In this episode we take a deep dive on strong German lagers from the bock family – doppelbock, maibock, weizenbock, eisbock. We trace the history of this style back through the mists of time to the city of Einbeck, then follow it’s reinvention as a lager in 17th century Munich, and the development of the rich, sweet salvator style that is now known as doppelbock. Then we head out to Edison Brewing in Gahana for a conversation with owner Wil Schulze and brewmaster Victor Ecimovich. Victor shares some of his wisdom learned in brewing traditional German-style beers over many years at breweries including Millstream (Iowa), Goose Island (Chicago) and Hosters (Columbus). The final segment features friend and award winning homebrewer Jamie Gentry for a discussion on homebrewing bocks.
Don’t forget you can find this episode and earlier ones on our podcast page, as well as Apple Music, Podbean or Spotify. Just search for the Pat’s Pints/Mark’s Mugs – All Things Beer podcast, and don’t hesitate to leave a comment or a rating.
Beers Featured
- Ayinger Celebrator Doppelbock
- Paulaner Salvator Doppelbock
- Edison Willy Goat Bock
- Edison Zenerator Doppelbock
- Edison Kozy AL Maibock
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Pat's Pints 
Pat/Mark. Here is your next assignment should you choose to accept it. Does the annual variation in alpha and beta analysis make it a challenge to brew a consistent IPA each year? The reason I ask is there are two local, notable IPAs that are clearly not the same beer they were in the past. Maybe just an intentional recipe change.
Mark could probably answer this question better than i can, but it is my understanding that since hops and malt do show variations from place to place and year to year making a consistent product is always a moving target. Then again the public’s taste preferences also change, which can also drive recipe changes. I’d be curious to hear which beers promoted this question (this could be offline if you prefer).
We are hoping to do an episode on hops later in the year and if that comes to fruition this would be an excellent question to explore in more detail.