Beer: Science, Styles, Sampling
Written by Jonathan Slonim
At last, a beer tasting class is being offered at Hillsdale College!
I’m not in the Honors Program, but when I saw that an honors seminar was being offered called “Beer: Science, Styles, Sampling,” I knew I had to get into it. As soon as the honors classes were opened to non-honors students, I snagged the last open spot in the class.
It has been entirely worth the trouble.
Dr. Christopher Hamilton and about twelve seniors meet every Friday afternoon at three o’clock in the Dow Science Building to learn about the chemistry behind a student’s favorite drink. We have learned how different kinds of yeasts break down sugars and other starches to create alcohol, how alpha-acids (which give the drink its bitterness and much of its flavor) are isomerized at high temperatures, and how grain is turned into malt.
That probably sounds like an awful lot of science for a class about an alcoholic beverage. In fact, over half of the class is comprised of chemistry, biology, and bio-chemistry majors, and the rest of us were required to have basic chemistry as a prerequisite to get into the class.
After about half an hour of lecture about the science of beer, we get to the fun part of the class. Dr. Hamilton breaks out four or five different beers of a given style (IPA, Hefeweizen, Pilsner, Porter, etc.) and we all taste each one, writing down our comments on the aroma, appearance, flavor, and texture, comparing them to standards set by the Beer Judging Certification Program (BJCP).
This is probably the most fun I’ve had in a class at Hillsdale. I have gotten to learn more about beer than I thought was possible, I’ve made new friends through a “field trip” to a brew-pub nearby, and I currently have 50 bottles of homemade beer finishing in my off-campus house.
And yes, we did get carded on the first day of class.
Jonathan Slonim is a senior Economics and History double-major at Hillsdale College. After he graduates in May, he will get married and start working full-time for the management consulting firm McKinsey and Company in New York City.