Beer · Style · Short entry
Rauchbier (smoked beer)
Rauchbier is Bamberg's smoked lager, brewed from barley malt dried over a beechwood fire. Its best-known form is a märzen-strength amber lager.
Method
Malt kilned over an open beechwood fire; lager brewing and cold maturation.
Character
Amber to dark, malty, with a smoky aroma from the malt.
Contested
Smoked beers are old, but the BJCP calls the origins of this specific style unclear: it must have developed after the märzen style.
Malt and smoke
The smoke in rauchbier comes from the malt. At Schlenkerla in Bamberg, barley malt is still kilned over an open fire of aged beechwood in the brewery's own maltings. Its flagship, Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier, is brewed and aged much like a märzen, at 5.1 %. Smoked beer has probably been brewed in Bamberg for at least five centuries, but the modern style's origins are unclear.
How it connects
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