Category Archives: Beer Styles

Bohemian White Beer: What I Didn’t Put in My Latest Book

August 21, 2026 ak 1 Comment

If you’ve already read my latest book Bavarian White Beer, you will come across the section about how Bavarian white beer originally made it into Upper Palatinate and Lower Bavaria from Bohemia where white beer had already been popular before.

One of the most interesting sources about early Bohemian white beer is Tadeáš Hájek’s (Thaddaeus Hagecius in Latin) book De cervisia eiusque conficiendi ratione, natura, viribus, & facultatibus, opusculum, which translates to “About beer and its preparation methods, nature, powers and capabilities, a small work”. It was first published in 1585 and describes beer brewing with a focus on white beer production (even involving wheat). You can find an English translation of this book here.

Hájek’s description is interesting because he puts white beer (brewed with wheat) as consumed in Bohemia (and his description really seems to be based on Prague, as that’s where he was based, and his mother was married twice to Prague brewers) into a broader context. In particular, he mentions that this beer type was not only consumed in Bohemia, but also in Poland and certain cities in Germany. While this is interesting by itself because it recognises the similarities of various local white beer types or even a certain wider spread of one beer type, it gets even more interesting when it comes to the ingredients.

Hájek describes the malt not as purely air-dried, but rather as very lightly kilned over a low fire from beechwood and/or oak, which left behind a “somewhat spicy or smoky” taste, but also removed unpleasant smells from the steeping process.

In 19th century Bavarian brewing literature, air-dried malt was considered to be ideal, but for practical purposes, Bavarian white beer brewers had to kiln some of the white malt, and often using smoke kilns (smoke-free kilns only gained widespread adoption in Bavaria in the first half of the 19th century). We know this because some of the earliest white beer had kilns. So at least some of the white beer in Bavaria was slightly smoky, even if the air-drying step beforehand would have minimised the smoke flavour.

What piqued my interest though is the combination of these two facts: a slightly smoky wheat malt, used in a beer spread across Bavaria, Bohemia and Poland. Does that ring a bell?

It is of course pure speculation, but could there be a relationship between Bavarian white beer and Grodziskie, a Polish smoky wheat beer style?

What both beers have in common is the use of wheat: some historic sources suggest that Bavarian white beer brewers tended to use 100% wheat malt grists and were even legally obliged to do so in some instances, while Grodziskie is also typically brewed from 100% oak-smoked wheat malt.

Where both beers differ is the yeast, and also the hopping: for Bavarian white beer, the yeast character of banana esters and clove-like phenolic notes is an important part of the style itself, while the yeast character of Piwo Grodziskie is much cleaner and non-phenolic, and also significantly more bitter than its Bavarian counterpart.

By the early 17th century, there was an active guild of maltsters (which also admitted brewers) in Grodzisk, so brewers must have been active there for even longer than that before they even formed a guild. Around that time, two beer types were brewed in the city, a strong dark beer named “Kuc” as well as a weaker pale beer, both from wheat malt only (source). So a white beer similar to modern Piwo Grodziskie was most likely already brewed back then.

So are they both related? We don’t know, but Hájek making the connection between three local white beers is certainly interesting. It may simply be an expression of a local beer fashion at the time, spanning from Lower Bavaria and Bohemia all the way to Poland, similar to how sour white beers like Broyhan, Gose and Berliner Weisse could be found all over Northern Germany from the 16th to the 19th century.

If you want to learn more about Bavarian white beer like Hefeweizen, including its general history and old malting and brewing techniques, you can read more about it in my new book Bavarian White Beer.

Beer Styles

Early Munich Helles

August 19, 2026 ak Leave a comment

This is not the story of the earliest Munich Helles, an apparent hype of pale lager beer from the 1820s until the early 1840s, during which most of the Munich breweries brewed a relatively pale lager, though it is not clear how pale, before they reverted back to brewing dark lager.

Instead, this is the story about modern Munich Helles, the stuff that’s popular these days and has become the standard beer of Munich and really, much of Bavaria. This beer style can be traced back to a very specific brewery and a very specific date: it was Spaten Helles Lagerbier, first released in Munich on 20 June 1895.

