Beer News: Siebel Tech Releases Open Source Beer Recipe / Mega-Drought Threatens Mexican Breweries

The beer biz never sleeps at American Craft Beer. And here’s just some of what’s been happening while you were drinking your way through the holidays.

Brewing Institute Releases “First Ever” Open Source Beer Recipe

For the first time in its 150-year history, Siebel Institute of Technology has released a specially formulated “open source beer recipe” for professional and homebrewers to recreate.

The Classic American Style Pilsner featured in this recipe dates to before Prohibition, and its roots are entwined within the roots of the school itself. Dr. J.E. Siebel was a pioneer in the evolution of the style, which uses malted barley, corn, and both domestic and imported hop varieties to create a smooth and easy-drinking lager beer. The recipe was selected after taste testing by almost 300 participants in blind tasting panels conducted at breweries in Chicago and at Siebel itself.

The official name of the beer is JE Siebel 1-Fifty Classic American Pilsner, named for the legendary German immigrant who established this historic brewing institute in Chicago in 1872.

 

Words to Drink By

“Life is every bit as devious as Death. It too can slip into town, lurk in an alley, or wait in the back of a tavern. “Bob Lefsetz, Music industry writer and media analyst – Amor Towles, American author, A Gentleman in Moscow

 

Mexican Drought May Change the Balance of Global Beer Production

Mexico is the world’s largest beer exporter and many of those big breweries our located in the North, a region now reeling from one of the worst droughts in decades. Dry conditions currently affect 85% of the country. Mexico City is seeing its worst drought in 30 years. Mexican newspaper El País, has reported that roughly 60 large water reservoirs, mostly in northern and central Mexico, were below 25 percent capacity. Some residents have been left without running water altogether.

Mexico exported 42 million hectoliters of beer in 2021, 11.5% more than in 2020 and, according to the World Bank, Mexican brewers sold more than US$5 billion worth of beer abroad last year. Mexican beer exports far exceeds those of Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands, however its future looks shaky unless resolutions to the country’s increasing drought conditions  are found soon.

Constellation Brands, home to popular beer brands Corona and Modelo, began the construction of a mega-brewery in Mexicali, one of the driest regions in Mexico back in 2016. But responding to farmers and regional activists who argued that the new brewery would overburden the region’s already limited water resources, that brewery was never completed.

Heineken has a plant in Baja California, where they expanded capacity in 2021. Anheuser-Busch has two breweries in the northern Mexico.

If the droughts continue and breweries are forced to rebuild entirely in new areas, Mexican beer exports will be vastly reduced, a reduction that will be felt around the world.

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