There’s more information about the Christmas Beer Markets taking place next weekend, December 20, 21 and 22, right here in Prague. Not only will some of the best Czech brewers bring their holiday and seasonal specials to the capital, but next weekend’s festival will also include a handful of great names in brewing from around Europe.
If you’re at all interested in craft beer, you won’t want to miss a single one of the festival’s just-announced foreign brews.
Of the many new brewpubs and breweries in the Czech lands, one of the most distinguished has to be Pivovar Kout na Šumavě, which returned to life by lurching off the operating table much like Frankenstein just as I was finishing Good Beer Guide Prague and the Czech Republic. Fortunately, I got the information in time to include a listing; unfortunately, there wasn’t enough time to try even a single beer before we went to print.
Until now.
Located to the south of Plzeňský kraj in the beautiful Šumava forest, Kout is one of the few real breweries — not brewpubs — to reappear in the Czech Republic. Even stranger, Kout started out with remarkable success in a region that is completely pwned by Pilsner Urquell and Gambrinus, the biggest brands in the country. Just after starting up, Kout secured distribution in several towns around the region, including Pilsen. Soon, more than a few cognoscenti started saying that they thought Kout made the best Pilsner-style beer in the Czech Republic, if not the world.
After tasting it, I’m inclined to agree.
There’s a lot more to Bamberg than just Rauchbier — the town is said to produce brews in some 50 different styles, including the buzz-worthy U, aka Ungespundetes, an “uncorked” or “unbunged” style of Kellerbier best-known in the versions from Mahr’s and Spezial, as well as very good wheats from places like Kaiserdom. If you’re tempted to take something home with you, the very last chance before you leave town is a small shop in the train station with bottles of Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier as well as one of the local oddballs: Zwergla from Brauerei Fässla.
The Fässla pub was one of my favorites on my first trip to Bamberg, if only for the atmosphere, as I got caught up in conversations with the Stammgäste there. And while Zwergla’s “Lil’ Dwarf” moniker is fairly distinctive, I couldn’t remember ever trying it. Grabbing a bottle in the Bahnhof, I figured I’d check out what I missed and compare it to some beers from back home.
Continuing with the report from Bamberg, and now on to Rauchbier, the local specialty made with smoked malt. Above is a post-first-sip shot of Spezial’s Rauchbier, shown in the taproom on Obere Königsstraße. In Bamberg itself, there are two main producers: the oh-so-famous Schlenkerla, aka home of Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier, and Brauerei Spezial. (While a few other producers in the larger region also make Rauchbier, I’ll focus on Bamberg for now.) Before I compare the two, I’d like to talk about something else for a second: wine.
Hang on — there’s no need to choke on your Double IPA, bro. This is still Beer Culture, and of course beer and wine have much in common, not the least of which is the fact that they both make life worth living. And just as extreme beers — with more alcohol, more hops, and of course higher prices — have taken off in the past few years, winemakers have gone through their own forms of extremism, producing wines with more alcohol, more oak, more fruit, more malolactic buttery flavors and mouthfeel, and of course ever-higher prices. And not everyone has been happy with the changes.
Let’s say you’re about to get married and, hypothetically, you like beer. (Use your imagination for the former, if not the latter.) Let’s also suppose, hypothetically, that your beloved enjoys a good pint as well. The day arrives; you finally say “I do.” Where on earth do you go for your honeymoon?
That is precisely the question that faced us last week. After several years of traveling around Central Europe, taking photographs and writing about travel and food and drink, Nina and I were finally married last week in Libeňský zámek, the chateau in our corner of Prague. After the ceremony, we had lunch with family and witnesses at the neighborhood brewpub, Richter Brewery, then headed home, grabbed our bags and hit the train station for a honeymoon in the region’s most beautiful city for lovers of great beer.
That is to say: Bamberg.
Prague is not in bad shape for beer, not by any means. Not only do we have U sadu, U kláštera and a few hundred other great pubs in town, but we also have about a dozen outstanding local beers, including one brewed by college students. Last month we had the Christmas Beer Markets to keep us warm. And now we’ve got a brand new brewpub in Praha 4-Nusle: Pivovar Bašta.
Also known as Sousedský pivovar U Bansethů (something like “neighborhood brewery U Bansethů”), Bašta sits just across from the nuselská radnice, next door to the old U Bansethů pub, a neighborhood stalwart for a century or so and a good source for Pilsner Urquell.
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