I met Lauren many years ago, most likely while judging at the Great American Beer Festival. She’s always a treat to talk to, as she thinks very deeply about the sensory experience. In her various roles at New Belgium brewing from starting their sensory program to her current job in charge of sour and wood-aged beers at New Belgium Brewery, she has gained a uniquely wise perspective that should be helpful to those involved in the sensory perception of any kind of food or beverage.
Lauren was one of the first people I wanted to talk to as I started researching the book, so this interview took place in June of 2018. Thanks to Lauren for taking the time to share her fascinating insights. There really wasn’t a lot of back-and-forth with this interview. I just got her going and she did the rest. Here goes:
Lauren: Today, I’m making pickled roses for a saffron and rose beer. I get to do fun stuff like that.
My Job at New Belgium:
Around 1998, I was assisting with production, and I heard a call over the PA saying the taste panels were running in the ‘Liquid Center.’ Anybody who wanted to could taste. At that time, it was just pitchers and/or bottles of today’s production plus pens and pieces of scrap paper. You were supposed to write your name and thoughts—that’s it. I was wondering what the purpose of this was and also thinking I could definitely help, and at some point somebody said: ‘Great, you’re in charge.’
I found the sensory groups on Yahoo and started asking all kinds of questions. People were very helpful, sometimes even calling me. Eventually I realized who these people were and I was like ‘Holy Crap!” I’m so sorry I’ve been bothering you.’ They were very helpful and I found out a lot of things I was doing wrong. Take out the biases, right? Randomize. Nobody was validated on attributes.
UC Davis was starting up a sensory course and I became one of their guinea pigs. Whatever I learned, I was doing it wrong. Of course it was fantastic. Then I started hiring people like Lindsay Barr [Founding parter of DraughtLab] and Ali Schultz [currently Sensory Manager at New Belgium and Bell’s breweries]. I’m wildly open to hiring smarter people than me. I don’t have that fear. The program is pretty incredible now.
For the last three years I have been the Wood Cellar Director and Blender, which was just part of my job prior to that. My team and I create all the New Belgium sour beers, start to finish. We started in 2000 with La Folie as the first blend, then [Terroir] series, tart lychees and more. These days the market is different so we use the foudres for smaller batches.
Let’s say I want to make a beer that tastes like a peach cobbler. How do I do that? One thing is mindful sourcing, with the right fruit variety from a great location.
A lot of my job is to keep all 65 foudres happy. We know we have 300 living organisms in there, 30 of which we have identified. We have to create a decision tree about what to do at any given point and look for markers over the life of that barrel. We look at isoamyl acetate [a banana-scented ester and yeast by-product]. At the second month it will taste like a ‘normal’ fermentation. Early on, we want to know if the bacteria is alive. Taste and pH will tell us that.
At 5–6 months we get full organic acid development and some stabilization. The ‘beery things’—like esters—go away, and the brett is done. We’re looking for a focused sour, not muddy. Along the way we get these strange aromas, which Ted and I have our own language for: dead leaves, brothy, dog food. Some of them we’ve figured out what the chemicals are, and then we can try to figure out ‘well, where did that come from. That last one is caproic [hexanoic] acid.
The unholy trinity is acetic acid, acetaldehyde and ethyl acetate. Once a beer gets to that point, it’s gone—you can’t go back. Once the Brett dies, you lose that antioxidant power, and then Acetobacter can go crazy.
Tasting:
There are three modes: First, is drinking. Brain off, just for the pleasure, not trying to be in my glass. Second, is with friends, to categorize, compartmentalize and hopefully deconstruct. Third is evaluation.
When I’m teaching tasting 101, the first thing is forgive yourself for not being good. Everything tastes like something, so pull from your own experience, memories. I always give people homework before they show up for class. Get a beer, pen, paper. Just you and yourself, quiet and calm. Now, beer. Say it out loud so your brain can hear it. Then, put it all together and put it on paper. Now, tell the class. Talk to me like you’re writing a Harlequin romance novel. Get a little racy with it. Get emotional.
Being intuitive is so beyond us because we’ve had it beat out of us. People say ‘I don’t want to be squishy.’
The most interesting thing about beer and sensory is that even the simplest beers are among the most complicated things you can describe.
Color:
Color messes with people so much. I always have people write about color last, because after you write ‘yellow,’ it’s hard to find blueberry after.
My Tasting Life:
I got out of the concrete world and into a much better place trying to live equally in both sides of my brain, seamlessly switching back and forth. People generally live in either the right or left side. In normal life we don’t get to talk about the unconscious. Our limbic and language don’t generally jibe with each other, but they share things through our memory.
I still get to make beers for people who drink things they really like. It’s terrifying these days, with the Internet. There’s a lot of shallow experience out there: what’s in, what’s out, what’s cool; how to dress—all this stuff. And even what to think and what you’re supposed to like.
It’s painful to watch people who are always ‘on the tips of their tongues.’ They just can’t find it. And I think that’s the way a lot of people are like that with their hopes, dreams, memories, desires. Being in touch with these deeper parts of your brain makes you a whole person.