Color is an integral and important part of our experience of food and drink, and beer is no exception. When beer is poured into a clear glass, the color is the first thing the prospective beer drinker will notice. Color invariably conjures up expectations, usually subliminal, of the flavor experience ahead. A bright golden beer may lead one to expect refreshment and to recall sunny days spent in beer gardens, whereas a reddish–black beer with a thick brown head may evoke expectations of malty roasted flavors and thoughts of sitting in front of a roaring fireplace. Because color works so powerfully upon the mind, chefs, winemakers, and brewers alike will pay very close attention to achieving the right hues for their creations.
It is ironic, therefore, that color can be an unreliable indicator of flavor. This is because color exists more in the mind than in reality; technically, color is the mere reflection or refraction of light as it strikes an object, solid, liquid, or gaseous. Our eyes register the wavelengths of light they receive, and the brain translates these into the colors we see. In beer, color is determined in various ways. The most significant source of beer color is pigments in the grain. Both the malted and the unmalted grains used in the brewhouse are kilned dried; the longer the drying process and the higher the drying temperature, the darker will be the grist for the mash and the more opaque will be the beer made from it.
Similar colors in different beers may be derived from different sources. For example, dark Belgian beer styles such as dubbel often derive their brown color not from roasted malts, but from a highly caramelized invert sugar syrup called candi sugar.
Dark candi sugar, which is specifically meant to give both color and flavor to beer, is different from products designed to be pure colorants. Various caramel colors, from malt-derived German “farbebier” to the old American “Porterine,” have been widely available to brewers for more than 100 years.
Chemical reactions that take place during malting, mashing, and wort boiling can also contribute to beer color. These include the so-called Maillard reaction, often referred to as non-enzymatic browning, during which melanoidins are created. These are responsible for the amber hue in many beers.
Brewers use several more technical methods for distinguishing between different colors and their intensities. One of the earliest methods was a color scale developed by Joseph Lovibond, which is divided into “degrees Lovibond,” usually abbreviated as L.
xEBC = [(x × 0.375) + 0.46] SRM
ySRM = [(y × 2.65) – 1.2] EBC.
For instance, a golden blonde Pilsner with a color value of 4.5 SRM would be have an EBC color value of 4.5 multiplied by 2.65 minus 1.2 = 10.725 EBC.
As a general rule, yellow to straw blonde beers have color values of 4 to 8 EBC (2 to 4 SRM), pale ales of perhaps 20 to 30 EBC (10 to 15 SRM), and stouts of 70 to 140 EBC (35 to 70 SRM). Colorant additives may have color values as high as 9,000 EBC (3,375 SRM). A pale malt may have a color value of 1.5°L to 2.5°L (roughly 2.8 to 5.4 EBC), a caramel malt 60°L (roughly 160 EBC), and a chocolate malt 350°L (roughly 925 SRM). Various blends of differently colored malts allow the brewer to achieve a wide range of color.
Just as many wine drinkers erroneously equate dark colors with both concentration and high quality, so beer drinkers often conflate darker color with alcoholic strength. In fact, beer color is entirely unrelated to beer strength, and most people are surprised to hear that nearly black draught Guinness has only about 4.2% alcohol by volume (ABV), making it notably lighter in alcohol than American Budweiser, which has about 5%. Conversely a golden-hued Belgian tripel will have about 9% ABV, and a German maibock of similar color can have a great depth of malt flavor and 8% ABV or above.
Another range of colors in beer may be derived from fruit, as is the case in Belgian kriek (cherries) and framboise (raspberries). Colors from fruit may be bright, especially if the fruit was added in the form of juice, or dulled, especially if the beer is barrel aged, where slow oxidation will eventually bring on brownish hues.
Bibliography