An ad for Spaten Helles Lagerbier that appeared on 20 June, 1895 in Augsburger Postzeitung (source)

Spaten didn’t just release this beer, but instead were testing it in other markets. In particular, they served it at “Ronacher’s Bierausschank” in Hamburg as early as 1894, which probably was Restaurant Spatenbräu on Hermannstraße 26, run by Jakob Ronacher.

The first commentary in an industry publication that I was able to find was an article in Wochenschrift für Brauerei, published by VLB, dated 19 July 1895, which directly compared it to both Pilsner and Dortmunder, and noted that while Bavarian industry publications have not published anything about it yet, Munich newspapers called it a “natural progression” of Munich beer, while the VLB publication called it a “beer-political event of the first order”, whatever that meant exactly.

The 1898 edition of Brockhaus Encyclopedia contains some analytical data, and if we believe it, this Helles was a quite odd: with an OG of 11.7°P (1.047), it only had 2.69% ABW (3.36% ABV) and a meagre 45.7% real attenuation. Compared to Munich Helles nowadays, it must have been very sweet.

But the Wochenschrift für Brauerei on 20 December 1895 contained analytical data of two brands of Helles (anonymised as “pale Bavarian beer” no. 1 and no. 2), with an OG of 12.37°P and an ABW of 3.45% (4.31% ABV) for the first beer and an OG of 13.2°P and an ABW of 3.8% (4.75% ABV), which paints a slightly different picture. Even though it was still not as highly attenuated as modern beers, with 53.5% and 55.3% real attenuation, it’s closer to a regular dark lager in Munich at the time in terms of OG and attenuation.

By 1902, the beer style seems to have developed a clearer profile, at least that’s what the analytical data in Bayerisches Brauer-Journal suggests: by that time, 15 different Helles were brewed in Munich. Compared to the Dunkel beer brands at the time, the Helles was on average brewed 1°P weaker (average 13.52°P for Dunkel, 12.35°P for Helles) and was slightly more attenuated (51.79% for Dunkel, 57.32% for Helles). The authors of Bayerisches Brauer-Journal also emphasised that the data shows that the Munich Helles isn’t just an imitation of other, foreign pale lagers, or a “characterless beer like it’s brewed oftentimes in other places”, but rather its very own distinct beer type.

And while this beer type was established by the early 20th century, it didn’t mean that it was the most popular. Between the beer’s launch in 1895 and the beginning of World War 1, Spaten’s beer production was never more than about 10% (Christian Schäder, Münchner Brauindustrie 1871-1945, p.92). This was virtually the same for other Munich breweries. Only Thomasbräu was different, as their Helles allowed them to increase annual output from 75,000 hl in 1895/1896 to nearly 200,000 hl in 1913/1914.

Interestingly, Spaten and Sedlmayr did not consider themselves innovators: in 1907, Carl Sedlmayr freely admitted that Munich breweries had already brewed pale lager beer from the 1820s until the 1840s, and that after that, Spaten brewed a pale Vienna-style lager (at least paler than Munich Dunkel) for the French market in the 1860s. Sedlmayr even specifically rejected a proposal to sue Thomasbräu for registering the trademark “Urtyp” (“original type”) because he did not think of Spaten as the inventors of pale lager beer in Munich, and instead credited Franziskaner-Leistbräu and their pale Märzen that they introduced in 1871 as an earlier pale lager from Munich. Carl Sedlmayr himself thought that only Franziskaner-Leistbräu or Hackerbräu (which had introduced a pale “Hacker-Gold” in 1893 that was likely a Vienna-style lager) would have a chance to challenge Thomasbräu’s “Urtyp” trademark (Schräder, pp.97-99).

The Schottenhammel tent at Oktoberfest advertising Franziskaner-Leistbräu Märzenbier, ca. 1902 (source; CC0 license)

Beer Styles

Schönramer is the Perfect Alcohol-Free Beer

August 4, 2026 ak 2 Comments

That title says it all, but let me briefly explain. Just a few weeks ago I asked whether science has gone too far with the development of alcohol-free Bavarian Helles.

A few days ago, I came back from our summer holiday. One big part of it was visiting Waging am See which is roughly half-way between Traunstein and Petting-Schönram. The former is the home of three breweries, including Hofbräuhaus Traunstein, while the latter is the home of Private Landbrauerei Schönram, a regional brewery firmly embedded in the Rupertiwinkel region of Bavaria.

