Two types of motivation

Week 4 of beer school came with a wake up call and some exciting news.

The weekend finished, Monday and Tuesday's classes moved along at the same pace as we had come accustomed to during the first three weeks at Siebel. We reviewed our previous week's test on Monday morning and moved quickly into lectures on beer quality control--topics such as filtration, spoilage, and microbiology.

Tim Foley, one of our instructors, continued that same trajectory Monday morning with a lecture on carbonation techniques. Despite my deep, deep interest in beer, 90 minutes straight of lecture on CO2 is hard to handle, but Tim caught everyone's attention as he wrapped up his talk. "Let's take 15 guys and then Michael Eder will be here to tell you your itinerary for the European Study Tour." For weeks, one of our favorite games during lunch breaks had been to guess where in Europe we might go during the two week trip. Past groups had traveled round Germany, made pilgrimages to Pilsen and Prague, and occasionally visited Belgium. Where would we go? People's conjectures were a mix of logic and wishful thinking--ranging from the obvious choices in Germany to the up-and-coming gastropubs and artisan breweries in Italy.

From our seats in the classroom, Michael's spreadsheet, in a font around 3.5 pt, with tour sites, locations, and dates was hard to read. But with some squinting and collaboration, we were able to piece it all together. Starting November 23, we'll visit 5 countries and over 20 breweries. From Munich, we'll head north to Bamberg, home of rauchbier, then on to Dusseldorf. We'll cross into the Netherlands for a night in Amsterdam and a visit to both La Trappe (the only Trappist brewery outside of Belgium) and the real Heineken brewery. Then, on to Belgium for a few days, with trips to Achouffe, Duvel, and Cantillon. We'll make a quick stop in Luxembourg before returning to southern Germany, the Black Forest, and Salzburg. Lest you think that the trip will be all fun and games, we will have our final written exam looming over our heads once we return to Munich, but I'm sure we'll have more than our fair share of fun and learning while traveling.

By the time Michael Eder got to the end of his explanation of the tour, people in the room were gasping. A weekend in Brussels; a few days in the Austrian Alps; a visit to the home of smoked beer--this was a dream itinerary for beer lovers of any ilk. And who ever goes to Luxembourg? But our excitement was quickly sobered as he dove full on into a lecture on the minutiae of colloidal stability in beer (oxygen, warm temperatures, increased filtration time, and a balance of polypeptides and polyphenols lead to irreversible beer haze). And, more shockingly, Michael started asking people in the class questions directly.

"Just know that the German instructors aren't going to accept vague answers," we were told earlier in the week, and the admonition had quickly become a reality. "I want you to think about the entire brewing process," Michael told us after many of us had failed to answer his questions correctly. "We are talking about haze, but that does not mean that you shouldn't remember how to read a malt analysis."

It took less than an hour for the entire dynamic of the class to change. A Reinheitsgebot for the classroom. Now, not only did many of us have the intrigue of a European brew study tour ahead, but we were also suddenly held accountable, expected to have detailed information at our fingertips at any moment. I believe both those things will make us all better brewers.