Yeast & Fermentation

Is Pils top- or bottom-fermented? Pils is bottom-fermented, meaning a lager yeast ferments the wort — the sugary liquid from the brewhouse — at cool temperatures, usually around eight to twelve degrees Celsius. The yeast settles to the bottom at the end of fermentation, which gives the style its name.

This kind of lager yeast is a hybrid of two yeast species, but that's a story for another chapter. What matters for Jever is the effect: the cool, slow fermentation produces almost no fruity esters and no heavy secondary aromas, keeping the beer clean and dry. That suits a Pils meant to live and breathe through its hops.

After primary fermentation comes lagering. The young beer rests for additional weeks in cold tanks, the yeast settles, carbonation binds, and the beer clarifies. Large breweries use modern stainless steel tanks for this, not rock cellars. In the flat marshland, there aren't any mountains to carve cellars into anyway.

Smaller houses go their own way. Küstenbrauerei Werdum bottles an unfiltered Pils, meaning it's left cloudy, with fine suspended yeast particles. The beer looks hazier and often tastes rounder. For the bock that several breweries offer in winter, the yeast needs more time, since the wort is stronger and fermentation proceeds more slowly.

Jever Pilsener is filtered to a bright finish. That gives it the clarity expected of a Pils and keeps the beer fresher for longer, even on its journey to stores far beyond the coast.