Fernseh-Pils-a-thon 2013

“I also drank almost my weight in IPAs” Wow! That is a ton of beer!!

Just kidding, Tony!

“Jack, I hope you weren't waiting for me to get back before you drank the Tannenzäpfle.” No, I just haven’t got round to it yet. I am contemplating doing a side-by- side tasting of Tannenzäpfle and Troegs Sunshine Pils. Do you think that is a proper thing to do?

Cheers!

P.S. I attended the National Homebrewers Conference this past weekend and Round Guys (a Philly area craft brewery) gave out free cans of a German Pilsner brewed solely with Cluster hops. I have not drunk that beer yet but that looks to be an ‘interesting’ beer.

P.S.S I look forward to reading your ‘reports’ from your recent vacation!

 

Almost true.

Sure, as long as it won't kill you. And then report back to us how they tasted.

Cheers!

Please report.

 

“Please report.”

I will certainly report on the various Pilsner beers. It may not happen for a while. Over the past three days (at the NHC) I drank a lot of great beer (mostly homebrewed but some great commercial beers as well). I think I need to ‘dry out’ a few days.

Prost!

 

Snapped this pic in the local REWE supermarket, which is across the strew from my apt. Yuck, eh?
. I'd never seen the 3 "Biermix" drinks before. Maybe I hadn't even bothered to look, but today I did, and I'm depressed that's all they could come with - a tired, failing strategy to lure young'uns and women with stuff that has no resemblance to beer at all. The Beck's Gold is also a very weak beer.

Notice the prices. 3.99€/six-pack, which works out to 0.66€/bottle for 0.5L bottles. A case of 24 would be 15.96€, or 0.66€/bottle again. Jever today was at 0.89€/bottle. Interesting prices, eh?

Please don't ask me to drink or try these mix-drink concoctions. I'll refuse.

 

Is it somewhat odd that the labels are in English? Orrr... is this dreck being imported from St. Louis now?

2.5 ABV?

 

Very observant… English gives them a "cool" factor that's supposed to differentiate them from Opa's (Gran-pappy's) brews, I think. It's a play to the youth, women and upscale markets, both of which are fleeing beer for (youth & women) Red Bull/Vodka mixes or the like, or (women & upscale) wine.

2.5% is to keep the appeal to the women & upscale folks, I think, for any wino on the street wouldn't waste his time buying something with so little alcohol. Besides, then women can drink it outdoors on a hot summer day like we would a session beer.

 

First, you go to McDs? I frequent a few Döner kebab places, especially one that prepares and spices its own mutton spits on site daily.

Your examples illustrate my point exactly. Who do Scrubs and McDs appeal to most? The former: young women, and latter: kids and teens, and parents thereof. Around the world, be it Japan, Turkey or Germany, English is marketers' shortcut to denote hip- and coolness without having to try hard, even if no one in the target country has a clue what the English words mean… believe me, I've lived in those 3 countries, Japan being the worst offender here, and it's a fact of life where English is a non-native language.

Ask 100 Germans what "twisted" means in German and I bet you'd get only 4 or 6 correct answers. Tell them it means verdreht, as in a "twisted meaning" and you get eye-rolls and giggles.

There's another point you subtly made. Often, the native language equivalent either doesn't exist, and/or is too weird to use. Take the word "Craft beer," which is now being used in Germany exactly like in America b/c 1) there is no direct German equivalent that conveys the same meaning, 2) since craft translates to roughly "hand-work" or "hand-made" if you used Handarbeitbier, it doesn't convey the same meaning, which leads to 3) Handarbeitbier sounding dumb, weird and nonsensical in German. It also makes sense to use Craftbeer in German because Kraftbier would translate to "Power-beer" or "electricity-beer," hence they use the C in Craft beer. It also gives it a cool factor that beer today in Germany has lost to Vodka and Red Bulls.

 

I've seen that, and understand the concept -- but it's Beck's, German ought to be it's original language... shouldn't it?

I have a German made coat that was made by the something-or-other Jean Co. Always found it odd that there was no translation for jeans.

Yeah, I saw the other parts of the labels too.

 

That's a good theory.

 

I bought a mixed six-pack of Bayreuther today, and they actually call it handwerklich gebraut. Hey, and in reference to your pic of the Beck's six-packs for € 3.99 - this one was € 4.99 and it's 0.5l-bottles and proper beer.

 

I think they have been around for a few years, but are more heavily marketed during summer.

 

Do they package for FedEx?

 

Aktien Zwick'lbier, Landbier and the Original 1857, all from Bayreuther Brauerei, from, are some decent beers. I've had their Zwickel and Landbier, which I liked a lot. I know of only 1 pub in FFM which has it. I've also ordered it from bierzwerg.de. Where did you get it?

 

They seem to be expanding a lot lately. I've even seen their crates of the Zwickl in my local REWE (!!) in Wiesbaden. Apart from that, at least two bottle shops near me got them. I got that box from Trinkgut in Wiesbaden-Biebrich, they also have the Bayreuther Hell and Weissbier, both from the same brewery, but different brand.

EDIT: The other shop would be Getränke Spezialisten in Wiesbaden-Bierstadt. They also always carry Schlenkerla Märzen, Weizen, Urbock and Lager!

 

The tradition loving German consumer base has long walked on Beck's.