Five Stars vs Classic, or the two colors of Mahou, who roam freely speaking beer throughout the Central area of Spain, where it has its great fiefdoms and where the Mahou ‘Red’ and the Mahou ‘Green’ coexist almost equally.
However, despite being sisters, they are very different beers. No, we are referring to the color of the can or the label – it is very obvious – or the name – which is also obvious – we are referring to its composition.
At first: water, hops, yeast and barley malt. If we read the ingredients, we will see that we are facing the same ‘shopping list’. So, how is it understood that the Mahou ‘Verde’ has less alcohol or is lighter than the Mahou ‘Red’, somewhat more alcoholic and with more body?
Furthermore, both being lager beers —The predominant style in our country—, which are low-fermented beers, with a golden blonde color, moderate bitterness and medium to mild intensity.
A specialty beer vs a beer
To understand why Mahou Cinco Estrellas is different from Mahou Clásica we have to go to the BOE. Yes, specifically until Royal Decree 678/2016 where the beer quality standard and malt beverages.
Here it is stipulated that beer is a food resulting from fermentation, using selected yeasts, from a brewer’s must made from natural raw materials. Then further divided into different options.
- Cereal beer: When the presence of barley malt in the beer must is less than 50% with respect to the total malt, it will bear the name “Beer from” followed by the name of the cereal with the highest weight content.
- Extra beer: Beer with a primitive dry extract greater than or equal to 15% by mass.
- Special beer: Beer with a primitive dry extract greater than or equal to 13 percent by mass and less than 15 percent by mass.
- Black beer: Beer that exceeds 50 color units, according to the analytical method of the European Brewery Convention (EBC).
- Low alcohol content beer: Beer whose alcohol content is between 1 and 3 percent by volume.
- Non-alcoholic beer: Beer whose alcohol content is less than 1% by volume.
With the law in hand, Mahou Cinco Estrellas is a special beer (which does not mean worse or better, or that it likes more or less) and Mahou Clásica is a beer (without this having to do with its quality) because it has an extract primitive dry of between 13% and 15% of mass.
But what are you talking about with this primitive dry extract?
ESP is the percentage of ingredients that make up the beer wort before fermentation. That is, the solid part that makes up that beer must, such as malts, cereals, yeasts or hops.
Being of a higher percentage, the beer has more body —Because there is more volume— and more alcohol —Because, generally, there will be more sugars when there are more cereals. For this reason, we see categories such as special or extra in many of our beers without this having to do with a question of marketing, but purely legal.
For example, other specialty beers that we see on our shelves are the Cruzcampo Especial (its equivalent to the green Mahou is the Cruzcampo Pilsen), the Estrella Galicia Especial (which does not have a lower category) or the Ambar Especial (which, like Mahou, has a “classic” category, also with a green label, but sold only in liter).
Images | Mahou
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