Cask Conditioned Beer
The following article was originally published in October 2003. It is still relevant today and provides good information about Cask Conditioned beer.
Washington Brewers Pump Out the Goods for Local Beer Lovers
by Kendall Jones
There was a time when Rainier and Olympia were the two brands used to define a Northwest beer drinker’s taste. You were either a Rainier man or an Oly man. It is no longer such a simple and binary task.
On the last Saturday of October, enthusiastic beer fans gathered in Seattle Center’s Alki Room for the 4th Annual Cask Festival—an event presented each October by the Washington Brewers Guild. This year the event featured 30 different breweries proudly pouring samples of their finest cask conditioned beer (cask beer). There were two tasting sessions, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Both sold out. This was a celebration of great beer, enjoyed by the growing number of people who appreciate it. That is simple enough to understand. But this is not ordinary beer. It’s not even normal microbrew.
The event, which was largely unpublicized, attracted a total of 500 visitors. At a cost of $30 per ticket, the crowd that assembled proved that they loved cask beer before they even took their first sips.
Away from the Cask Festival, an increasing number of pubs and alehouses across the Northwest are serving cask beer. It causes one to wonder. What is cask conditioned beer, why is it getting popular and who is drinking it?
To begin with, cask conditioned beer is different than what most Americans imagine when they think of beer. It is not what television commercials tell us beer should be. It is not the light, fizzy beverage that is usually presented by busty blonds in bikinis. It is not ice cold and it is not topped with a foamy white head spilling over the brim of a frosted mug. Cask conditioned beer is an ultimate departure from the commercial stereotype.
Perhaps the simplest way to describe cask conditioned beer is to call it extreme microbrew. Cask beer is served from the same container in which it is conditioned. The beer is matured by secondary fermentation in the vessel—usually a keg—from which it is poured. This secondary fermentation process is still taking place when the cask is delivered to its final destination. One of the byproducts of fermentation is carbon dioxide, so what carbonation there is in cask beer is the product of the final fermentation cycle. Unlike typical draught beer, CO2 is not used to propel the beer through the lines. It must be pumped from the vessel into your glass.
Purists applaud this method of serving because of the unique flavor characteristics imparted to the beer. Secondary fermentation in the cask ensures that the beer is as fresh as it can possibly be and prevents the loss of any flavor through filtration or pasteurization. The result is a beer that is more reflective of the brewer’s intention.
“With cask conditioned beer, you can really taste the essential elements of the beer,” says Jeff Lawrence, owner of the Whistle Stop Ale House in Renton. “You can appreciate the way all of the ingredients are playing off of each other. Cask beer allows the beer drinker to sample something that is much more like what the brewer tastes straight from the conditioning tank when he decides that the beer is ready."
Like an increasing number of establishments across the Northwest, the Whistle Stop pours cask beer from a device affectionately known as a beer engine—a rather old fashioned looking device which is required to properly serve cask beer. Yes, "beer engine" is the official term. First patented and put to use in London in 1785, the beer engine’s purpose and basic design have remained unchanged. A beer engine differs from a typical tap in that it features a hydraulic pump. The tap handle operates the pump instead of just opening a valve as it does in a pressurized line. As the beer is pumped out of the keg, air is vented in rather than keeping everything under pressure from a CO2 cylinder. Usually two slow pulls on the tap handle produces a pint of beer.
Until recently, sampling beer served in this traditional way would usually require a trip to England (where they refer to cask beer as real ale), but beer engines and the cask conditioned offerings that flow from them are becoming more common here in our corner of the world. Most brew pubs, ale houses and tap rooms that consider themselves serious about beer either have a beer engine already or have plans to install one. Some places, such as Bob’s Cork and Barrel in Yakima, have two.
The beer that is drawn from a beer engine is not fizzy and does not sport a big foamy head like many beer drinkers expect. It does contain CO2, but when compared to most nationally recognized brands it is flat. That’s not a bad thing. It’s natural. It’s the way this kind of beer is supposed to be served.
The growing popularity of cask conditioned beer is an evolutionary step in the Northwest’s love affair with beer. Over the last twenty years the Pacific Northwest has hosted a remarkable beer revolution. When Bert Grant opened his brewery in Yakima in 1982—an event that many beer enthusiasts consider the big bang of the microbrew universe—only in his wildest dreams would he have imagined that just 20 years later the Washington Brewers Guild would have 48 active members and the state would be world renowned for producing fine beers.
The growth of the craft brewing industry is both the cause and the effect of the public’s increased appreciation of fine beer. As the beer drinking public was introduced to beers like Grant’s Scottish Ale, Redhook’s Ballard Bitter, Pyramid Wheaten Ale and a handful of other beers that emerged in the 1980s, they slowly learned the difference between traditional beer styles. More and more regular folks turned to craft beers to quench their thirst and even women began to appreciate darker, full-bodied beers. Beer drinkers began to look for selection and hence created a demand for more beer.
Today, as beer drinkers across the Northwest become even more sophisticated in their tastes, the demand for cask conditioned products is growing. “We installed our beer engine about 7 years ago. Since then, the demand for cask beer has more than doubled.” Lawrence says, explaining that the Whistle Stop has gone from an average of a quarter barrel (pony keg) every 10 days to 2 quarter barrels per week. “Sometimes we’ll go through a quarter barrel in one night if it’s a particularly popular beer."
The breweries also report an increase in demand for cask conditioned product. “More and more places are installing beer engines and asking us what we’ve got available,” says Bryan Bendix of Bellingham’s Boundary Bay Brewing Company, as he hands a sample of his Imperial IPA to a Cask Festival attendee. “We’re getting a reputation for our cask beer. It’s impressive, but not surprising. This is good beer and people around here know it.”
So who are all these people drinking this cask conditioned beer? One would imagine them to be the most hardcore beer fans amongst us—those who have dabbled in the art of home brewing, moved here from England, or for whatever other reason approach beer with the same passion that a Tuscan chef approaches Chianti—but that is not the case. The crowd at the festival was diverse, ranging from tattooed hipsters to grizzled beer veterans. And yes, women were there.
“We have a portion of our clientele who are real hardcore beer people, a portion who are much less passionate about beer, and everyone conceivable in between. We see a random sampling of our customers ordering cask beer,” says Lawrence. “Some people order a pint of it based on the style, or their familiarity with the brand, others order it just because they are fans of cask beer in general and are willing to try pretty much anything we’re pouring that way. We even see a fair portion of it being served to women, which some people might find surprising.”
The Whistle Stop believes that educating people about beer is the duty of any good ale house and they’re happy to share their knowledge with anyone who asks. “Surprisingly, most people know what they’re getting into when they order a cask conditioned beer. Some people just know that it’s different, and they don’t really care how or why. They just like it. But I’d guess that at least 60 percent really understand exactly what it is. When it comes to beer, it is really amazing how well educated and how enthusiastic people have become,” says Lawrence. “The popularity of cask beer is proof of that.”
In the last 20 years a lot has changed for the Northwest beer drinker. The mythical creatures that once defined our beer drinking tradition are extinct. The wild Rainiers that once ran free in our forests and the hairy little Artesians who were credited with producing the water used to brew Oly have been wiped out by a series of corporate takeovers and mergers. Our new beer drinking tradition is all about the fine handcrafted beers that a vibrant community of dedicated brewers produce for the increasing number of people who appreciate their work. But even beyond that, the growing