Lager/Ale

[Dougan]

I've got my extract brewing done to the point where I feel like I know what I'm doing.... making my own recipes and such. Still doing the extract thing (Waiting to move out of my tiny apartment in spring to make the big grain jump) but I still feel like I have a sense of what I'm doing. Now, I've been doing ales but my buddy's basement is now pretty cold (Living in Wisconsin) and I think I'd like to try brewing a lager beer.

So at my point I know enough to know that the stereotype of lagers being your budweisers and ales being your red ales and such is of course very wrong. But that does lead me to ask the question, what is the difference? I know the difference between how they're made, of course.

I guess my question is, if I had the same simple recipe and fermented one as a lager and the other as an ale, what would the difference in taste be?

 

[cdburg]

From my own experience, it's going to depend on the recipe and the yeasts you use. Generally though, when I've brewed a double batch and fermented half with an ale yeast and half with a lager yeast, I've found that the ale yeast is fruiter. Most ale yeasts are more crisp and not quite as fruity tasting. Some ale yeasts accentuate hops more than most lager yeasts.

The best way to find out is to give it a try for yourself. It's amazing how much different two beers from the same recipe can be when you use two different yeasts. It will show you how much flavor the yeast contributes to a beer.

 

[david_42]

The difference between a lager and ale ale is the yeast, period. Most lagers are at the lighter end of the color & flavor scales, because that's what lager yeast strains are good at. However, if you take a recipe and use a clean fermenting ale yeast at the low end of its temperature range, you get a very lager-like beer.

I've done a schwartzbier (Saflager), black ale (Nottingham) comparison. They were very similar, but both of those yeasts are clean and crisp. If I had used a London ale yeast, I would have had a fruitier ale.