The Thrill Of Beer: Lager

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Making a Lager Beer and Types of Lager Available

What is a Lager Beer?

There are two main types of beer, which are Ales and Lagers. Lagers differ from Ales because Lagers will ferment at a much lower temperature and the yeast flocculates at the bottom part of the brew instead of the top part. With a much aggressive fermenting process, the yeast will produce a residual sweetness. Lagers also have a much longer aging process, which can take several months. Lager beer is much preferred by most beer drinkers because it is cleaner and clearer looking than Ales.

How to Make a Lager

Lager beer is made by simply fermenting the beer at a much lower temperature. It may sound simple but you have to be attentive to every detail to create a crisp and clean beer flavor. You should have the right tools and follow the steps accordingly without any mistakes.

Build a Yeast Starter

Making a yeast starter is very important because the yeast will be working at a much lower temperature. This is how you make a yeast starter:

• Pour 1.9 liters or half a gallon of water into a stockpot and heat it up to 170 degrees Fahrenheit.
• Put half a pound of malt extract, stir it in and bring it to a boil.
• Let the water boil for about 10 minutes.
• Let the water cool down as quick as possible to about 90 degrees Fahrenheit.
• Pour it into a sanitized container and put the yeast in as well.
• You will wait 2 to 3 days for the yeast to propagate before brewing.

Pitch Yeast Starter Into the 60F – 65F Range

When the fermentation starts, you have to drop to the recommended temperature of your yeast, which can be as low as 45 degrees Fahrenheit. You can place your fermentation vessel into an ice chest that has a thermostat.

2 Weeks Fermentation

Fermentation will take about 2 weeks. After 2 weeks or after fermentation, you should raise the temperature to as close as 62 degrees Fahrenheit. This stage is called the Diacetyl Rest wherein the increased temperature will assure the fermentation is complete and drive off the remaining CO2 that might disrupt the flavor. The increased temperature will also allow the yeast to completely absorb the diacetyl produced by the fermentation.

Rack the Beer Into a Carboy

After two or three days at 62 degrees Fahrenheit, it is time to rack the beer into a carboy. The temperature should be lowered by about 5 degrees Fahrenheit a day until it reaches 35 degrees Fahrenheit. Lagering has started and this process can be done for a minimum of six weeks.

Bottle the Beer

After lagering or the secondary fermentation process, you can now bottle the beer or put it in a keg. Lager beer should look clean and clear.

Types of Lager Beer

Pale Lagers

Pale lagers are the most basic beers that most Americans know. This type of lager is light-colored and corn or rice is added to the barley mixture during the brewing process. It contains about 4 to 5 percent alcohol by volume and designed to be served very cold.

American Dark Lagers

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The Wildwood Brewery

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Jim Lueders – Owner
4018 US Hwy 93 North
Stevensville, MT 59870
406-777-2855

The tap room is presently open everyday from 4:00pm to 8:00pm, but keep posted for seasonal hours.

The Brewery

The Wildwood Brewery is a state of the art brewing system. It starts with three malt silos which can hold nearly 100,000 pounds of bulk malts. The malt is brought into the building with a cable and disc conveyor and empties into the malt hopper where it is electronically weighed. An intermediary hopper is used to add specialty grains which come in bags. The malt gravity flows from the malt hopper through a Künzel 4 roller mill and into the grist hopper. The Künzel is the BMW of malt mills. The grist is brought out of the bottom of the grist hopper with a screw auger, which empties into a bucket elevator bringing the grist up more than 25 feet. The elevator empties into a chain drag conveyor which gently moves the grist to the mash kettle. A grist hydrator is used to evenly mix the dry grist with temperated brew water.

The mash kettle was designed by Mr. Lueders in 1992 and custom made by Mueller, Springfield, Missouri. The other three vessels of the four vessel brew house were made by BAM, Freising, Munich. These vessels include a Brew kettle, a lauter tun, and whirlpool. There is a 50 hp high pressure boiler, two 50 bbl hot liquor tanks, and a 30 ton chiller. A 1000 square foot cooler building is built in the shadow (North side) of the larger brewery barn. For additional efficiency, there is a 600 gallon glycol reservoir inside the walk in cooler. An outside 600 gallon water/ice tank which includes a heat exchange coil can be used as a pre-chiller at times when the temperature outside is below 30°F.
There is cellar capacity of 240 barrels.

