[Iliff Ave]

Hi All. I am curious what a beer brewed with or close to 100% Vienna malt would be like. I have done an all munich beer but not Vienna. Would it be a decent choice for a pale ale?

[denny]

Yeah, it works really well for that.  I find Vienna to taste a bit less malty than Munich and make a drier beer.

[hopfenundmalz]

Works well for a Vienna Lager.

[a10t2]

Works well for a Vienna Lager.

Hopefully I'm not derailing the thread too much, but… Does it bother anyone else that an all-Vienna grist doesn't hit the color "target" for a Vienna Lager? It seems like it's the only BJCP style that requires a grain addition for color adjustment only.

I guess the better question is, why the discrepancy? Were "Vienna" malts that much darker back in the day? Or did the style just become darker with the mass-market Mexican examples using coloring agents?

[dmtaylor]

A 100% Vienna beer is excellent.  Very malty and a very good idea for a pale ale.

As for the color thing, a10t2, I'm not sure but my guess is the same as yours... either it used to be quite a bit darker, or the Mexicans have decided to add coloring agents to make the beer look distinctive and more malty (which of course, it is).

[Iliff Ave]

How about 91% Vienna, 9% crystal? I am looking to balance the bitterness with some maltiness and some sweetness.

[denny]

Works well for a Vienna Lager.

Hopefully I'm not derailing the thread too much, but… Does it bother anyone else that an all-Vienna grist doesn't hit the color "target" for a Vienna Lager? It seems like it's the only BJCP style that requires a grain addition for color adjustment only.

I guess the better question is, why the discrepancy? Were "Vienna" malts that much darker back in the day? Or did the style just become darker with the mass-market Mexican examples using coloring agents?

It might bother me if that was what I used it for!  From what I've gathered, I think Vienna malt used to be much darker.

[blatz]

Works well for a Vienna Lager.

Hopefully I'm not derailing the thread too much, but… Does it bother anyone else that an all-Vienna grist doesn't hit the color "target" for a Vienna Lager? It seems like it's the only BJCP style that requires a grain addition for color adjustment only.

I guess the better question is, why the discrepancy? Were "Vienna" malts that much darker back in the day? Or did the style just become darker with the mass-market Mexican examples using coloring agents?

so...this is quite funny.  it bothers the hell out of me - if only because people will judge it as being out of "THE RANGE" when its only coloring...

i just did a vienna lager 2 weekends ago, intending to go 100% vienna, based on the mouthwatering pic shown here by SiouxerBrewer:  http://forum.northernbrewer.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=26936&start=1470  (6th post down, second pic)

but when it came to brew day at the last second, I just couldn't do it, so while I was weighing everything out  i went with 4% Munich II, 4% Caramunich and the balance vienna.  turns out, with the exception of excluding the dehusked Carafa II its my usual house recipe that I haven't changed in years (and love). 

It turned out a bit lighter than a Boston Lager. 

Am intrigued  on how it will taste.

Goschman - I would not go 9% with crystal malt on this - might be a little sweet and out of place.  actually what I wound up doing, with 20-24 ibus of noble hop would be perfect, IMO.

I used a hockhurz step mash (146 for 20min, 158 for 45min, then raise to mashout) but a single infusion at ~152-3 would be fine.

EDIT - sorry, just saw you were wanting to do a Pale ale - then yeah 6-9% probably a-ok.

Isn't Victory Hop Devil vienna based? or is it munich?

[erockrph]

Works well for a Vienna Lager.

Hopefully I'm not derailing the thread too much, but… Does it bother anyone else that an all-Vienna grist doesn't hit the color "target" for a Vienna Lager? It seems like it's the only BJCP style that requires a grain addition for color adjustment only.

I guess the better question is, why the discrepancy? Were "Vienna" malts that much darker back in the day? Or did the style just become darker with the mass-market Mexican examples using coloring agents?

Dunkel anyone? I suppose if you use the darkest Munich at the highest OG for the range you might hit the lower limit of the style guidelines for color. But every recipe I've seen uses at least some dark roasted malt for color adjustment.

Maybe back in the day both Munich and Vienna malt were a lot darker? Or maybe there was something going on in the decoctions? It is still curious that both of these styles are basically SMaSH lagers with a small color adjustment. Maybe this came about intentionally to distinguish these beers from the lighter lagers?

[denny]

If you read the section about Anton Dreher in Jackson's "New World Guide to Beer", you get the impression that even the lightest malts were much darker back in the day.

[morticaixavier]

wan't porter originally brewed with more or less all brown malt? so in a way modern porter uses dark malts for color correction so more efficient, higher DP malts can be used for the base.

[euge]

Isn't Bohemia the example of the style? That beer is very pale. I made one recently with 100% pils malt and now want to do 100% Vienna to see the difference.

[HoosierBrew]

I was thinking Negra Modelo.

[johnf]

Bohemia is the beer some people argue should be a classic example of CAP.

Negra Modelo is a BJCP classic example for Vienna Lager, as are a number of US craft brewery re-imaginings.

In my opinion the BJCP category 3 is a bit of a mess. Consider 6 beers.

1. The beer Dreher made in Vienna. This is historical Vienna lager.
2. The beer Sedylmeyer made at Spaten. This is historical amber maerzen. Note that 1 and 2 were intended to be the same style and that at some point in history 2 was associated with Oktoberfest (the event).
3. Modern Oktoberfest beer. This is paler and stronger than amber maerzen.
4. Modern amber maerzen, these are exported to the US (or brewed in the US) as Oktoberfest beers.
5. Negra Modelo. This is a pale adjunct lager colored to be amber. This shares a historical tie with beer 1 via Santiago Graf.
6. Modern Vienna lager. There is no direct lineage to 1, these are recent re-imaginings by craft breweries.

BJCP category 3 attempts to differentiate 1 and 2 (which are the two most similar of the 6) while reconciling 1, 5, and 6 and separately reconciling 2, 4, and 7.

This is how you get two styles with nearly identical numerical and sensory descriptions and both having idiosyncratic classic examples.

[denny]

Isn't Bohemia the example of the style? That beer is very pale. I made one recently with 100% pils malt and now want to do 100% Vienna to see the difference.

Just because Bohemia (or Negra Modelo) is a BJCP example doesn't have anything to do with the original beer.  No one really knows what that was like...or so I'm told.