What is a craft lager? Geist Brewing Co. launches a new beer, Geist Repeat Strong

Bengaluru-based brewery Geist Brewing Co. has a portfolio of wit beers, Bavarian dark beers, American IPAs and Belgian blonde ales. But what was missing was a good old lager. The new launch, Geist Repeat Strong, is filling the gap. A crisp lager-style beer that has a balance between malts, hops and finish. It is easy on the palate, and pairs with most foods.

“Geist is South India’s first distribution craft brewery,” says Narayan Manepally, Founder and CEO, Geist Brewing Co. In 2010, the Karnataka government made laws that allowed microbreweries to start, and there was no looking back.  “We started with an association with two microbreweries in Bengaluru, Brewski and Byg Brewski. What we heard from customers was, we love your beers, but we do not want to wait in traffic to have them. Please make it available closer to home.” In 2016, they got an industrial brewery license and launched cans of beers like Geist Witty Wit (Belgian-style wheat ale), Geist Uncle Dunkel (German-style dark wheat beer), Geist Kamacitra (IPA). The ales worked very well in the Indian market then.

The 500 ml cans are priced at ₹210 in Karnataka
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What is the difference between an ale and a lager?

Narayan breaks it down. Broadly speaking ales and lagers are two categories of beer. “The difference is that they use two different strains of yeast, a lager strain of yeast and an ale strain of yeast.” Lagers are generally fermented at a cooler temperature, between 15°- 17° Celsius, for a longer period of time. Whereas an ale is fermented at 21° Celsius for about 14 days. “So, an ale has more rapid fermentation, resulting in more of a mouthfeel, whereas lagers are crisper and drier.” Typically, in India people know lagers as barley-based beers.

So why lagers now?

“Interestingly enough, worldwide there is a trend nowadays of going back to lagers…sort of going back to basics.”

The Geist Repeat Strong has an 18 IBU, and alcohol content of under 8% . The lagers are all malt lagers and use traditional methods of brewing. They do not add any ‘feed’ exogenous enzymes while brewing. “We wanted to pay tribute to the way lagers were originally brewed.” The beer is an ‘export’ style beer. (Export in this context means the strength of the beer and does not denote it going outside the country). It is a strong, but drinkable beer. Not very bitter but with a malty backbone. The beer is lighter in colour, making it more approachable. “We waited to introduce a lager, because we wanted to get it right,” Narayan explains.

“There are many mass-produced lagers in the market, but we wanted to make ours craft like and different.” Geist tested and researched these beers for over a period of two years before the launch.

The beer is priced ₹210 in Karnataka for 500 ml cans. Available across retail stores across Bengaluru and will be available in other states soon