Of course, the locally dominant beers there are Hofbräu Traunstein Helles and Schönramer Hell, with Schloßbrauerei Stein also having some presence. Naturally, we drank plenty of Traunsteiner and Schönramer, and of Schönramer’s beers, I enjoyed having their Alkoholfrei readily available and pre-chilled in the local supermarkets.

I now very much believe that this is the perfect alcohol-free beer. When it’s properly chilled, and poured into a glass, it’s absolutely beautiful, and is virtually indistinguishable from a regular Helles. Only in the nose, there’s a tiny trace of an aroma that is a bit off, and while tasting the beer, the body is almost right. Literally the only thing that’s missing is that tiny bit of alcohol that is noticeable. Other than that, no flaws.

As we were in the area, we also did a tour of the brewery, which is an experience in itself. Probably the best brewery tour ever, other than maybe the handful of times where I was given private tours by brewers. Everyone was very open about the brewing practices and processes, and all my questions were answered. The only thing they said they wouldn’t hand out is brewing recipes, but if you wanted to brew Schönramer beers, you can get a good idea about their approach through articles like this one and home-brew recipes like this one.

As for the alcohol-free beer itself, that’s what I’ve been able to find out: Schönramer currently contracts out the dealcoholisation process, which is done at Brauerei Hutthurm near Passau. Hutthurm dealcoholises via reverse osmosis membrane filtration, exactly the modern method I mentioned the other week. The resulting beer is then returned by tanker to Schönram, where it is then blended with Schönramer’s Surtaler beer (which in itself has 3.5% ABV) to get just below 0.5%.

An open fermenter at Schönramer brewery with fermenting beer in it, with kräusen (white-ish foam) on top.

Schönramer is apparently working on moving dealcoholisation in-house, but this is still in the planning phase. When I briefly spoke to senior brewmaster Eric Toft (I had a bit of a fanboy moment), he actually voiced his preference for the Surtaler Schankbier, and to me it sounded like he wasn’t 100% happy with moving towards a beer style that is much more resource-intensive in production compared to their other beers (even just the dealcoholisation itself, never mind sending it around with tankers), especially after all the effort Schönramer put it to make the whole brewing process as energy-efficient as possible, including energy recovery at various stages of the process.

I still think Schönramer Alkoholfrei is an excellent beer, and knowing all the details that go into making the Schönramer beers as good as they are, it is not an accident, but rather shows the technical excellence of the brewmasters and the staff at that regional Bavarian brewery.

The back of a Schönramer-branded high-vis vest worn by a brewery tour participant. It says "Biersucher" on the back, a portmanteau of "Bier" and "Besucher" (visitor). — The back of a Schönramer-branded high-vis vest worn by a brewery tour participant. It says “Biersucher” on the back, a portmanteau of “Bier” and “Besucher” (visitor).

Beer Styles

Has Science Gone Too Far? Modern Bavarian Non-Alcoholic Helles

July 14, 2026 ak 2 Comments

In the last few years, a number of new Bavarian non-alcoholic Helles were launched by reputable breweries such as Augustiner (which really started this new craze), Tegernseer, Bayreuther, Weihenstephaner and Schönramer.

Augustiner’s new non-alcoholic beer was without any doubt Munich’s hype beer of the year 2024, and several other breweries followed suit and launched their own products once they realised that the hype was real.

From what I was told, these new beers are all based on new methods of gentle dealcoholisation using reverse osmosis, to a large extent driven by research at TU Munich at Weihenstephan (one paper about the impact of different production methods on NA beer aroma can be found here).

When Augustiner released that new beer, my prediction was that it would be a big deal, and I firmly stand by that assessment. It’s changed the world of alcohol-free beer for the better, making it actually enjoyable. My first tasting a few weeks later also confirmed it for me. And zebra-striping between Augustiner Oktoberfestbier and Augustiner Alkoholfrei Hell in the Augustiner tent at Oktoberfest on the last day of the festival in 2024 further showed what an incredible beer it is: when served extra cold from keg, it’s virtually indistinguishable in terms of aroma and flavour compared to a regular Augustiner Helles.

When I first tried Tegernseer’s version last year, I actually found it to be even better, at least from the bottle, to the point where it tastes exactly the same except for a slightly noticeable lack of alcoholic mouthfeel.

