Brewery icon Jim Koch inspired a revolution in the American beer industry over the past 30 years.
With far less fanfare, he’s helped save the signature taste profile of German ?lager on two continents.
The Bavarian beer community honored the founder of Boston Beer Co. and the Samuel Adams brand Tuesday with the Bayerischer Bierorden (Bavarian Order of Beer). The award is given to individuals who have “rendered outstanding and innovative concepts” in the beer industry. Koch is the first non-German to receive the award in its 35-year history.
“Craft brewers in the United States are making the best beer in the world and it’s humbling that other countries recognize the passion and innovative spirit of craft brewers like Samuel Adams,” said Koch. He was in Bavaria this week to accept the award and make his yearly pilgrimage to German hop-growing country.
The Boston Herald got an exclusive look at Koch’s passion and impact on the German beer industry a few years ago. I was meeting pals in Munich for Oktoberfest that autumn and learned that Koch was in Bavaria for the annual hop harvest.
So I took a detour to a barn-like hop warehouse in the village of Mainburg, north of Munich. Koch and his team were sampling the season’s noble hops, Hallertau Mittelfrueh most notably. They were sniffing small piles of hops, taking notes on each, working the small, cone-like flowers between their fingers to check for texture.
Koch was wearing a purple smock; his hands were covered in sticky hop resins and dusty yellow pollen. Tiny hop flakes were in his hair and even up his nose. He was quite literally covered in hops; sourcing his raw materials at the most intimate level.
None of those raw materials are more important to the success of Boston Beer than the Hallertau Mittelfrueh hop. It’s noted for a peppery, spicy aroma and provides the signature profile of German lagers and Koch’s flagship Samuel Adams Boston Lager.
One hop farmer that day told me that Koch “saved the German hop industry.” He may have been exaggerating, but only slightly.
Hallertau, you see, is an ancient “land race” hop —- a low-yield variety that existed long before modern hop cultivars, jacked up to provide ever more bitterness, aroma and yield per acre. The old hop is simply inefficient. So Bavarian farmers over the years cut back on the crop.
Then Koch came along, with an ever-increasing demand for the unique taste of Hallertau forced by America’s ever-increasing demand for Boston Lager. Bavarian hop farmers began planting more acres. Koch kept buying. Today, when you smell a fresh Boston Lager, you still smell Hallertau Mittelfrueh.
“The original recipe from Jim’s great-great-grandfather used Hallertau Mittelfrueh, so that’s why we used them,” said Jennifer Glanville, who runs the Samuel Adams brewery in Jamaica Plain. “We kept using them because they work for the beer and taste great.”