The Beer

1. Organic Mystical Stout
Mystical stout is an Irish style dry stout similar to that brewed by a renown brewery in County Cork, Ireland. Organic two row barley and black roasted malts give this beer a flavor and aroma reminiscent of coffee. This beer is easy drinking and user friendly.
13.2° Plato original gravity, approximately 5.4% alc./vol.

2. Organic Bodacious Bock
Bodacious Bock is a traditional German spring bock. Three organic malts are employed to give a complexity which hints of honey. Only German noble hops from the Hallertau region are used for a soft bitterness and floral aroma. It is decoction mashed in the old world tradition. This is a strong beer, imbiber beware!
16° Plato original gravity, approximately 7.5% alc./vol.

3. Organic Ambitious Pale Lager

Ambitious Pale Lager is a classic Munich style lager. Only certified organically grown barley malts are used. It is cold conditioned, well balanced between malt and German noble hops.
12° Plato original gravity, 5% alc./vol.

4. Lucid Cream Ale (Seasonal)

Lucid Cream Ale is an American Style cream ale. It has characteristics of both ale and lager beer. It is light and refreshing, clean, and crisp, with a hit of fruity esters.
12° Plato original gravity, 5% alc./vol.

The History

Jim Lueders, Patriarch
Wildwood Brewing began as a dream in the mind of Jim Lueders, an emigrant from Chicago. After moving to Montana in 1979 to be schooled, he started homebrewing in 1981. In 1987 he was hired as assistant brewer at the Bayern Brewery in Missoula and thus began his commercial application. In 1990 he shipped himself off to Munich, Germany and spent the next 9 months, with nothing more than weekends free, studying brewing, malting, and soft drink technology at the prestigious Doemens Acadamy. To pay for this expensive endeavor he shipped over his 1952 Chevy pick up truck, which he meticulously restored over the past two years, and sold it just a week before graduation. After finishing at Doemens, Mr. Lueders went on a tour through 12 countries getting behind the scenes tours of nearly 100 breweries and related facilities.

Upon returning to the USA, Jim found himself in demand in the young craft brewing industry which was growing fast. He was first hired as start-up consultant and head of production for the Saxer Brewing Company in Portland, Oregon in 1993. This is where he first set up the beautiful German made brewery which would later become his own at Wildwood. At Saxer Lueders’ remembers brewing 3 decoction brews by himself in 18 hours. With youth still on his side he left Saxer to continue consulting for brewery start-ups across the US and overseas.

The Wildwood Project

The Wildwood project started in earnest in 2002 when Lueders’ bought all what was left of the Saxer Brewery from his past employer. That same year Lueders’ completed a training certification class with Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives (ZERI.ORG). Jim, under the tudelage of the renown Prof. George Chan and Prof. Gunter Pauli, designed and dimensioned the integrated system which will bring the Wildwood project towards sustainability.

A suitable, and affordable site was found in the Bitterroot Valley, near Stevensville, just 24 miles south of Missoula. Construction began in fall of 2008 with the pouring of the concrete which utilizes as much waste fly ash from the Eastern Montana coal burning power plants as we could put into it. In Spring of 2009, the timber frame structure, salvaged from a Wisconsin barn originally built in 1901, was put back together at its’ new home. The roof system was completed using metal from 100% recycled material and made in Missoula. Locally available wheat straw bales were used as insulation exterior of the frame, nearly 800 of them in total. By fall of that year the bale walls were competed and plastered. The inside of the building was finished in early 2011 and the brewing tanks and equipment started to come into the building in February. The building of the brewery took nearly a year since Lueders’ had to have everything a certain way and did much of the work himself.
Operations began in late January 2012 with the brewing of a Mai Bock which was labeled Bodacious Bock. The first brew, a keeper. Subsequent brews were, in order, Discerning Pilsner, Mystical Stout, White Bark Wheat, and Ambitious Lager.

Wildwood quietly opened its doors on March 16, 2012.

