HomeBlogNorthbound Strikes Doppelbock Gold with Weyermann® Specialty Malts

Northbound Strikes Doppelbock Gold with Weyermann® Specialty Malts

For Northbound Smokehouse & Brewpub, 2024 was truly the Year of the Bock. The Minneapolis brewery’s rich and robust doppelbock – crafted using 100% Weyermann® malts – dominated on both the local and global stages, winning the top prize in Dark Lagers category at the Minnesota Craft Brewers Guild’s MN Brewers Cup in March. A month later it won a gold medal in the German-Style Doppelbock or Eisbock category at the World Beer Cup. To round out an epic malty trifecta, Northbound’s eisbock, produced from the winning doppelbock, brought home a gold medal from the Great American Beer Festival in the fall. With such impressive credentials on their mantle, we wanted to talk with the Northbound brewers about these two deeply malty brews and the excitement around their annual release. So, we linked up with co-owner/brewer Jamie Robinson and brewer Andy Rosenthal (above) over a few glasses of the beer.

Reenvisioning a Robust and Strong Malty Lager

The original iteration of the doppelbock, developed by Robinson, had been part of the brewery’s seasonal line-up since it opened in 2013. It’s so popular Northbound built an annual outdoor beer poking party in the frigid month of January around it, which quickly became the busiest day of the year for the brewpub. (Those crazy Minnesotans!) The brewery took a break from brewing doppelbock in 2020 due to COVID-era changes in demand. When the doppelbock returned the following year, it had a new look, feel, and taste at the hand of brewer Andy Rosenthal – essentially an overhaul featuring new base and specialty malts. Doppelbock 2.0, if you will. 

The first change was using Weyermann® Barke® Munich malt in place of what was a blend of Weyermann® Munich Malt Type I and Munich Malt Type II malts in the original recipe. “It’s such a solid malt,” Rosenthal said of Barke® Munich. “It tastes great right out of the bag. We’ve used it in other beers and just fell in love with how deep and robust it is. The entire brewing process with it is wonderful. When we’ve used it in fairly high percentages in other beers we end up with a bread toast and honey background that lays the canvas for specialty malts to come in and meld with.”

Rosenthal says he loves to include Munich-style malts often as an accent, but when used as a base malt they create an incredible foundation – especially for richer, darker beers. “Some people might get intimidated because in the malting process it does get pushed up into some higher Lovibonds, but if you look at the recommendations it can be used up to 100%. We did that once to nearly 100% with an amber bock, and that was the beer that opened our eyes to what this malt can do.”

During doppelbock’s one-year hiatus, Rosenthal also experimented with different malts in brewing the brewpub’s annual Oktoberfest, including Weyermann® CARABOHEMIAN®, a drum-roasted caramel malt with intense bread notes and flavors of caramel and toffee. “Using a smaller amount in our Oktoberfest, I liked how the malt tasted and how it performed. I thought using a high percentage of it in the doppelbock could play out really well.” Robinson agreed and said he also enjoys the notes of raisin and dark fruit the malt provides to the doppelbock.

The inclusion of Weyermann® Floor-Malted Bohemian Dark Malt, an heirloom malt floor-malted in the Czech Republic by Weyermann for intense earthy malt aroma and sweetness, cranks the doppelbock’s malt complexity to 11 with layered notes of bread and biscuit. Rosenthal had experienced the depth of its flavor previously when brewing a Czech Dark Lager and knew it had a place in Doppelbock 2.0. “I was basically taking experiences of brewing other beers with these malts, taking slivers of flavors from each to help redefine our doppelbock beer. My favorite doppelbock is Ayinger Celebrator, and it was my biggest influence. Not that I’m trying to make Celebrator, but I’m taking what I like about the beer and expressing that with the ingredients I know how to use.”

