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| Real Beer Man: German-style craft beer now on tap at Old Bavarian |
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The story of Old Bavarian beer will warm the heart of any homebrewer who has ever dared to dream about one day brewing beer on a larger scale for the public. Steve Olson of Menasha, an award-winning home brewer and founding member of the Appleton Libation Enthusiasts brew club, has been wowing judges and beer lovers for years with his British and Belgian beers. His desire to go commercial with his beer making is well known.  He finally got his chance with a phone call from Frank Schadt, a 27-year-old German culinary school graduate who moved to Appleton in 2002 to help his parents, Ed and Christine Schadt, run the Old Bavarian restaurant and bar in downtown Appleton. Olson created the recipes for the four German beers that went online at the two Old Bavarian locations last month on Fat Tuesday – hefe weizen, Munich helles lager, Oktoberfest and a dopplebock called Tanjanator, in honor of Schadt’s wife. Olson also oversees the brewing with contract brewer Milwaukee Brewing Co. “I did a lot of research,” Olson said about his beer recipes. “Although I brew pretty much all different styles, I tend to specialize in British and Belgian ales. The dopplebock I had been doing for quite a long time because it’s one of my favorites. In terms of the Munich lager and Oktoberfest, I put a lot of research into them. I wanted to make sure they were authentic.” Schadt agrees. “The beer’s not cheap,” he said. “We buy the finest authentic ingredients and they cost money. We could cut the costs in half using cheaper ingredients, but it cuts the quality too. We’re going for beer lovers. If we put that Old Bavarian name out there, it has to be top of the line.” Besides the four Old Bavarian beers, you can also find four styles from the Munich brewery Spaten – Premium (their Munich lager), Maibock, Oktoberfest and the famous Optimator. “Spaten is the most traditional German beer out there,” Schadt said. Which makes it all the more important to Olson to brew authentic German-style beer for the OB brand. “We’re using all German ingredients, so we special order malts and hops for each batch,” he said. “To be honest, I was fairly conservative. I tell people, these are serial No. 1. As we get feedback, we’ll tweak to get exactly what we need.” “It’s right up the alley, tastewise, stylewise,” Schadt said. “Eventually I hope we can get more than four kinds, but right now we have the basics.” In fact, he adds, within a year he and Olson hope to have a brewhouse running at the downtown Appleton location. “We’re in the beginning stages of becoming a brewery. We are in the works already with the paperwork,” Schadt said. “We want to do it downtown so people can see it when they walk by. It would be so unique to the area with the German heritage. I think people would love it.” Olson isn’t about to quit his day job in research and development at Georgia-Pacific. In fact, he refers to himself as brewing consultant in his present capacity rather than brewer. But the dream is close enough to taste. “I have a really good job, but this gets me in the business, brewing professionally,” he said. “I realize how much I love it still and would like to continue to pursue this in the future.” OLD BAVARIAN TASTING NOTES Hefe Weizen: This southern-German style of wheat beer (weizen bier) is top fermenting, which technically makes it a style of ale, but uses a special yeast that imparts a very distinctive taste and aroma. This Bavarian style ale has a unique citrusy, clove-like and/or banana yeast character that may be mild to assertive. By German law, at least 50% of the fermentable sugars must come from malted wheat, 5.1 ABV. Munich Helles Lager: This Bavarian pale (helles) lager is a malt-accentuated beer that is not overly sweet, but is rather focused on malt flavor with an underlying hop bitterness for a smooth, balanced profile. This style of beer was created in Munich in 1985 at the Spaten brewery to compete with Pilsner-style beers, 5.2% ABV. Oktoberfest: This is a smooth, clean (but complex) rich beer that is one of the classic malty styles of beer. This style of lager was typically brewed in the spring, signaling the end of the traditional brewing season and stored cold (lagered) during the warm summer months, then served in autumn during the traditional Oktoberfest celebrations, 5.9% ABV. Tanjanator Doppelbock: This is a very strong, rich and malty full-bodied beer that has a slight nutty/chocolate flavor for complexity. This Bavarian specialty was first brewed by the monks of St. Francis of Paula. The term doppel (double) bock was coined by Munich consumers. Like many other versions of doppelbock, our version also has a name ending in “ator,” in tribute to the original Salvator, 7.5% ABV. |
