The great thing about beer tasting, as opposed to wine tasting, is that you have to actually drink the beer not spit it out! Apparently this is because the tastebuds for bitterness (a key component of any beer) are located at the very back of the tongue. However, I heard Stephen Fry say on QI recently that is was just a myth…. and you’ve got to believe the Fry haven’t you?

Anyway, wherever the tastebuds are, they are useful after too many pints so, it’s always a good idea to limit your tasting session to 10 to 20 beers, so your judgement doesn’t get too impaired.

There are the major things to look out for when assessing a beer’s taste: flavour, mouthfeel and finish. As your first two sips of any beer are the most sensitive, use the first to assess the beer’s flavour, and the second to rate its mouthfeel (the feel and texture of the liquid within your mouth and throat).

Flavour

On your first sip, don’t swallow straight away. Let the beer linger in your mouth for a couple of seconds so that it comes into contact with all of your tastebuds, and breathe through your nose while you’re doing this. This process is known as “retro-olfaction”, and it allows the beer’s scent to reach your olfactory nerves, which, due to the connection between the senses of taste and smell, intensifies the beer’s flavour.

Mouthfeel

On your second sip, concentrate on the beer’s mouthfeel. You may detect a metallic or astringent quality, or perhaps a powdery feel. Note also whether the beer is lightly or heavily carbonated, and whether it warms your mouth and throat as you swallow it. Other points to consider are the beer’s density, and whether it has an oily or sticky quality to it.

Finish

Another important aspect to consider when tasting beer is the aftertaste. The aftertaste is critical to the overall impression of the beer and should confirm taste and appeal. The flavour and length of the aftertaste will differ significantly depending on the style of beer being tasted: American lagers, for example, often have virtually no aftertaste, whereas a stout will likely have a heavy and somewhat bitter aftertaste. Take note of the aftertaste’s character (sweet, bitter, malty) as well as its length.

Smell is critical to tasting anything. Since the senses of taste and olfaction are linked, smelling the beer gives the palate a sense of what to expect. If you don’t believe it, try holding you nose as you eat something, and you will find your appreciation of the taste is significantly diminished. In fact our sense of smell is 10,000 times more sensitive than out tastebuds. Therefore, smelling the beer is arguably the most important step in a beer tasting.

Agitating helps to release the odours so the best way to sniff your beer is with a glass that is half empty. This allows you to give if a swirl with your hand over the top of the glass to keep in all the lovely aromas fighting to escape. Then stick your nose in and take a deep breath. The sense of smell is quickly saturated so make sure you concentrate and take particular note of the aromas you detect upon the first sniff.

The “dominant scent” is the initial aroma released during the pour, and (depending on the beer style) it can be a mixture of: malt, butterscotch, roasted barley, hops or other strong scents. You should also look out for any “off” odours such as the skunky odour of a light-struck beer, or the boiled caggabe smell of a beer suffering from a bacterial infection.

The more mellow “secondary scent” will come through as the beer settles in the glass. As you practice, you will learn to recognise and look out for floral, fruity and spicy scents. The final aromas that come through once the secondary scent fades, is the “residual scent”, sometimes referred to as the beer’s “signature smell”. This is whene the more unusual aromas, such as earthiness or nuttiness, are released which give a beer its unique character.

Happy sniffing.

The first consideration when evaluatign a beer is the appearance. Three things are usually taken into consideration:

• head retention
• colour
• clarity

The correctly poured beer should start off with a 2-4cm head. This should not dissipate too quickly, and should leave a coating of “Belgian lace” on the glass as the beer is drunk. Sometimes an impressive looking head can turn out to be pretty short lived. I remember my first batch of Otter’s Pocket Stout – the head was so think and creamy it made me want to stick a flake in it. But by time I got back from the kitchen it was all but gone.

The colour and clarity of a beer are best judged by holding the glass up to a white background in a well-lit place. Assess the clarity by looking through the liquid, and the colour by looking at the top and sides of the glass. You must bear in mind the variety of beer when assessing its colour and clarity. For example, you would expect a lager to be clear and bright, whereas a wheat beer may have a more cloudy appearance.

Unusual appearance should also be noted. Are there notably large bubbles? Is there sediment present, and if so, how fast does it settle? etc…

On the subject of dodgy looking pints… Lunchtime cheekies at the Retreat have been a regular occurance lately. Especially with the Ashes on. Get there for 12 and see the last hour of play before lunch. Nice. But I have learned not to go for a pint of London Pride! :-S  At lunchtime, its always the first out of the barrel and is a cloudy soup of dubious solids which settle into a inch of brown muck at the bottom. Not pleasant.

When tasting beer, its imporant you serve it correctly to all the proper appreciation of the look, smell and taste of the beer. The first rule is simple : NEVER taste beer directly from the bottle or can it came in.

Whilst this will seem ridiculously obvious to any true beer fan or experienced homebrewer, it is a schoolboy that is far to often made. Apart from the obvious problems with sediment in a bottle-conditioned beer, it needs to be in a glass for you to fully appreciate the finer points of the beer’s appearance, aroma and taste.

The type of glass is not too umportant, as long as its clear, clean and free from detergent residue (this is important as it inhibits head formation and retention).

Head retention is one aspect to be considered when judging a beer, therefore the best way to pour your beer is tilting the glass and moving it progressiviely away from the bottle whilst pouring. This will ensure a decent head of foam which allows the beer’s aroma and other perfumes to escape, and protects the beer from possible oxidation which can deteriorate the taste. Although head size will depend on the type of beer, you should aim for somehere between 2 and 4 cm of foam.

You should also serve your beer at the correct temperature to bring out the best flavours. It is a common mistake to drink beer too cold. Indeed a common trend is towards “extra cold” versions of draught beers being available in pubs. I have known Aussies who, when in this country in winter, choose to leave beers out in the snow so they can “enjoy” them ice cold. Though possibly refreshing, this will ensure you taste nothing. But then, he was drinking Castlemaine XXXX, so perhaps this was the idea.

Michael Jackson (no, the other one) proposes a five-level scale for optimal serving temperatures:

Today, I am going to start a new series of posts on how to taste beer. Hopefullly, this will build into a step-by-step guide on the art of beer tasting which will be useful to both the casual drinker and the expert brewer. The aim is to give you the tools asses the quality of your beer whether commercially produced or homebrewed, to better appreciate the unique qualities of a good pint, or even organise your own beer tasting evening.

I future posts I will provide a step-by-step tutorial, with various digressions to discuss more detailed issues. But here, I give a very brief introduction.

It seems to me that most people don’t choose their beer based on taste. This sounds ridiculous, but I think its true. People choose on the basis of price, name or image more than taste. With the rise of binge drinking, beer has become pretty much a functional item – its purpose is to get you drunk, rather than something to be enjoyed in the drinking. And yet, at the same time craft brewing is becoming ever more popular and appreciation of the complex taste profiles of beers has meant that good beer is being tasted and talked about in the way once reserved only for wine.

In fact, the art of beer tasting is based on many of the same priciples, though the things you are looking for are rather different.When tasting beer, there are three major areas to be assessed:

• appearance
• aroma (nose)
• taste (palate)

I will look at each of these ares in future posts, explaining what you should look for in each area and how to evaluate the quality of a beer.

But the first step is ensuring that you serve your beer in the correct manner. If you don’t serve your beer properly you wont be able to fully appreciate the above qualities. So that will be the topic of my next post in this guide.