American craft beer making inroads in Germany

[shrike]

Here's an interesting article:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/in- ... story.html

[cfrancis]

I've spent a lot of time in Germany over the past 2 years because of work. I have seen American craft beer in one place. I was in a larger supermarket in Dusseldorf called Indeka. It's a chain, they had a total of 15 different beers including Firestone Walker Parabola for $35 a bottle. There were more Belgium beer, picked up a bottle of Rodenbach for $6 for a 750ml.

I have had his Braufactum brand and it is very American inspired, the IPA was extremely citrus and above average bitterness. The german that I was with enjoyed it and actually bought a second bottle to take home. We had dinner in the store, it had a wine bar and actually a really cool seafood dinner with 5 different champagnes including Dom and Moet and Chandon for 250 euros.

But if you go to the average beverage store, in Dusseldorf and Koln it is Trinkgut which translates to "Drink Good". You will not find one foreign beer. It is all German and mostly local breweries except for the bigger German brews like Hofbrau, Hacker Pschorr, Erdinger, Paulaner, Warsteiner, etc. Then you will find some different styles. But where I was the store was 30% Pilsner, 20% Alt, 20% Kolsch, 15% Hefe and the remainder was seasonals or radlers and alcohol free. I was hard pressed to find a Dunkel, Bock or Rauch because I was not in that area of the country where they are popular.

I took the train down to Frankfurt and went into a store there and couldn't find very many Alts or Kolsch and it was loaded with more Bavarian brands. The masses still drink very local.

[Belgian]

There is an old principle there of drinking German, and drinking local. Even excluding exports by default. This firm attitude is both an acknowledgement and a support of the long-maintained traditional high quality of German beer. Some beer styles of Germany are, in fact made better there than any place in the world.

This traditional out-of-hand dismissal of import beers in Germany has been - and to some extent justifiably so - cast as reactionary, blinkered and unreasonably protectionist. An extremely successful campaign that has almost certainly limited the range of beer styles I've seen there on my many trips. There will definitely be a little payback effect for these years of 'holding back the rising tide' of foreign competition, both in terms of more German drinkers accepting imported craft beer, and Germany's need to adapt its own brewing industry to all that's changing so quickly in the USA & globally. Craft beer has arrived. The new wave of brewing is no longer the enemy to quality, and it's not just the Macro-brew demon of Annheuser-Busch knocking at the door anymore.

I sense change in the air, that this might be an excellent (and exciting) time for new craft breweries to set up in Germany, and for cities like Berlin to build a massive beer culture with bars and retail about equal to that of the best American beer destinations. I believe Germany will adapt and thrive, and that this painful yet healthy transition could unsurprisingly happen in the next 8-12 years.

Is tradition-bound German brewing really a liability with the dawning of a true modern craft beer market in the land, no, not permanently - I see these things as a double advantage because they already have something we do not. They have a baseline beer culture with decent standards, one not based primarily in BMC-MolBatt yellow fizz water, so the market is primed to roar ahead in its acceptance of superior and broader choices of newer craft ALONG WITH traditional German beer.

Speaking of which, this is an excellent opportunity for German brewers to re-discover, bring to life and to popularise traditional styles of German beer that are now marginalized, not even made or on the verge of extinction. A possible parallel: you can recall what happened when Peter Celis revived the 'dead' Belgian Wit beer style in the then-obscure town of Hoegaarden, Belgium. Will true Leipziger Gose-style beer similarly be part of the next wave of German Craft brewing pride?

[cfrancis]

I agree with you on everything.

The thing every German preaches to me when we start to talk beer is the Reinheitsgebot and how it ensures the quality and purity of the beer. Once I start talking about lambics, sours, anything outside of basic ale, the nose goes up. It's going to take some massive education, most Germans don't even know much about the styles from other parts of Germany.

There is such a great beer culture like you said. They have traveling Bierborse, which translates to Beer Market. I went to the one in Dusseldorf a couple of years ago. So awesome, they had foreign beer there as well. Staropramen from Czech Rep and a few others. So it's coming but like you said it still is 8-10 years away.

[Tapsucker]

I agree with what has been said here, but I would like to add that you can make exciting, interesting and diverse beer within the Reinheitsgebot (with the addition of yeast). The law does not necessarily mean you need to end up with boring beer or that breaking it with fruit, infection or other adjuncts is necessary to make exciting beer.

I liken the German beer culture to the blues. A hell of a lot of variety has come from the family, but some of the best is closely tied to the 12 chord basics. What we need is to separate boring formulaic 12 chord drones from the inspired art that can be made from the same building blocks.

[Belgian]

Best outcome is a shot in the arm for ALL German beer culture - Germans becoming more aware of it, less blasé about the 'commodity' status of their beer, and more concerned hearing how their brewers will be impacted.

The 'crisis' might attract more German people's attention to the beverage and create a sort of Renaissance - a broader appreciation of their own deep brewing heritage and also the best of what the world has to offer. This 'opening of the eyes' is exactly the way in which the awareness of wine has spread globally. The old German attitudes to beer will shift with the times (or, I suppose die off in passing generations.)

I'm sure there will still be 'lowest common denominator' supermarket brands sold in plastic bottles just as there are now. But the overall industry certainly doesn't need to stoop to making swill at the cut-throat pricing level and it won't - simply because Germans like to enjoy their food and drink. Quality gastronomy will prevail as it always has, and I have to say the food over there rarely disappoints.

[Bytowner]

I agree with what has been said here, but I would like to add that you can make exciting, interesting and diverse beer within the Reinheitsgebot (with the addition of yeast). The law does not necessarily mean you need to end up with boring beer or that breaking it with fruit, infection or other adjuncts is necessary to make exciting beer.

I liken the German beer culture to the blues. A hell of a lot of variety has come from the family, but some of the best is closely tied to the 12 chord basics. What we need is to separate boring formulaic 12 chord drones from the inspired art that can be made from the same building blocks.

This. I have no interest in drinking a double blueberry India pale ale from nurnberg. I honestly don't believe the world of beer misses anything from traditional brewing nations not falling in line behind the Americans. I worry that all this "experimentation" just homogenizes.