Is German beer really THAT good?

And why should we have to pick one over the other as "best?" I had a very nice Trumer Pils yesterday, followed by a very nice Sierra Nevada Pale Ale -- and my tongue didn't even snap off its roller!

 

I don't know. Just as I don't know when it happened that traveling to experience the world's great beers -- instead of being able to go to your closest specialty bottle shop -- became onerous and not fun. I mean, you can get a weekend train ticket to take you and your friends to the Belgian/Czech border from anywhere in Germany for the price of one bottle of Cantillon....

 

But how many Cantillons will it take to get me a plane ticket to Bamberg from California?

I kid. Agree heartily. If you're even remotely close to a place like that, you make damn sure you get out and try as much of the local beer (and /culture) as you possibly can.

 

After traveling in Europe several times for extended stays, and sampling as much local beer as possible as I went through each country, I'd have to say that Germany had the best beer of Europe, but I still think the American beer scene is so much better...IMHO that is. I am an ale over lager guy and that makes a big difference in my opinion, but I was very tired of the same tired styles and many, if not most, of the varieties of each style tasted too similar and even some styles tasted too similar to pick out real differences. I didn't think that the beer scene was very complex/complicated and there were not all that many options, compared to the States. As mentioned, all of this is just an opinion and my personal observations from multiple trips to the region, but I'd take an American brew over a German or Euro brew any day of the week!!!

 

A real promising prospect. That city is really changing and going to be very different 10-15 years from now for sure.

 

“In short...what the hell are we doing here?”

A very good question.

I personally tried to stay focused on the question posed in the title of this thread with my first post of:

“To the question of "Is German beer really that good?", my answer is that for many German breweries (e.g., Mahrs, Ayinger, Schlenkerla, etc.) the answer is a resounding YES! For breweries that sell a lot of German beer (e.g., Becks, Warsteiner, etc.) the answer is not a resounding yes.”

I purposefully stayed away from the whole Germany vs. US comparison since that is a ‘can of worms’ I was not personally motivated to open.

Now, in all fairness @DieHippieDie seemed to want to open the ‘can of worms’ with his statement of: “My point is, has the four ingredients (3 outside of Bavaria) lead to boring, repetitive beer in Germany? In my opinion, nobody does German beer like Germany (obviously) but my point remains. I miss me some RuinTen, BBA Siberian Night, and Curieux which I would take any day over Scheider Weisse, Franziskaner, and Weihenstephaner. What say ye Beeradvocates?”

There is no denying that the diversity of beer styles available to beer drinkers is much larger in the US than in Germany. There are a large number of BAs who value and appreciate having the choices we have in the US and those people are going to express their opinions. The latest contributor to this effect is @DrMindbender where he stated that after multiple long term stays in Europe he prefers the beer scene in the US with our variety of beer choices. IMO that is a valid opinion to express given what DieHippieDie posted in the original post.

Cheers!

 

When I was drinking a fresh bottle of Andech's Vollbier Hell in my freezing apartment in Boston last year, it immediately took me back to Munich. No American version of a Helles has done that for me....yet.

I believe this is why these discussions are much more civil in the Germany forum. There's no comparison of what is "best" and who brews the most styles...etc. But every time these discussions crop up on the main forum, every US member immediately becomes defensive. America is the best at everything! Instead, we should simply be discussing beer, not some ridiculous "contest".

This comment isn't aimed directly at you. But what you've posted above is why there will be the inevitable "shake out" as @herrburgess described earlier in this thread. The need for MORE variety, MORE flavor, MORE abv, more more more.....eventually all the tickers on Untapped will become tired of it. And they'll move on.

Moreover, the brewers constantly trying to appease this mentality will create beer that suffers in quality. Because every new brewer will rush to make the next Heady Topper, instead of perfecting the next Sierra Nevada Pale Ale.

 

I lived in Germany for four years and went through some of what you're going through now. If you stick only to normal German retail - the Getränkemärkte and grocery stores - you will find yourself getting bored very quickly with the selection. The solution for me was to go beyond these outlets, which means either travel (which can be done on the cheap if you plan far enough in advance) or internet. There are several websites that will deliver straight to your door. I found one of my favorite beers simply by selecting a beer at random from here and ordering a 10er of it. Places like Kneitinger and Schlenkerla (I'm sure there are more) do direct ordering from their websites. Schlenkerla's Ur-bock is available now, and their Eiche Dopplebock will be available in December. Delivered straight to your door, fresh as you will ever find it. The other thing I needed to do was simply get past my craving for IPA - it takes a lot of work to find a good one in Germany, although there are a few. Stop trying to find what America does well and immerse yourself (not literally) in what the Germans do well. I have since moved back to the US and I really miss those German lagers (and those German lager prices, but that's another story...).

 

But that assumes that a shakeout is a bad thing. Look, if there is bad beer on the market, it SHOULD get shaken out. As in, I want it to get shaken out. That's not something to fear; that's something to laud.

I also think you underestimate the skill of (some) American brewers. Yeah, there are breweries that need to be shaken out for producing subpar product, but there are many other breweries that create consistently good new product. Think of all the startups that have taken off in the last couple years and the variety of brews they produce -- Cigar City, Jester King, etc. Sure, those breweries will have some misses, but there isn't evidence at all that their product has suffered in quality due to their interest in variety.

