Have you ever heard of sahti? Before Michael Jackson, hardly anyone had. Have you ever heard of Boak and Bailey? Before they wrote The Birth of the Beer Hunter: Looking Back on Michael Jackson’s Legacy on Beeradvocate.com, I never had. To be fair to them, they have apparently been beer blogging and writing for about 10 years, since roughly the time Michael Jackson passed away in 2007. Thing is, a lot of people write about beer these days (I’ve been doing it since the mid-90s), so hopefully Boak and Bailey will forgive me if they got lost in the shuffle.
In large part, Michael Jackson is the reason so many people can write about beer these days. He and pioneers like Fritz Maytag, Jack McAuliffe, Ken Grossman, Jim Koch-I could go on-lit the fires that rekindled America’s love affair with beer. Real beer. Variety in beer. We have so many breweries and so many beers today because of these pioneers. Why then, do Boak and Bailey seems so down on MJ in their article?
That’s the impression I took from it, and I’m not alone. Having lived through the dawn of craft beer and remembering the time before it, I was there to see Jackson in action (is that like Action Jackson?). I devoured his books in the early 80s and then on each time he (rarely) produced a new one. I reveled in watching his classic Beer Hunter documentary series when it first aired in 1989 and then again and again and again. A TV series about beer in 1989? Who does that? Michael Jackson of course.
Boak and Bailey seem to go out of their way to criticize Jackson, claiming his work is responsible for “straitjacketing” beer into styles. Seriously? Style is the definition of beer. It does not confine at all, it is the recipe by which beers are made. Jackson himself said beer is a playground and not a prison, but without style you are just throwing ingredients in the kettle to see what happens. Style defines beer, and Jackson was really the first to stress its importance similar to the way in which it defines wine.
The criticism of Jackson's early descriptions of beer as too simple are highly unfounded. His early works like World Guide to Beer must be taken in context of the times in which they were written. The Pocket Guide to Beer, which is meant to be, duh, a pocket guide to beer, is compact and concise, and gives very brief descriptions and a simple three-star rating system. Boak and Bailey take issue with that, and imply modern beer bloggers would suffer for such a system.
They miss a key point, which surprises me greatly. As writers, they of all people should be well aware of this cardinal rule: write to your audience. Take a look at the tasting notes of Jackson from the 70s and early 80s and you will surely see they are very similar to other great beer writers of the time such as James D. Robertson or Fred Eckhardt. I don't think the drinkers of the day were ready for a flowery lexicon akin to what wine writers used, and Jackson knew it. Look at his later writings in Beer Companion for example, or tasting notes in All About Beer. Amazingly detailed. When he wanted to too, he could describe beer with an exquisite palate, a keen wit, and a true flair for description. Then too, in many cases, beer in the early days was just not as complex as it is today. Sorry, Boak and Bailey. I was there. You weren’t.
I don’t think Boak and Bailey ever met Jackson. They don’t claim to have done so in their story, at any rate. I was lucky enough to chat with him at length along with a few other beer lovers, and instantly it was like you knew him all your life. He was interested in hearing what you had to say and asked pointed questions all throughout our discourse. Beer was who he was.
That leads me to another point of contention, the criticism that Jackson was too close to the industry he wrote about. How could he not be? He was friendly by nature, and a bon vivant. And again, I’ll just say these were different times. Today, anybody with a web cam can proclaim himself or herself an expert, “review” beers and ask breweries for beer samples. In Jackson’s day, it was more about collaboration to revive a thirst for good, real beer in America and to a lesser extent Great Britain. You don’t revive interest by telling everybody how bad this brewery or that one is. You bring everybody up by celebrating the good ones.
It’s also a bit ironic to me that the very platform upon which The Birth of the Beer Hunter is published, Beeradvocate.com, could be said to be much more beholden to the industry than Jackson was. For every beer that the founders have not reviewed, there’s a suggestion to “send ‘em beer”-a direct suggestion for breweries to send them free samples for review. Jackson never begged breweries for samples; breweries begged Jackson to sample their beer.
I drank a bottle of Offcolor Bare Bear Beer a few weeks ago, but hadn’t fleshed out my initial thoughts yet, so it seemed a fitting soapbox if you will to air my gripes. I think it is a great example of the legacy Jackson has left us for many reasons, not least of which are these very words from the Offcolor website:
Michael Jackson claimed that "Sahti is the only primitive beer to survive in Western Europe.The beer that peasants learned to brewing in the 1500s is still made much the same way today." Bare Bear is our interpretation of this traditional Finnish beer. Sahti has a long and peculiar history in Finnish culture. Most sahti today is still brewed in saunas.
And there you have it right there. The first two words in their definition of the style (perish the thought, style) are Michael Jackson. Rare beer styles are all the rage these days amongst the modern crop of beer geeks, who all too often seem to think they invented them, but it’s important to note they have a history that predates the modern American craft beer movement. Jackson was writing about sahti in the 80s and possibly the 70s as well. Think about that.
Anyway, since we’re really here to talk about Off Color Bare Bear Beer here’s some more of what the brewery has to say about sahti:
Inside the typical home/sauna brewery is the Finnish mashing vessel called a kuurna. The bottom of this long, trough-shaped vessel is lined with juniper branches and straw that act as the filter to separate the wort from the grains in the mash. The mash often, but not always contains a large quantity of rye malt (sometimes up to 50%).The juniper berries on the twigs often add a spicy, aromatic note to the final beer. The berries may also be used later in the process as a anti-infectant and flavoring ingredient.
True sahti is homebrewed, of course, though a few commercial examples exist in Finland and, of late, America. This is one of only a handful of sahtis I have reviewed. That makes it difficult to peg stylistically, but we’ll certainly try. Harry’s market was selling it for $7.99 a 4-pack, and the beer has an alcohol content of 7% by volume with 20 IBUs.
Ingredients from the website:
Malts: Pils, CaraRye, Rye Malt, Carapils, Red malt, Roasted barely
Hops: Nugget
Secret Ingredients: Juniper Berries
Off Color Bare Bear Beer pours to a muddy reddish color with a spicy rye nose and a good-sized head of spritzy foam that fades almost as quickly as it forms. Taking a sip, the beer is a little bready with spicy notes of rye, clove and black pepper. Gin-like juniper and cherry are also apparent, and the beer is tart and slightly acidic from the oak. There are spicy saison-like yeast notes too. It finishes slightly sour and quite tart, with drying spice lingering on the tongue.
I’m pretty sure Michael Jackson would have enjoyed Offcolor Bare Bear Beer. Boak and Bailey claim The Beer Hunter was a persona, but that’s just not true. It’s who Jackson was, really, and I learned that the first time I met him. They also warn that Jackson’s admirers will take issue with any criticism of him, and that’s less than true. He was human like the rest of us after all. What we won’t stand for, however, are unwarranted attacks and revisionist history by modern “beer writers” trying to build themselves up by tearing Jackson down. Ain’t happening on my watch, Boak and Bailey.
And remember, try a new beer today, and drink outside the box.
*Pricing data accurate at time of review or latest update. For reference only, based on actual price paid by reviewer.
(B)=Bottled
(D)=Draft
(G)=Growler