At Northbound, the grains are mashed with a single infusion, and the run-off wort boiled for two hours in the brewery’s direct fired kettle. The combination of the full-bodied malts and long boil helps emphasize the malts present in the recipe. Even before your first sip, the beer looks absolutely beautiful: a brilliantly clear deep amber-red color with a lasting head. One taste and you know why the 8.5% ABV doppelbock is a favorite for brewpub regulars and competition judges alike. “There’s a lot going on, but it’s not overwhelming,” said Rosenthal. “Honey. Biscuit. Toasted Bread. Dark fruit and caramel flavors. It’s a big, bold, caramel-laden doppelbock with a rich malt character. As it warms you get more toffee and dark raisin flavors.” It has a charm and warmth that makes it almost dessert-like without the strength of a much stronger beer, such as the brewery’s 11.5% ABV Block Heater Barleywine. Robinson is particularly fond of the Weyermann® Barke® line for its unique nutty character. “You can put a glass of our updated doppelbock recipe next to a glass of German doppelbock that someone’s been making for 200 years and they’ll be comparable,” he said. “And that’s because of the quality and performance of those malt ingredients.” 

In addition to the competition awards doppelbock garnered last year, Rosenthal is exceptionally proud that the beer was included in a list of Top 10 Beers of 2024 by none other than respected beer journalist Stan Hieronymus by way of Craft Beer & Brewing. His words: “A beer I would have liked to have lingered over, had I not hopped off an airport-bound train with a need to hop on another soon. Rich but focused, with pure malt flavors (plural), bready texture, and hints of dark fruit. A solid punch of alcohol without being cloying. Worth the hop off/hop on.”

Eis As Nice!

But the fun is only beginning with the doppelbock. Every year Northbound has brewed any form of doppelbock, Jamie Robinson has overseen production of a very small, limited batch of eisbock. The brewery’s eisbock is made by traditional methods, by freezing part of the water off of the finished doppelbock, yielding a more concentrated eisbock that becomes a second style created out of one beer. This year’s 8.5% ABV doppelbock produced a 16% ABV eisbock. Robinson says without a top-notch doppelbock there can be no top-notch eisbock because all the original beer’s flavors (or flaws) will be magnified. “Our doppelbock lagers at 31°F for three months, which drops out tannins and impurities to make an extremely clean doppelbock. That’s a huge part of the process, and you cannot rush it.” 

Part of making these immaculately clean lagers is using reverse osmosis water that is treated only with calcium chloride. “There are no impurities in this beer,” said Robinson. “It is stripped all the way down to zero and we add back only calcium chloride. You need calcium for the yeast health, keeping cell walls strong while fermenting a huge beer like this. You also end up with residual chloride in the wort which accentuates the subtleties of malt flavors in the beer.”

The biggest thing that people notice about the eisbock is the alcohol, but it’s so much more than just a boozy beer. “It’s actually kind of weird,” said Robinson, “because some of the flavors that are subtle in the doppelbock become very pronounced in the eisbock. You might get some lighter notes of toffee and raisin – maybe even some anise – from the doppelbock, but those flavors are very prominent in the eisbock. They are largely coming from the use of the Weyermann® CARABOHEMIAN® and are accentuated by the alcohol.”

The alcohol definitely helps keep beer lovers warm during the brewpub’s annual winter eisbock release and beer poking party, much of which takes place on Northbound’s outdoor patio. Poking the doppelbock and eisbocks with a glowing hot poker further accentuates the caramel and dark fruit notes in the beers. The crowd is full of smiles and laughter as they celebrate a very limited and exclusive beer, only available on the release date and a small window thereafter in the brewpub.

“The haze craze of hazy IPAs has really hurt the appreciation of styles like doppelbock and eisbock,” said Robinson. “I hope that with back-to-back awards and the release event we’re helping to make more people aware of these classic styles and how enjoyable they are to brew and drink.” 

We’ll Drink to That

Our thanks go out to the entire Northbound team for their hospitality and good humor. Nothing beats seeing talented, hardworking brewers receive hardwon hardware. When it’s time to brew traditional German beers that turn your taproom and patio into party central, RahrBSG is your one and only source for Weyermann®’s award-winning malts. We can’t wait to work with you!

Previous Blog Post Next Blog Post