Ranking your favorite German breweries.

Weihenstephan is my favorite brewery not located in the united states

 

Not a fan of Rauchbiers but you liked Spezial?

 

Anyone in Wisconsin who hasn't shopped Discount Liquors for German imports is cheating themselves.
http://www.discountliquorinc.com/import-beers.html

@grantcty -- which spots are you finding German beers in MN?

 

You're going to make me go back into my notes again?! I'll let you know tomorrow what beers I had there and any notes that I wrote.

 

Ha, sorry you don't have to. I just know both breweries are known for their Rauchbiers, so I was curious.

I've never had anything from Spezial, I do recall some people on these boards saying that they're not as smoky as Schlenkerla though, so that could have something to do with it.

 

How were you able to tell that the Edelstoff was fresh? I know there is some kind of numbering on the front label but I've never been able to decode it to figure out the bottle date.

 

After reading this I was curious how many stops we had made while on our trip in Germany... Not including any "repeats", like the three different Paulaner or Augustiner locations we had gone and stuff like that, the final unique brewery count was 27.

Even with that many, I feel like we still have so many more places to go! Next time, I guess

Taste. It still had a freshness to it in the malt character and didn't have any of the sweeter, oxidization notes which is common with old imports (or beer in general).

Sadly, no bottle code on those so I only picked up a six pack and crossed my fingers it wasn't super old. I was hopeful though as this shop didn't stock all that much of each beer and they were kept cold. So those were good signs, at least... Most imports around here are kept on warm shelves and have a nice layer of dust on em'.

 

You called it right on Spezial's beers being less smoky.

Yesterday when I created my 'favorites' list above I realized that we had visited Spezial's main location on a Wednesday and then walked up that hill to Spezial Keller the next day, so I averaged them for the favorites list, assuming they serve beers from the same brewing source. I had the Rauchbier at both locations, and wrote a comment at the main place "slightly smoky" and a comment at the keller "not smoky." However, I wrote that last comment next to the Weissbier, but drew an arrow pointing to the Rauchbier. So it's a bit unclear to me which beer I meant is not smoky.

Incidentally, I scored the rauchbier differently at each location, with a 4.25 at the main location and a 4.0 at the keller. Maybe the beers are from different sources after all, or more likely, different taste receptors from one day to the next.

But my experience adds to what you said in your post that Spezial's beers are not as smoky as Schenkerla's.

 

I have been burned on more than one occasion with Edelstoff bottles that were clearly past their prime, so I have essentially stopped buying them. Poured into a glass and the head would fizzle out almost immediately like it was seltzer water. Agree, though, that when fresh it's an excellent beer.

 

I mean, it IS an entire country. You could probably spent a couple weeks in either Munich or Bamberg alone.

One quick and dirty method I use if there's no bottle date is I'll rotate the bottle end over end a few times and then hold it up to the light. If it's not crystal clear, then I don't buy it. Anything floating in it is a bad sign.

I rarely buy them regardless these days without a date, but that's one crude method. Obviously this only works for something like a Helles/Pils and not something like a Kellerbier, Hefeweizen, amber Bocks...etc.

The dust is to keep the light out.

 

Absolutely!

 

I went to HS in Frankfurt and remember Henninger and Binding.

 

Spezial's rauchbiers are pretty widely known as being less aggressively smoky than Schleknerla's. I've seen/heard them even tell people that directly. They also have a kellerbier that's completely unsmoked for people that don't like any smoke at all.

IMO, neither of them carry as much smoke on tap as they do from bottles, too. It doesn't look like Spezial is imported anymore, but when they were I'd say their bottles had the same level of smoke that Schlenkerla has on tap. Spezial on tap has even less smoke than that. I'm not a huge rauchbier fan, but I consider Spezial's normal rauchbier to be pretty amazing.

 

In the Twin Cities, the big chain store (Total Wine) has a solid selection, although it's shrank a bit in the past few years. For example, it used to carry Andechs, but doesn't anymore. There are several smaller stores that pick up the slack by carrying several of the brands that Total Wine doesn't. Some are even getting the B. United canned imports. I'm lucky that I don't have to do too much driving around to pick up smaller releases or offerings from the big breweries.

 

@herrburgess

 

I'm assuming you were in Zwei, KTown or Pirmasauns with the Parkbrau reference.

 

I was there 3+ years with 3rd AD Band. Our bar was a Binding bar, ate at the top of the Henninger Turm a couple of times.

 

I used to be able to purchase Furst Wallerstein beers at my local Total Wine & More (Claymont, DE). I discussed their Zwickel in a past New Beer Sunday thread:

https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/new-beer-sunday-week-516.246648/#post-3159231

Unfortunately Total Wine & More stopped carrying Furst Wallerstein beers which is a disappointment for me.

Cheers!

@RobH