Last weekend, I finally had the chance to try out the latest contender, Schönramer Alkoholfrei. Schönramer Hell is one of my favourite Helles, it’s incredibly light, fairly dry and just incredibly drinkable. So of course I was looking forward to trying it.

And… it’s good. It’s very good. It seems even more refined than either Tegernseer’s and Augustiner’s version, but it’s the first time where I feel like there’s something lacking in the non-alcoholic Helles (other than the alcohol itself, of course), rather than something still being in there that makes it identifiable as a NA beer. The Schönramer version is so clean, the beeriness almost seems diminished to the point where it reminded me a bit of American light beers.

Me holding a bottle of Schönramer Alkoholfrei on my balcony.

This was the first time when I thought: has science gone too far? Has non-alcoholic Helles been optimised so much in an attempt to make it as clean-tasting as possible, that it has actually lost some of its character as a beer? It still tastes like a beer, don’t get me wrong, but I do wonder whether the non-alcoholic version could just be a bit more characterful. I also wonder whether this is simply down to the base beer, and I don’t know whether this is just a dealcoholised version of their regular Helles, or whether more tweaking was done that caused the beer character to become less and less.

So I had to go back the day after and try the beer again. What I noticed was that from a beer glass (nothing fancy, just a Willibecher), the beer was somewhat more aromatic, without any noticeably increased non-alcoholic character, and closer to the regular Schönramer Helles.

Anyway, in a few week’s time, I’ll be drinking Schönramer straight from the source, and we also have a tour booked, so I hope I’ll be able to ask a few more questions about the specific way Schönramer produce their non-alcoholic Helles and report back on my blog.

Beer Styles, History

Breslauer Schöps, a historic beer in four versions

July 13, 2026 ak 3 Comments

As I’m working on my new book project, I found some great sources about a beer style that I had heard about but didn’t know much about: Breslauer Schöps, hailing from the Lower Silesian city of
Wrocław in modern-day Poland.

It was probably not so much a single beer style, but rather four related ones. Think about it as a 2-by-2 matrix: one dimension was beer colour that distinguished between brown Schöps and white Schöps, while the other dimension distinguished between regular strength Schöps and Doppelbier, a slightly stronger version.

The historic sources are quite specific about it: the dark version was described as black to brown, with a very roasted taste to it, but otherwise clear. The pale version on the other hand was simply brewed from 100% air-dried or otherwise very pale malt.

In terms of strength, regular Schöps had an original gravity of about 8°P, while the Doppelbier variant was not double the strength, but rather only 1.5 times as strong, with about 12°P.

Brewing in Wrocław had been regulated in a guild since 1582 that made it exceptionally difficult to enter the brewing trade in the city unless you were born into a brewer family or got married to a brewers’ widow. Malt making was communal, which actually had the interesting effect that the communal malthouses were kept modern: in 1872, they were described as being at least partially automated, with automated cleaning machinery steam-powered malt mills, and even double-floor kilns.

But what specifically caught my eye was how Schöps was fermented: very quickly, at high temperatures for Central European brewing. The yeast was pitched at 35 to 37°C, fermentation started quickly, and the beer was finished fermenting in 12 to 18 hours. Historic descriptions give a strong indication for mixed fermentation, as the beer was described as having a sour tang similar to buttermilk. Because of this, Schöps was called a “three-day-beer”: “brewed today, fermented tomorrow, and consumed with joy on the third day”. For the Doppelbier, FG dropped down to about 4°P, while for the single strength Schöps, a FG of 3°P was expected.

The pitching temperature and fast fermentation really sound more like farmhouse yeasts. Was there any relationship to any of the strains still around today? We may never know, because Schöps as a beer style unfortunately went extinct.

Beer Styles

Session 150: Early German Porter As A Health Drink

June 28, 2026 ak 4 Comments

This blog post is my contribution to Session 150 to celebrate Martyn Cornell’s epic work about the complete history of Porter and Stout.

I have been interested in specifically German Porter for quite a while, in particular when I first learned about its existence through the 1947 notes of former Groterjan brewmaster A. Dörfel. I previously wrote about what brewing literature said about the specs of German Porter over the course of the 20th century.