The Intergrated System

The Wildwood Brewing Company is building an integrated production system which will transform waste streams from the brewing process into inputs for a network of industries. The cyclical, efficient use of raw materials and energy will reduce operating costs, allow the associated businesses to sustain themselves at lower production levels than their competitors, and provide a model for sustainable development.

The Costs of a Barrel of Beer

In a traditional brewery, producing beer results in a significant waste stream. This waste is a business expense, an inefficient use of resources, a burden on the environment and community, and a loss of opportunity.

For example, up to ten barrels of water may be used in producing one barrel of beer. Most of that water ends up in a sewage treatment plant mixed with spent hops, surplus yeast, and cleaning chemicals. Of about 45 pounds of barley malt that go into making that barrel of beer, more than 41 pounds come out of the brewing process as waste. Significant quantities of heat and carbon dioxide are also released in the brewing process, and much of the packaging used in selling beer ends up as waste.
drawing: traditional brewery

Turning Costs into Opportunities

The Wildwood Brewing Company offers a better way by turning wastes into value added inputs to support other productive enterprises. Eventually, the cycles will be completed so these enterprises provide the majority of needed inputs to each other.

Our vision is based on a proven model developed by Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives (ZERI.ORG), and the success of the functioning examples in two other countries. The Wildwood Brewery will be at the heart of the cluster of enterprises that cycles and recycles materials and energy, growing toward zero emissions and imitating the interdependent processes of nature. As we build, each new link will offer enterprises and industries that benefit the people, the economy, and the environment of western Montana.

Toward Zero Emissions

Our network will be based on a flow of materials from one enterprise to another, making the best possible use of generated “waste” of each process. In this manner, value is added at each stage, and costs are lowered.
Here are some of the main enterprises and processes we envision in our zero emissions demonstration project:
a) Brewery – Wildwood brewery produces high-quality, certified organic beer.
b) Mycoculture – Spent grain from the brewery provides the substrate for growing mushrooms for local and regional sale. Mushrooms break down the spent grain and make a nutritious and easily digested food for animals.
c) Vermiculture – Used mushroom substrate feeds worms that produce compost and become feed for chicken and fish. The worms are also the base for biodegradable detergents. A unique separation technology will be used to create enzyme-based cleaners for the brewery and other users. Live composting worms may also be sold in bulk and in home composting kits.
d) Biodigestion – With inputs of wastewater from the brewery and organic waste from other operations, anaerobic bacteria in the biodigester produce methane gas that will be used as a heating or power-generating fuel. Biodigestion also produces organic nutrients that are used in aquaculture.
e) Aquaculture – Water and nutrients from the digester feed algae such as Spirulina, phytoplankton and other aerobic organisms which become inputs to polyculture fish farming. Spirulina, known as a “superfood”, can be separated and sold to the expanding health food market. Hydroponic produce will also be grown in the nutrient rich water. This water is subsequently used in agriculture.
f) Agriculture – Recycled water, nutrients from the brewery, digesters and aquaculture, and worm compost are used as inputs for growing organic produce for local market. Hops could also be grown for use in the brewery as the climate in western Montana is ideal for this crop. Carbon dioxide from brewery fermentation and mushroom cultivation are utilized by plants in the greenhouse.
g) Animal husbandry – Small numbers of pigs, chickens, ducks and turkeys will be economically supported on the Wildwood farm. The waste from the animals is flushed daily into the digesters providing the bacteria necessary for anaerobic digestion. The animals will enjoy a clean and healthy life, with good food, fresh air and exercise.
h) Maltery – A small malting plant can provide enough high quality organic barley and wheat malt for the Wildwood brewery and perhaps other breweries in the area.
i) Heat recovery – Heat produced in the brewing process will be recovered and used to heat buildings, digesters, aquaculture ponds, greenhouses, drying mushrooms, and driving other production processes.

Project Status

We are building this project on the solid foundation of an operational template based on successful models in Fiji and Namibia. We have made additional calculations specific to the Montana environment, the regional market, our brewing equipment, and the facility we envision.
A complete complement of state-of-the-art, energy efficient, and multi-use brewery equipment has been installed and has provisions for the build out of the integrated system.
Our vision is to create a sustainable, cyclical network of businesses that support each other by converting waste streams into value-added resources for other industries.

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