German craft beer

Can somebody educate on me on what this store is called/where it is located? May be a nice idea to meet one of my FL buddies who has relatives in HD.

 

Courtesy of @JHDStein :

First up, Heidelberg now has its own dedicated craft beer store, known as “Upper Glass”. It’s located not far from the main tourist street, and the owner is a super nice guy who seems to know his stuff. I won’t post pictures of the interior here, but you can see them at http://www.upperglass-craftbeer.de/. It has a tremendous selection, and while I’ll be the first to admit the prices are rather on the high side, it’s another small piece of evidence that expanded interest in “different” types of beer is on the rise (at least in this area...). Hopefully it survives.

Cheers!

 

Amazed it has not been discussed here yet:
The bavarian state is pulling some Camba Bavaria beers out of the market! The first victim was their milk stout, barrel aged beers, the coffee porter and the witbier might follow... Because they are officially "not verkehrsfähig" under german law, which is so absurd when you see how many witbiers and milk stouts from other countries are aviable in specialty stores here these days, and how many other german brewers outside of bavaria making similar stuff with no problems...

Full article: http://www.camba-bavaria.de/news/artikel/neue-kontrolle-weitere-camba-biere-bald-nicht-mehr-erlaubt/

I personally do really not get the actions of the authorities. The only reasoning I can see behind is,is that in 2016, they are celebrating 500years of the dreadfull german purity law, and they want to make it seem like all of bavaria is still standing behind it.
Silly stuff.
I mean, imagine some bakeries couldn't bake italian style bread with dried tomatoes and olives in the dough because of a "Brotreinheitsgebot"...

 

^ I've found that odd from the get-go since I can hardly see how that can be rationalized - particularly since it's usually just about not calling things "Bier". Actually didn't know it might hit more than their milk stout. That is sad, I really like their lineup.

 

I'm a bit surprised at your distaste for the purity law, if only because I've heard other suggest that it was responsible for, or at least helped to maintain, the enduring beer cultures of Franconia/Bavara (see @herrburgess. And, speaking of, where are you, buddy?!) If I read you correctly, though, you feel like German beer would have been, and would be, fine without it?

 

This was discussed a while back, @-N8 I think talked to the guys at the brewery (or e-mailed)' maybe he will chime in on this.

 

It depends on how the RHG is treated. As it is treated now, I think it does more bad than good.
First of all, as you might know from my posts regarding the Kölsch Konvention, I am heavily aiganst limiting or prohibiting the evolution of beers by laws...
Furthermore, I'd say the way big breweries use the RHG to communicate quality, it is more of a marketing tool than anything else.
Industrial, pasteurized Pilsners with hop extracts, for 25cents/0,5l or less in the Supermarket, are brewed according to it. Tell me those are in some way superior to Cambas "illegal" beers....

That being said, in many parts of germany,esp. in franconia and bavaria, a lot of excellent beers are brewed according to the RHG

I don't know if it helped to mantain the brewing cultures of Franconia and Bavaria. I would rather suggest that all the village brewers would have been fine without it as a forced law, but rather with the RHG as a seal of quality, similar to the prädikat labels of german wines- you don't have to label your wine as "Kabinett","Spätlse" or "großes Gewächs", but if you want to, certain conditions have to be met.
So why not do the same for beer?

 

was at a CITTI today.
They had a crate of Darguner Pilsner on sale for 4,44
Thats cheaper than water

 

But water is not brewed according to the RHG-malt, hops and yeast are absent, so it is inferior

 

@einhorn , since you are in the beer industry: how is it possible for German breweries to produce beer and sell it cheaper than bottled water? How is it possible for the breweries to make a profit in these circumstances?

Cheers!

 

We did talk about this earlier, I'll try to find the conversation, but I believe the problem was not RHG per se, but with whatever the equivalent of the FDA is having a problem with lactose in their milk stout. I hadn't heard of their other beers being taken off the shelves.

EDIT: page 44 of the Bayernbier thread, post #1758 is where the fun begins.

 

Slackers.

 

So, that results in profit!?!

Cheers!

 

I also imagine the margin on bottled water is much higher than beer. Just a guess though

 

Also bottled water in Germany is pretty cheap - if I recall the water I buy is something like 14 cents a bottle (after you've returned the plastic bottle it comes in). Sometimes I wonder how they can manage to break even on some of this stuff. The water inside obviously costs next to nothing, but shipping it, packaging - it's surprising they can do it for so cheap.

EDIT: that's 14 cents for a 1.5 liter bottle

 

More here:
http://www.camba-bavaria.de/news/artikel/milk-stout-die-ganze-geschichte/

Camba's Milk Stout was good, better than average, and a tasty alternative to the usual German brews.

(Even if their logo was a bit of a knockoff of Left Hand's Milk Stout)

 

Sorry, I did not receive notification that this thread has moved on, so I have a lot to catch up on. I live near Kaiserslautern, have toured Karlsberg and found the store Losch's that carries some varieties of what may be considered craft beers.

 

..Tough luck, not the best beer region in germany
I think the nearest region where there is now some serious "crafting" going on is the Mainz/Wiesbaden area, with KuehnKunzRosen ( http://kuehnkunzrosen.de/ ) and others being located there.
In Saarbrücken, the local Bruch brewery makes some very decent traditional beers, including a very good Zwickl and a nice seasonal Festbier.
The Karlsberg brewery for me is always a two sided sword- although I do like some of their offerings, esp. Ur-Pils and Bock, their focus on mixed beers annoys me.
Stuttgart also has some notable breweries, for example Schönbuch (http://www.braumanufaktur.com/), although I never had their newer craft offerings
There used to be "Juchems Welt der Biere" in Idar Oberstein, but sadly it's closed now...