Why Does Beer Need To Have A Head

[deebee]

Someone asked me recently why does beer have to have a good head on it. The only reasons I could come up with were firstly that it helps to hold and disperse the beers aroma and secondly that it looked good. Possibly it is also a reflection of good ingredients and brewing practices. I suppose it also gives you a hint when to stop pouring so that you dont spill your beer.

Of course some beers tend to not hold a very good head particularly with high levels of alcohol, and I no longer worry when one of my beers carries little head, but in many styles the head of the beer is characteristic.

Why? What is its purpose?

DB

 

[Tony M]

DB, I can just picture you sitting in the middle of your vege garden staring into a beer and contemplating the meaning of life and the secrets of the universe.
----but I cant help you.

 

[Fingerlickin_B]

I've had many beers that just seem to taste (for lack of a better word) better when you get some froth in your mouth when you take a sip

PZ.

 

[Whistlingjack]

Possibly it is also a reflection of good ingredients and brewing practices.

Hit the nail on the head, so to speak. Just the right amount of proteins from the mash and hopping.

Too much and you'll get turbid beer but good head retention. Too little, no head and loss of some desirable flavour compounds.

WJ

Ps. I agree with the aroma part as well.

 

[jayse]

Hit the nail on the head, so to speak. Just the right amount of proteins from the mash and hopping.

Thats more closer to the question 'Why does beer have a head? but here I think Deebee (or deebee's mate) asks 'why does beer NEED a head?'. Totally different question.

You could almost say with the general consumers in many countries its the same as why does beer need to be yellow fizzy stuff. Thats simply because thats what beer has been like for the last several generations of beer drinkers and if it looked any different the masses are gunna be put of. <_<

Anyway thats my little twisted twist on it. h34r:



Jayse

 

[Ross]

It doesn't need a head - In the south of England, if your beers served with a head, you hand it back & tell them to fill the glass.
I continually get knocked in comps on my English Bitters for not holding a head - If carbonated correctly to style, they don't. I wonder how many of the judges here have actually drunk a cask bitter - not many I reckon from the feedback I've recieved...

cheers Ross

 

[Wortgames]

You mean they don't look like this Ross? Tsk tsk tsk, you must be doing something wrong :lol:






DeeBee: A beer doesn't need a good head any more than a woman does. But it's nice to have isn't it...

"a reflection of good ingredients and brewing practices" - bingo.

 

[Adamt]

Following on from Jayse:

When you say beer to your average joe, they think of "yellow/amber, fizzy clear liquid with a frothy head". For your mega-swill, its purely aesthetic, there's no aroma to subdue, and its produced by artificial compounds; just like fake tits!

 

[Uncle Fester]

It doesn't need a head - In the south of England, if your beers served with a head, you hand it back & tell them to fill the glass.
I continually get knocked in comps on my English Bitters for not holding a head - If carbonated correctly to style, they don't. I wonder how many of the judges here have actually drunk a cask bitter - not many I reckon from the feedback I've recieved...

cheers Ross

I'm hearing you Ross. A friend of my old man's used to ask the barmaid if his beer had any head on it...

"do you reckon you could fit a dash of lemonade in that glass love?"

If the answer was "yes", then his instant retort was

"Well, I don't like lemonade..... so could you top it up with beer instead?" :huh:


Gotta love the Irish!

Festa

 

[roger mellie]

It doesn't need a head - In the south of England, if your beers served with a head, you hand it back & tell them to fill the glass.
I continually get knocked in comps on my English Bitters for not holding a head - If carbonated correctly to style, they don't. I wonder how many of the judges here have actually drunk a cask bitter - not many I reckon from the feedback I've recieved...

cheers Ross

And a great shame too Ross

Good news is I am off to Blightey in a week - staying in Guildford - I can tell ya there wont be much else drunk than FLAT WARM BEER :excl: . Going to pay a visit to the HogsBack Brewery and if I get time to that one in Horsham whos name escapes me.

Gotta love it :beer:

RM

 

[Coodgee]

I imagine beer in early civilisations as a frothy rich brew, with suds overflowing from primitive coconut shells. yum! full of impurities and protiens and all sorts of stuff.
full of impurities and protiens and all sorts of stuff.

 

[InCider]

Apart from bring a K&K brewer, I complete the philistine phermentation by drinking straight out of the longnecks. So does it really need a head? No - unless I have to share a glass and make an impression. Tallies are great for gardening with. So many fenceposts, so many coasters!

 

[Steve]

its just aesthetics and what you get used too when gowing up drinking beer....in the north of england if an ale didnt have a head you handed it back and asked for something else. I'm drinking a glass of coopers sparkling now - it doesnt have a head - but it tastes nice...
Cheers
Steve

 

[berapnopod]

Going to pay a visit to the HogsBack Brewery and if I get time to that one in Horsham whos name escapes me.

Would that be Gales, you lucky *******???

To answer deebee's original question, I think deebee had the answer in one. It makes the beer look better and holds in (and dispenses) the aromas a lot better than a flat surface.

Berp.

 

[MHB]

I recall from some reading of the history of brewing that there are several historic reasons why "Head" is perceived as beneficial.

Primarily for a couple of thousand years the drinking water was suspect - read dangerous - beer was the every day drink, to ferment beer you need good, clean potable water. An infected or poorly made beer usually won't form or hold a head.

So it comes down to a heady beer is a safe beer - old habits dying hard.

For the last few decades the mega breweries have been saying "Look at our beer isnt it pretty", they could hardly get away with saying "Taste our beer isnt it flavoursome" now could they.

Its good marketing to take an entrenched cultural imperative and reinforce the hell out of it, to make your market see your product the epitome of what they think they want.

If you are trying to sell a beer in today's market it better have a pile of suds on top - no mater how good it tastes.

Sadly the same often applies to comps - perception is everything.

MHB

 

[johnno]

I thought this was another Pumpy poll.

cheers
johnno

 

[bugwan]

Since most of our taste is actuallly sensed by olfactory means, could the head oin a beer (ie. high concentration of gases) assist these flavours in getting to the smell sensors in the back of the throat/nose? Just a (questionable) theory.

The foam on beer also assists the not-so-stable drinker deliver his round to the table with minimal spillage. I spent most of my years in Engliand with wet elbows, ferrying full pints of bitter (sans head) to the table...