Of course none of that is nearly as comprehensive as what Martyn Cornell wrote about. I have to admit, I’ve only read parts of his book, in particular those about Germany and Austria. What I noticed in there was the early association specifically of German Porter with being a Gesundheitsbier, a health beer, that was often also simply called a Malzextrakt. Remarkably, this was very often used in advertising, in which various producers frequently pointed out how good their beer was for sick people. In fact, when I started looking into it more, I noticed that virtually all mentions of Deutscher Porter from the 1860s to the 1880s that I could find made some health reference.

So how did this German Porter compare to English Porter? One German brewer, Hollack, wanted to show how superior their product. So at the Berlin Exhibition of Hygiene in 1883, they provided specific analyses that they handed out, which we have available:

Beer	SG	ABW%	Free Acid%
English Porter	1.0258	5.35	0.275
Malzextract Hoff	1.0258	2.77	0.252
Malzextract Werner	1.0385	3.35	0.31
Malzextract Grohmann	1.0535	4.46	0.315
Malzextract Hollack	1.0633	3.65	0.39

As you can see, the German Porters had more residual extract and were lower in alcohol. This looks like they were fermented in such a way to be richer in unfermented sugars (with the exception of Hoff’s Porter), while lower in alcohol content.

From a few years later, 1887, we also have a different analysis of Hollack’s Porter:

SG 1.0564
3.43% ABW
0.157% lactic acid
0.123% phosphoric acid

While the SG and the ABW is slightly lower compared to the 1883 specs, they are still quite high up there.

In 1890, yet another brewer, Th. Krepper, “German Porter and Lager Brewery” in Burg near Magdeburg, advertised their German Porter by posting the analysis results of the Versuchs- und Lehranstalt für Brauerei Berlin (also known as VLB Berlin):

SG 1.01968 (= 4.9°P)
4.56% ABW
0.0882% lactic acid
OG 15.36°P

Compared to the specs of other beers, this beer seems much more attenuated, and also quite a bit lower in acid.

Until then, all ads seem to refer to bottled German Porter only, and quite often in a health context. The first ad of cask German Porter I came across was from 1892, when a breakfast restaurant on Unter den Linden 24 in Berlin advertised cask German Porter 1/4 litre for 20 Pfennig, and cask English Porter 1/4 litre for 30 Pfennig.

And even Köstritzer seemed to have brewed a German Porter during the late 19th century, at least it’s listed as what the brewery exhibited in 1892 at an International Exhibition for the Red Cross in Leipzig.

In 1893, we can find another analysis used in advertising, when Freyberg’s Brauerei near Halle (Saale) put their analysis they got from a Mr. C. Bischoff from Berlin in an ad in a medical newspaper:

OG 21.27°P (calculated)
5.94% ABW (=7.4% ABV)
FG 7.5°P (apparent extract)
0.234% acid

To summarise, even though these German beers were called Porter, they must have been a lot sweeter and richer than their English counterparts, often did not have nearly as much alcohol, and were frequently advertised as a health beer. Some of the description do say that the German Porters are similar to English Porter, and they probably tasted similar, but the numbers suggest quite a large difference.

It would be interesting to work out in greater detail when German brewers moved away from the health claims specifically, and how it turned into the German Porter of later decades that was even codified as part of the East German beer standardisation efforts.

Modern German Porter, apart from the craft beer scene, is just a shadow of its former self. Lausitzer Porter seems to be the only surviving brands, which is a relatively weak beer, with barely any roasted flavours, and also available in fruit-flavoured versions, with cherry or strawberry. And the latest “innovation” that I only came across last week, is “Porter Radlerin”, a dark Radler from Porter and lemonade. Ironically, this is actually something I can get behind, because we could certainly do with more Dunkler Radler.

A bottle of Porter Radlerin, "beer mixed drink with lemon flavour", "first dark radler from out Porter". — A bottle of Porter Radlerin, “beer mixed drink with lemon flavour”, “first dark radler from out Porter”.

Beer Styles, Book

Bavarian White Beer, My New Book

June 19, 2026 ak 2 Comments

Today I can proudly announce that I just published my new book, Bavarian White Beer. Very much in the spirit of my previous book about Vienna Lager, my intention was to find out as much as possible about Bavarian White Beer, the beers people more commonly know as Bavarian Weissbier, Weizenbier or Hefeweizen, first from a historic perspective: how did the beer style get popular? How did it develop over time? What were the important locations and historic events during all of that? How did it survive to this day?

