Three beers in conversation: The industry continues to lie to itself

You come from near Aachen, but have lived in Cologne for a while and also brewed beer here.

What do you have to know about the Kölsch beer style?

Uwe Ebbinghaus

Editor in the features section.

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Sebastian Sauer:

"Kölsch" is a geographically protected indication. Kölsch may only be called what corresponds to the Kölsch Convention from the eighties. Outside the urban area, for example, it may only be produced by breweries that had already brewed Kölsch before the Convention. There is also a precisely defined manufacturing specification. Kölsch has to be a light, top-fermented and hoppy beer - although this last term is very broad from today's perspective. Some Kölsch nowadays only have 18 bitter units, but that would hardly be called “hoppy” anymore. In addition, Kölsch must have been filtered - in Cologne. The Mühlen-Kölsch, for example, that we have in front of us right now

, it is filtered in Cologne.

But in Krefeld it is pulled on the bottle, which is allowed.

There are hardly any Kölsch breweries in the surrounding area, only two: the Erzquell brewery in Bielstein with the Zunft-Kölsch and the private Bischoff brewery in Brühl with the Bischoff Kölsch.

Why does Kölsch really have to be filtered?

Where did this fixation on clarity come from, since beers were originally cloudy?

Kölsch has only been filtered since 1918.

Before that, there was Wiess in Cologne, an unfiltered Kölsch.

The Sünner brewery was the first to use the term "Kölsch".

It has to be said that only a third of the beer market in Cologne was dominated by Kölsch in the 1950s and 1960s.

Pils, Bockbier and even Altbier were still strong.

Kölsch is of course strongly connected with the entire pub culture, including Köbes, Kranz and the right bar.

Do you think clear beer is nice?

Isn't a certain cloudiness now increasingly accepted for aroma reasons?

Brewers always prefer to drink unfiltered beer, the filter system is actually the least important device in breweries.

However, customers rate the clarity positively, perhaps because it seems as if nothing can be concealed here.

The key brewery in Düsseldorf may have the appropriate saying: "Eat what is done, drink what is clear, say what is true."

When do you like to drink a Kölsch?

For me, Kölsch is a drinkable, simple, uncomplicated beer.

You don't have to analyze anything here or unthread the flavors.

How do the individual Kölsch varieties actually differ?

The differences are minimal.

When it comes to malt, there are slight variations in the composition of Pilsner, wheat and light Cara malt.

Sometimes there is also a bit of sour malt.

The hops are very mild and classic: Hallertauer Mittelfrüh, Perle, Tettnanger.

With Kölsch it is not designed for the aroma, but for the bitterness.

Would there be something against using more aroma hops in Kölsch?

No not at all.

Have you tried this before?

We ourselves produce white wine that, geographically speaking, can be brewed anywhere.

We keep the original cloudiness and therefore have more character through more spiciness and a little more bitterness.

It is then no longer as lean as the Kölsch, but much more aromatic.

An aromatic hop goes very well with this.

Outside the city limits, in Frechen and Brühl, the unfiltered version of Kölsch is more popular than the filtered one.

The preferences change completely over a distance of a few kilometers.