

With that explanation/apology done, here are my reasons why the Reinheitsgebot is a load of old bollocks:



1. No-one in the world brews according to the Reinheitsgebot of 1516. Everyone (with the exception of the lambic brewers who disqualify themselves on other grounds) uses yeast as well as the water, malt (and that's specifically and exclusively barley malt). Even if you don't deliberately add it, you'll find it pretty difficult to brew beer without yeast. 2. It's a bread protection rather than beer protection law. The original idea in limiting the permissible ingredients of beer, was to stop people using grain better suited to making bread for making beer. Specifically, rye and wheat. Barley, not so suitable for baking but very much so for brewing, was to be reserved for beer. No wheat beer can claim to be brewed to the Reinheitsgebot of 1516, because until the 17th Century, when the Kurfürst (the ruler of Bavaria) granted himself a monopoly in brewing beer with wheat, the use of wheat in brewing was specifically forbidden in Bavaria. In the original law only barley is permitted. 3. The only permitted ingredients are malt, water, hops and yeast. . . .except for sugar in top-fermenting beers. Exactly why this is allowed in top-fermenting beers and forbidden in bottom-fermenting beers is a riddle to me. You will note that German brewers don't advertise the fact that sugar is sometimes allowed in their beers. 4. In itself, it's no guarantee of good beer. Let's face it, Heineken Pils is brewed according to it. Are you seriously accusing that of being a top-quality beer? Or try that delicious Binding beer. Umm, dishwater with a dash or margarine. Lovely. 5. There are still chemical additives used in German beer. It's perfectly permissible to treat the water with chemicals before you use it. Plus all the pesticides and chemical fertilisers you like in growing the barley. Some German brewers got most upset with people brewing organic beer, because they saw it as a challenge to their claim to purity. 6. It limits the styles of beer which are possible. Virtually none of the classic Belgian ales is, or even can be brewed if you stick to the rules of the Reinheitsgebot. Framboos and kriek because of the use of fruit (hardly a cheap replacement for malt), La Chouffe and witbiers because of their use of spices. None of these would be possible. Given the choice between Heineken Pils and La Chouffe, I know which I would go for.



Considering the number of breweries it possesses, Germany is home to relatively few beer styles. Bavaria, with its hundreds of breweries only has a handful of different styles. Belgium, on the other hand, with it's open-minded approach to ingredients, has almost as many styles as breweries. Even Austria, with only 90-odd breweries, manages to have at least as many different types of beer as the whole of Germany. 7. Germans have been brewing to the Reinheitsgebot since 1516. Well, Bavarians have. But then again, not even all of them. In 1516 Bavaria was a good deal smaller than it is now, and didn't yet include that not-really-so-important brewing area of Frankenland, where getting on for 50% of all the breweries still active in Bavaria are located. Nuremberg, Bamberg and Bayreuth became Bavarian in 1803, as part of the fallout of the Napoleonic Wars. The Reinheitsgebot was only extended to cover the whole of Germany in 1906 (though it was adopted earlier in the South - Baden 1896, Württemberg 1900). It was a prerequisite for the Bavarians in agreeing to German unification. It was vigourously opposed by North German brewers who (quite rightly) saw it as an attempt by the Bavarians to protect their trade. Its introduction to the whole country saw the extinction of certain beer styles (there had been a tradition of spiced beers, probably dating back to before the time when hops were widely used), as happened again in the 1990's when one version of Köstritzer Schwarzbier could no longer be produced. 8. It doesn't act as any protection for the consumer. It's still perfectly possible to produce dreadfully impure beer, with a yeast or bacterial infection, and sell it. I have drunk beer in Germany which was so badly infected that it was unfit to have left the brewery. The Reinheitsgebot has nothing to say about this. Real consumer protection legislation would insist that beer was fit to drink. 9. The current Reinheitsgebot is not the same as that of 1516. The original law says that beer should only be made from barley, hops and water. Note that this is not barley malt, but barley, which is specified. Of course, no mention of any other form form of malt or grain, such as wheat. Guinness, which doesn't count as a Reinheitsgebot beer because of the use of roasted barley would have qualified under the 1516 rules. 10. German brewers do not always stick to the Reinheitsgebot themselves. Many breweries use various adjuncts for versions of their beers sold abroad. (Though this is not allowed for those located in Bavaria.) 11. Many German wheat beers may not, strictly speaking, be sticking to the rules of the Reinheitsgebot. Wheat malt is only permitted as an ingredient in top-fermented beers, yet many hefeweizen beers are bottled with a bottom-fermenting yeast. As this yeast will be continuing the fermentation in the bottle, it's a matter of debate whether the end result is a pure top-fermenting beer.