I then looked into the historic brewing literature to see what we can learn about the style there. This is also where the title for the book came from: I very quickly realised that even though the style’s history is also closely connected to the use of wheat malt in brewing, using wheat was far from obligatory, and plenty of examples of white beer using just barley malt were also brewed. This is why I don’t like using names involving only wheat when talking about the breadth of historic beers in that tradition.

And since my focus of previous books of mine has also been on brewing in general, I also took a look at the latest science and state-of-the-art technology and processes that are used to brew great Bavarian(-style) white beer in all its forms. This is of course complemented by a collection of homebrew recipes that cover the variety of historic and modern styles and variations: classic banana-forward Hefeweizen, oak-smoked wheat beer (a Bavarian-style wheat beer loosely inspired by early historic descriptions), historic Kelheim wheat beer from 100% wheat malt, Hefeweizen brewed on a Burton Union set (and what the Burton Union has to do with brewing wheat beer), modern hoppy wheat beer, and three homebrew versions of commercial beers: Skeleton Key & Goldfinger’s Bavarian Breeze, a beer that I was able to try at Goldfinger’s taproom in 2024, then the award-winning Live Oak Primus Weizenbock, and finally Sapwood Cellar’s Exaggerated Truth, a hazy IPA recipe that demonstrates how Bavarian wheat beer yeast can be used to add more complex fruity flavours to hoppy beers. Homebrewers can even learn how to malt their own wheat and make historically accurate air-dried wheat malt at home.

In terms of what’s covered, this is the most detailed brewing and history book solely dedicated to Bavarian white beer. You can buy it on Amazon as paperback or e-book. Visit waizenbier.de for more information. It has all the links to all the Amazon stores, and you can get an overview what to expect through the book’s table of contents.

An 1827 illustration showing wooden casks expelling foam during fermentation, so-called Spundgärung, which was common for top-fermented beers at the time.

What inspired me to look into this whole topic was actually another beer writer getting in touch with me. In early 2023, Jonny Garrett approached me with very specific history questions about the Degenberger family for a book he was working on then, The Meaning of Beer. The Degenbergers were a noble family from Bavaria who were very closely involved in the early development of white beer, in particular in Lower Bavaria. I couldn’t answer some of the questions, so I had to visit a specialised library to see what existing literature there was about the Degenbergers and the beginning of the Bavarian white beer monopoly. And just that got me down a rabbit hole about a nowadays very popular beer style that had already been popular in Bavaria from the 16th to the late 18th century.

And while some literature about it was around, it was either about super specific aspects of this whole history or just more general brewing literature. I realised that no book just focusing on this style existed that explained both history and brewing science to the level of detail that I would have liked to have. So I sat down and wrote that book myself.

While the idea had been in my head since 2023, it took me until June 2025 to actually start the work on it, and in the roughly 12 months since then, I managed to write a book pretty much how I wanted it to be. I have not been able to answer every single question about the style that there is, but I was able to dispel quite a few myths and unearth surprising historic details along the way, and overall, it covers all its important history, from its early establishment as a beer style in the 15th and 16th century all the way to the 21st century.

While writing the book, I noticed an interesting 80:20 effect, or at least something like it: in the first 2.5 months of working on the book, I wrote roughly 60% of the final text, while for the remaining 40%, it took me another 8 months, most of which was researching a lot of tiny details and very particular aspects of the history and brewing science of Bavarian white beer. The remaining time was proof-reading, incorporating corrections from reviewers, and technical things like fixing the layout, finding and adding images, and just sorting out all the tiny details to get everything ready for self-publishing both as a printed paperback book and as an e-book.

At this point, I also have to say many thanks to the people who were willing to review my manuscript and give me valuable feedback on it: Brian Alberts, Dave Carpenter and Ben Palmer. Their feedback greatly helped me improve the bits and pieces that just weren’t quite there yet.

I’m also saying thanks to David Bailey, who created the colourful, happy-looking cover image of a beer hall full of people enjoying Bavarian wheat beer, snacks, and each other’s company. I’ve known David’s work mainly through Pellicle Magazine, and always loved his style, so I was very happy when he agreed to draw the book cover.

