Dogfish Head unveils Blue Hen Pilsner
Dogfish Head Brewery is jumping into the emerging pilsner market with a concoction that pays homage to Delaware’s present and past: Blue Hen Pilsner.
The light beverage – only 4.8 percent alcohol by volume – is crisp and goes down smooth on a warm spring day. For a company famous for its India Pale Ales, a pilsner is a bit different, but Dogfish founder Sam Calagione said it’s a style the brewery has experimented with before. The beer had its official launch at Dogfish Head’s Rehoboth Beach EmPOURium April 3.
Calagione said Dogfish’s first collaboration beer was a 2003 pilsner with beer journalist Michael Jackson, part of an effort to revive what was then a marginalized beer style. A pilsner, and its American cousin the light lager, is different from an IPA in that it is fermented cold. Pilsners originated in Europe and closely follow one of the world’s most famous laws, the German purity law of 1516, which states that beer only consists of three ingredients: water, barley and hops, in addition to yeast.
Calagione said unlike an IPA, which typically uses several different hops, fruits and other flavors, there’s really nowhere to hide with a pilsner, which only uses four ingredients. Ales also use warm fermentation, so they are easier and quicker to make. Making a consistently good pilsner requires patience, since cold fermentation takes longer. It’s also what gives pilsners and lagers their more mellow complexity. Calagione said the best way to think of it is that ales are like red wines and pilsners are like white wines. He said his head brewers, Bryan Selders at the Rehoboth brewpub and Mark Safarick at the Milton brewery, like the style for its challenges.
Blue Hen Pilsner uses water from Milton and Rehoboth, Saaz hops from Czech Republic and malted barley made in Delmar, Calagione said, giving it a mix of local and European flavor. The malt used in pilsner is lightly toasted, which gives the beer its light-gold appearance. Pilsners and lagers have been experiencing a revival in the craft beer world, which has been dominated for years by IPAs and more recently, sours.
The can for Blue Hen Pilsner is an homage to the state bird and the University of Delaware mascot, the fighting blue hen. But Calagione said the name actually originates with Delaware’s history in the Revolutionary War, when a company of Delaware soldiers was known as the Sons of the Blue Hen, due to their blue uniforms and their commanding officer owning a fighting hen.
The release of Blue Hen Pilsner came with a collaboration between Dogfish Head and Kam Productions in Milford, makers of the ubiquitous 302 logo with the horseshoe crab. The collaboration resulted in handmade, screen-printed T-shirts with the Blue Hen Pilsner logo on the front and the 302 logo on the sleeve.
Keith Mosher, co-founder of Kam Productions, said Calagione had contacted them in the fall about collaborating on apparel to tie into the beer release. He said the idea was to make the shirt very Delaware-centric. The 302 logo itself came about by accident, Mosher said. Organizers at Milton Theatre asked him to come up with designs for their retro film screenings in 2016. The result was the horseshoe crab with Delaware’s area code. Mosher said Dogfish has sold about 50 percent of its inventory of the shirts within the first three days of the Blue Hen Pilsner release.
The shirts are available at Dogfish Head’s EmPOURium in Rehoboth.
Calagione said for now, Blue Hen Pilsner is available in four-pack, 16-ounce cans in Rehoboth. Distribution will then expand to the Milton brewery, Calagione said, and eventually, beyond.
For more information on Blue Hen Pilsner, visit dogfish.com.
