German craft beer

ohhh god! They (all breweries) really should start a bottled on/best by date. This 1 yr, 2yr, variable for styles etc... is quite annoying.

 

Does anybody know which hops were used to brew Beck’s Pale Ale? Was Mandarina Bavaria hops used?

Cheers!

 

Having bottling dates would be really nice.

 

It doesn't come out until the end of the week or next week, no? I think I mentioned earlier that I've been told the Pale Ale is actually decent. Not amazing, but decent.

I'm in Bremen, so you'd think we'll have it here as soon as it's out. Looking forward to trying it.

 

Beck's PA with 6,3%?
Thats right around the same as Köstritzer PA last year.

 

So, German craft beer page.... I don't think that I've said on this website that a beer was bad. I've had a ton of terrible German interpretations of American styles over the past 2.5 years here in Germany, but have usually kept my opinions off of Beeradvocate. Well, Braufaktum's Pale Ale is a piece of shit. In a blind tasting that included other poorly made Pale Ales, it stood out as completely undrinkable. Mouth full of pennies (assuming massive oxidation and/or extremely stressed fermentation)

Did I somehow happen to get a bad bottle? I'm not willing to pay 7 Euro/L to give it a second try. Where the hell is Radeberger Gruppe's QC department?

 

There's certainly a lot of that going around, particularly with the "trend styles". As I have noted elsehwere I think, I've only had one German stout (Camba Bavaria's Milk Stout) that stood up to American counterparts I've tried and very few IPAs that were somewhere close.

I don't doubt the majority of stuff out there in those styles is subpar. And honestly, I don't find that surprising - these appear to be new styles to a lot of German brewers and I doubt they have a lot of experience with them. It would appear similar to the phenomenon that American counterparts of traditional German styles seem to fare equally "well" most of the time.

I just try to single out the good German stuff and otherwise stay with the non-German varieties I like.

 

Yup. Though it's improving, and I'm sure it will continue to do so.

So I checked the local Späti here in Bremen, still not Becks Pale Ale. I'll keep looking.

 

There have been some others - the Roundhouse Kick from Crew Republic isn't bad. Shoppe Bräu's Black Flag, while not consistent, can be pretty good. Bayerischer Bahnhof's older Baltic Porter recipe used to be *excellent* (though to your point, they don't sell that in Germany. Vagabund in Berlin has made a couple pretty good ones - the Crimea River was quite good.

Not too many great IPAs though, that's true. Here in Bremen, Grebhan's has some decent Pale Ales and IPAs going on. The Heidenpeter's Pale Ale isn't that bad. The Escalation from Crew Republic is decent too.

But yeah - I've never had a German craft beer stout/IPA that knocked my socks off, that's for sure. Yet. I'm sure it will happen eventually. I do like to see the variety though, and I'm enjoy watching the country discover non-traditional types of craft beer.

 

Matt,

Are the issues technical brewing flaws (e.g., massive oxidation and/or extremely stressed fermentation) or simply poorly constructed recipes? Is there a reason why German breweries should have technical brewing problems when trying to brew craft type beers?

Cheers!

Jack

 

I think you might have gotten an off bottle? I've had the Palor Pale Ale 2-3 times now in the past couple of years, and I've always thought it was a decent, if not great, pale ale. Nothing special, and certainly not worth the price, but I never ran across the off flavors you did.

 

For me, most modern german IPAs are more APAs. Prime example: Riedenburger Doldensud IPA. Dont't get me wrong, I like the beer every now and then, and its aviabilty is a big plus.as well as its price.
I think some czech and polish brewers are closer to making big and bold IPAs in the american vein. Esp. in the 100+IBU range, think of Crazy Mike IPA.

2 IPAs i can think of that were way off were Pyraser Herzblut and Waldhaus. I Only had Braufactum Palor once,did not notice any flaws though.

I predict that it will take a few more years before something out of germany can compete with something like Stone Ruination IPA (and I'm not sure if the fact that stone is coming to berlin will really change that).

Anyway, for me personally it is good enough that I can even get Pale Ales and stout regularly if I want to. 10 years ago,this seemed unthinkable. Sadly, this did not really improve the distribution of beglian or other "foreign" european beers. For me, even in the german craft scene, there still seems to be some prejudice towards everything not RHG

 

In other words, exactly what Maisel is doing!

Jeff and his family spend a lot of time in South Carolina -- they still keep a house in Charleston/Daniel Island. I agree that they are doing it right.

 

I saw a ton (6 or 7 types) of Pax Brau beers at P&M today, but i wasnt dying to spend 8€ on a Märzen or Weizenbock when I can get amazing examples for 1€.
The owner also showed me that he had, and he laughed as he showed me, in the back a single box of the 3 becks "craft beers" that come in a box with a glass. It said it will be sold at Kaufhof and something else... Sorry, I should have taken a picture.

For me, I am currently cooking a bunch of Indian food as we have several friends over tonight (spinach paneer, broccoli dahl (my own invention), and "chicken" tika masala, all vegan
To go with it we have Unertl Hefeweizen, Waldhaus Pils or Uerige Alt.

cheers

 

Imagine these in a box, glass too, black styro padding and dark lid, thats what I was shown today.

 

Ugh, I don't know that I want to try it bad enough to buy a damn box set.

 

Has anybod tried this


so far? So far I've read his wheat is subpar and the Backbone Splitter is supposed to be really good and now I'm wondering how this fares - particularly given my mostly underwhelming experiences with German Stouts.

 

I've yet to have a Hans Müller beer I thought wasn't terrible. I'm actually surprised to see the positive ratings on Backbone Splitter - I'd passed over it just because of how terrible all the other stuff is. I might need to give it a look.

I'd actually just seen that one at the bottle shop just now, and gave it a pass, again just because of my poor opinion of his stuff overall.