Aug 1st, 2011
New Beer: PG-13
PG-13 is the newest beer from Mother’s and it’s only available on draft in Mother’s Tasting Room. PG-13 will be tapped on Friday, August 5th at 5pm.
So you’re probably wondering, “what exactly is PG-13?” To be honest, we’re wondering the same thing…. well, kind of. I mean, we do know what it tastes like and what we were going for, but it’s a different kind of beer. This is what we can tell you about PG-13……
PG-13 is not a bitter and it’s not a pale ale, but it does lie somewhere in that general tasty area. It is a medium bodied, copper colored ale with a touch of toasty, biscuity malt character and a soft bitterness with big hop flavor. PG-13 resembles its originator, Foggy Notion (Barley Wine Style Ale), in that it was made from the same mash using an old brewing technique called, parti-gyle. PG-13 also uses the same hop varieties as used in Foggy Notion.
So now you might be wondering, what in the hell is parti-gyle? Well, your Mother’s loves you enough to give you lil’ bit of information about that as well…. Brace yourself.
Parti-gyle is an old English brewing technique that involves drawing off the first part of the mash and using it to make a stronger ale (i.e. Barely Wine in this instance), then re-mashing the grain and drawing off the second runnings for a lesser strength (ABV) and weaker wort.
Old English breweries often used the parti-gyle technique to make three brews from a single mash - a strong ale (XXX), a common (XX), and a small beer (X). This technique was not just used by English brewers. In fact, this is the historical basic of the categories of Beglian Trappist beers: triple was made from the undiluted worth from the mash, double was made from the runoff from re-flooding the first mash, and single was made from a subsequent infusion.
So there you have it, parti-gyle. Now, you can come on down to Mother’s tasting room and taste, first hand, how we used this technique to end up with PG-13.
We hope to see you soon!
Cheers!