Birra di Modena is an historical style of lager, which in fact recaptures the Bohemiam style prevalent in the late 19th century in Vienna, a city with which Modena had tight commercial ties dating back to the Estense Duchy and its Hapsburg-Este family. Birra di Modena is distinctive for its decisive character and full body combined with a suave taste and moderate alcohol content (ABV 5%). That combination, unusual today, was preferred at the turn of the century and is made possible by the preparation of the wort through the process of double decoction. Birra di Modena, hearkening back to this historical Modena style, is produced in a brewery in Bohemia (today part of the Czech Republic) because only there does the beer industry still use this traditional process. Almost all other lagers today use infusion for the wort. The double decoction exalts the sweetness of the malt in balance with decisive character.

Characteristics

Bottom-fermented, lager
Color: golden
Flavor: Suave, not bitter, but with full taste and body

Alcohol by volume: 5%
International Bitterness Units (IBU): 27

In favor of normal beer

On our site you can find the sitcom “Professor Sanguinetti’s Campaign for Normal Beer.” It portrays a professor from the University of Modena, who, finding himself in New York on an academic exchange [...]

Is Birra di Modena a craft beer?

Heaven forbid. It is a traditional regional beer. It follows faithfully the style of beer prevalent at the end of the 19th century in the Austrian Empire and also in Modena with its traditional ties to Vienna [...]

Barbaric customs in the consumption of beer

1) In Australia lager is served at 1°C whereas in general it should be served at 6°-12°C according to exact type. Consequently, one hardly tastes it, which may be just as well for certain Australian lagers. [...]

Birra di Modena
Summary Card
Fine beer, produced in an historic brewery of the Hapsburg lands, according to a style current at the end of the 19th century in the Austrian Empire and also in the Estense Duchy of Modena with its traditional links to Vienna.
Bottom-fermented, lager Alcohol by volume (ABV): 5%
Color: golden International Bitterness Units (IBU): 27
Flavor: suave, not bitter, but with taste and full body
Birra di Modena is an historical style of lager beer. It hearkens back to the original Vienna style
created by Anton Dreher in 1841 for an amber-dark beer with a pronounced malty flavor. This style evolved towards a lighter version thanks to new malting techniques that had originated earlier in England and Bavaria and were then adopted in Bohemia (today in the Czech Republic), where the Dreher Group had a brewery, and that permitted the production of beers in various shades of yellow, from straw-colored to golden. Many of these were strongly hopped and bitter, with IBU’s up to 45. Others offered the sweet softness of malt, derived not from simple infusion (as used today for almost all lagers) but from the double or triple decoction that is still typical of Czech beers. This process confers on Birra di Modena a distinctive character though it remains a suave and only moderately alcoholic beer.

 

May the lord’s beer be simple

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    Birra di Modena
    Che sia parca la birra del signore