous as ever, I thought I’d treat you to some modern Dunkles to accompany the 19th-century ones.

I did a fairly extensive sweep of German brewery websites a couple of years back, looking for ones that listed both the gravity and the ABV. Using those two number, it’s relatively simple to work out the FG and the degree of attenuation.

Though it should be borne in mind that this is slightly different from a chemical analysis. At small breweries, there probably isn’t 100% consistency in hitting those numbers. And large breweries might well be deliberately undershooting to reduce their tax bill.

Somewhat arbitrarily, I’ve divided the beers into Dunkles Lagerbier and Dunkles Export, using a gravity of 12.5º as the dividing line. The distinction between Lagerbier and Export has rather eroded in recent years, so don’t take these classifications too seriously.

Let’s start with Dunkles Export:

Dunkles Export in 2014
Brewer Town Beer OG Plato OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation
Paulaner Munich Münchner Dunkel 12.5 1050.3 1011.9 5.00 76.45%
Löwenbräu  Munich Dunkel 12.5 1050.3 1008.2 5.50 83.70%
Hacker-Pschorr Munich Münchner Dunkel 12.5 1050.3 1011.9 5.00 76.45%
Weihenstephan Freising Tradition 12.8 1051.6 1011.6 5.20 77.51%
Klosterbrauerei Andechs Andechs Export Dunkel 12.5 1050.3 1012.8 4.87 74.56%
Göller Zeil am Main Dunkel 12.5 1050.3 1010.4 5.20 79.43%
Kulmbacher Brauerei Kulmbach Tradition 12.8 1051.6 1011.6 5.20 77.51%
Privatbrauerei Gessner Sonneberg Alt-Sumbarcher Dunkel 12.5 1050.3 1010.4 5.20 79.33%
Brauerei Weller  Erlangen Jean-Paul-Bier 12.5 1050.3 1008.9 5.40 82.31%
Zum Löwenbräu Flair Hotel Adelsdorf Hausbräu Hefetrüb 12.7 1051.2 1012.7 5.00 75.18%
Brauerei Hofmann Pahres Dunkel 12.5 1050.3 1011.9 5.00 76.35%
Gasthof Gundel Kammerstein Dunkles Gold 12.6 1050.7 1010.8 5.20 78.72%
Brauereigasthof Winkler Berching  Berchinger Dunkel 12.6 1050.7 1012.3 5.00 75.76%
Bürgerbräu Hersbruck Hersbruck Dampfsud 12.5 1050.3 1013.4 4.80 73.47%
Average 12.6 1050.6 1011.3 5.11 77.62%
Sources:
The relevant brewery websites

The gravities of these beers are pretty modest, and considerably lower than in 19th-century versions. As you can see from this table of the average of 39 samples from the late 19th century:

German Export Dunkles 1878 - 1900 averages
OG Plato OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation
14.35 1058.2 1019.1 5.06 67.16%

There’s almost a 2º Plato difference between the average gravities. But the ABV of the modern examples is slightly higher because of the higher degree of attenuation. That’s almost always the case when you compare modern Lagers to ones from more than 100 years ago. Though 77% isn’t exceptional by modern standards.

Here are the Lagerbiers:

Dunkles Lagerbier in 2014
Brewer Town Beer OG Plato OG FG ABV App. Atten-uation
Wolf Zeil am Main Urbräu  11.5 1046.1 1008.5 4.90 81.57%
Einbecker Brauhaus Einbeck Dunkel 11.50 1046.1 1008.5 4.90 81.57%
Walhaus-Bräu Erfurt Stock-Dunkel  12.2 1049.1 1009.9 5.10 79.82%
Schübel Bräu Stadtsteinach Dunkel 11.7 1047.0 1009.3 4.90 80.19%
Brauerei Kanone Löhr Schnaittach Dunkel 12.4 1049.9 1010 5.20 79.96%
Brauerei Windsheimer Gutenstetten Dunkel 12.4 1049.9 1010 5.20 79.96%
Average 12.0 1048.0 1009.4 5.0 80.51%
Sources:
The relevant brewery websites

The rate of attenuation in these lower gravity versions is even higher, so much so that the average ABV almost matches that of the 19th-century beers.

No comments: