[HBF] Reinheitsgebot Rant

[Flannery, Phil]

>From today's Ami HBF.  Wow, what a rant!

Date: Sun, 8 Feb 2004 16:11:18 -0500
From: "-S" <-s at adelphia.net>
Subject: Re: Reinheitsgebot

Chad says Dave says of Reinheitsgebot ...

> The law has to be one of the first ordinances controlling the
> quality of food and drink in the whole world....

Such a wretched misunderstanding !!  Reinheitsgebot *REDUCES* beer quality
and restricts brewer creativity !

It's downright weird that historical law is viewed thru' rose colored
glasses while modern law and politics with cynical eyes.   I'd suggest that
human nature, intelligence and even political machinations haven't changed
more than a jot since cave dwellers began telling each other how to live.

Reinheitsgebot certainly includes a "purity" clause that requires beer to
include only water, hops and malt (no yeast please!), *but* 80% of
Reinheitsgebot involves the government creation of price caps for beer in
Bavaria.  It's net effect could only reduce beer quality.  If you find a
Bavarian brewer who claims to follow Reinheitsgebot, I'd suggest you stock
up.  Aside from Marzen, their beers must sell at either 1 cent or 2 cents
per mug (just over a liter) depending on the season !

Beyond  pricing, I still can't see that restricting the ingredients to
water, hops and malt has any positive implications for quality.   OK it
keeps the cabbage, pumpkins and peppers out of beer, but it also prevents
the use of unmalted adjunct, sugars, spices and fruits which can be used in
very high quality beer.  Are the unfettered Belgian brewers making lower
quality beer than Bavarians ?   I don't think so, but they certainly are
producing far more varied and creative styles.

As for being the oldest beer law - a 1290 Nuremberg law forbade the use of
rye, oats and wheat in brewing in order to preserve these grains for baking.
There is evidence of brewing in Europe ~800BC or a bit earlier and I suspect
the 'lawyers' of the era must have created some pointless busybody civil
restrictions regarding it's creation.  The code of Hammurabi ~2100BC
includes the penalty of drowning the vendor of inferior beer (does Auggie
Busch read this list?).  A bit earlier in Babylon certain types of beer were
reserved for Siris and Ninkasi temple use so brewing restriction must have
existed.

Maybe Chad can address the logic behind Gulatingslov but I expect is was for
the pagan Yule (solstice eve) celebration with perhaps religious
proscriptions.   I'm a little amused at Chad's contention that Christianity
supplanted the northern pagan mid-winter fest.    Personally I think that
Christianity has only made a small dent.  The Midwinter fest is still full
of Yule elves (tho' now carrying Christian names like SantaClaus), yule
logs, wassail, mulled wine, caroling, the use of evergreens, misletoe, holly
all with associations pagan custom; Thor, Freya but also Odin and Balder as
well as druidic practice.   Thor(aka Donner)'s  flying wagon pulled by a
team of horned goats becomes a sleigh pulled by a reindeer (one named
Donner) !  Odin's penchant for leaving gifts for children is taken up by
S.Claus.  Balder's death from misletoe at the hands of his brother and
eventual rebirth, like the Christian story, echoes the astronomical change
from a receding sun to an approaching one.   Even the Germanic custom of
eating pork at new years connects directly with Freya and the boar
symbology.    Norse 'yule', Anglo-Saxon 'geol' and the Germanic 'weh'
solstice fests share a lot in common.   My observation is that Christian
influence at mid-winter ranks third after pagan and commercial aspects of
the holidays

 -S