 

Andechs Doppelbock dunkel served from the barrel onsite in a ceramic beer mug at the monastic brewery is one of the best beers I have ever had. Spicy, rich, sweet, with the perfect amount of bittering and aromatic hops. And what a setting to drink it in! Like many on this board, I am partial to double IPAs and double imperial stouts, but sometimes you cannot beat a beer that has been perfected over generations. There is something special about going to the true source and drinking it how it was meant to be, well, drunk, too. There are tons and tons of great beers through Germany, and many of them do not get shipped outside the towns they are made in. Like Belgium, you really have to spend some time on the ground there to appreciate the diversity and depth of beers on offer.

 

I find it sad that many, also young, german brewers who experiment a lot with recipes and styles, who make oak aged IPAS and all kinds of stuff, sometimes still adore the reinheitsgebot and therefor dismiss many great brews. its almost kind of religious. I understand adhering to the RHG when making classic german styles which evolved under it, but when yo do not, whats the point?

Otherwise, I think the german landscape is easy on par with the american now. Besides the proper made classic german styles, you can get IPAs, stouts and pale ales locally produced in all bigger cities..

 

I'm still waiting for the day I get sick of it, but I keep going.
To me it's a different experience. With the crazier American beers I tend to tick away and try everything I can. To me most are great in small amounts. At the same time, there are very few I want to drink a whole liter of. That's where the best German and English beers really shine. I can drink those all day.

 

You're right, it's not. I apologize, I should have made it clear that I agree, it is definitely a good thing.

I think you overestimate the skill of many American brewers. How many of these brewers do you think have 20 years brewing experience under their belts? 10 years? Less? There's over 3000 breweries in the US now. Compare that to 10 years ago. Do you really think thousands of brewers all of a sudden became world class at their craft in a decade?

In many cases, I would suggest you wouldn't even know. Consider this. The most popular style is the IPA, and the IPA is one of the more forgiving styles when a mediocre example is produced. These two points are not mutually exclusive.

Yes, there are plenty of great breweries in America today. But I find myself more often than not gravitating towards the one's that have been around for awhile. Anchor, Brooklyn, Sierra Nevada especially, even Sam Adams. Some of the newer breweries are excellent as well, but you'll often discover the brewers behind that outfit have a decade or two of experience under their belt.

 

Well, I attempted to qualify my discussion of American brewers/variety by noting "some", hoping to not give the impression that I thought "thousands of brewers all of a sudden became world class..." Apologize for using the scare quotes, but I just feel like you overstated my point.

Re: IPAs being forgiving, I'm not a brewer, so I really can't comment, other than to say I imagine there are probably brewers who would disagree with that.

I'm with you on often drinking the big, or at least "bigger", guys, from Deschutes to Firestone to Sierra Nevada. And I agree that there are (as I said before, "some") new breweries that pump out a nice variety of good stuff, and that in many cases those guys have good pedigrees. Indeed, that's actually one of my complaints about some of the startup craze now -- lots of folks who don't have a solid educational/professional background in brewing. I wish more folks committed themselves to that. But, that's the price you pay for experimentation and variety, and in the end I imagine the bad ones will shake out, rightfully so. Sure, it's a pain in the neck, I guess, to try out a new brewery and find the beer lackluster, but it's also wonderful to try something new and have it stop and make you say, "Wow!"

 

A good quote from Mitch Steele at Stone: "Please, for God’s sake, hire someone who knows what they’re doing."
I don't necessarily think someone needs decades of experience to do well, but some of the newer places popping up definitely need brewmasters with more experience than "I'm a good homebrewer in my kitchen."

 

I had a pint of Andechs Doppelbock on draft this weekend and it is indeed a beer of beauty. Needless to say I was not in the enticing environment of a Monastery but I was able to watch football while enjoying my Andechs Doppelbock and that was a good thing!

Cheers to Andechs Doppelbock & Football!!

 

The thing that was absolutely frustrating and mindblowing beyond belief, was that while I was in Berlin going around looking and asking for beers, it was impossible to find a Berlinerweisse IN BERLIN that was NOT from Berlinr Kindl...

For the life of me I could not find one in shops, gartens, bars, restaurants, cafes, you name it...

 

The ones from Bogk (which are supposed to be among the most authentic) are apparently nearly always "sold out" before they ever hit stores, because the geeks snatch them up. Yep, American "craft" culture is already catching on in Germany....

 

In all fairness to Andreas Bogk and Bogk Brewing he has a very small brewery and he started his brewery via crowdsourcing.

Below is an extract from an article written by Evan Rail:

“This is not quite as nice as it sounds. With a batch size of 36 liters, every time Andreas brews he ends up with maybe a hundred 330-milliliter bottles. That means that even a full year after the crowdfunding project finished, Andreas is still brewing beer for his backers, and his beer still hasn’t been released to the general public. “I ended up owing people 2,000 bottles,” he says.”

Cheers!

 

Its not that IPAs are more forgiving it is that lagers allow fewer degrees of freedom in hitting the target. An analogy which is reasonably close here might be the difference between horseshoes and archery. Getting a ringer in horseshoes is challenging and requires skill, experience and understanding of the game but it doesn't have to be a perfect dead center pitch for the shoe to catch the post and become a ringer. However, in archery, hitting the target bullseye at 100 yards offers a lot less leeway or flexibility for "close" to count.

Edit: BTW, there are at least a few pro brewers with lots of experience who have publicly stated that brewing a lager is less forgiving as there's no place to hide the faults.