One thing that I rediscovered while writing this book was how much I actually liked Hefeweizen. The beer style as such was quite formative for me because it was the only truly different beer on offer back when I was 17, 18 years old, compared to all the Austrian Märzen (which is really just a slightly more bitter Helles). As part of my work on the book, I also reacquainted myself with the style, and drank all the ones I could find, no matter whether on draught or from bottles. I realised how good the beer style actually is, and how much complexity there can be to it, and it somewhat made me understand why the beer must have been popular when the alternative would have been darker, slightly smokey lager beers.

As part of sampling all this Bavarian wheat beer, I also ventured into territories I hadn’t explored much before, and also realised that Kristallweizen (basically a clear, filtrated version with slightly more bitterness) can be excellent, even when it’s probably one of the least fashionable beer styles around right now.

So yeah, I hope the book can also increase the interest in this quite unique beer style, get more people to homebrew Bavarian white beer, and learn something about the beer’s history along the way! So please buy my book (all the information is on waizenbier.de), and don’t hesitate to get in touch if you have any further questions about the topic.

“Why waizenbier.de?”, you may wonder. Well, the story behind that is that I like vanity domains to promote books. What would be spelled “Weizenbier” in modern German actually wasn’t standardised until the German Orthographic Conference of 1901, and in particular the spelling “Waizenbier” was nearly as common between the 1760s and the late 19th century. The very first time G. Schneider & Sohn served their beer at Oktoberfest in 1895, they advertised their stall (it was likely more like a wooden hut) as “Waizenbierbude”, and that was very much my inspiration.

A historic stoneware mug with a tin lid (ca. 1900) and a wheat beer glass (ca. 1960) with Hofbräuhaus München Champagner Weizen branding. — A historic stoneware mug with a tin lid (ca. 1900) from which white beer would have been drunk out of, and a wheat beer glass (ca. 1960) with Hofbräuhaus München Champagner Weizen branding.

Beer Styles

Oktoberfest Beer at Oktoberfest: Does the Difference Even Matter?

October 3, 2025 ak 1 Comment

Working for a Munich-based startup (though in my case, remotely from Berlin) comes with a few perks. One, travelling to Munich a few times a year for work, two, going to Oktoberfest with my work colleagues because that’s apparently what any respectable Munich company is meant to do.

2025 has been my third Oktoberfest in a row now, each year in a different tent serving a different beer brand, in particular Marstall Zelt (Spaten), Augustiner Festhalle (Augustiner) and Schützen-Festzelt (Löwenbräu). While I don’t have a comprehensive overview over all the beer brands, 3 different beers are still half of them.

A Maß of Spaten Oktoberfestbier at Marstall Festzelt, 2023

Last year, in the weeks before Oktoberfest, I actually attended a guided Oktoberfest beer tasting, where I was able to try out all six beers (Augustiner, Spaten, Löwenbräu, Paulaner, Hacker-Pschorr, Hofbräuhaus) side by side. In previous years, I did similar taste tests together with my wife Louise and my friend Ben. In these tastings, there were always stark differences, and they weren’t always identical. Two years ago for example, I thought Löwenbräu was fairly good, and ranked it third on my list, while last year, it tasted really bad and I ranked it last. So let’s just say, I have opinions.

Every time I went to Oktoberfest, I had certain expectations about the beer quality, not just connected to my personal prejudice (let’s face it, everyone is somewhat prejudiced about major beer brands) and brand perception, but also informed by previous tastings. But every time, these expectations were shattered.

Spaten at Marstall? Excellent. Cool, fresh, not underpoured, and tasting great.

Augustiner at Augustiner Festhalle? Exactly as I expected and knew it.

Most recently, Löwenbräu at Schützen-Festzelt? Whoa. Fresh, dry, crisp, entirely unlike what I had experienced in previous years.

A partially drunk Maß of beer at the Augustiner-Festzelt, 2024

When I came home after Oktoberfest, I actually went back into our beer fridge and tried a can of Löwenbräu Oktoberfestbier. And… it was not the same. It was solid, but nowhere near as good as just a few days before. And it tasted quite different from the Paulaner Oktoberfestbier (also from can) that I had afterwards, and also quite different from the bottled Oktoberfestbier I had had just a few days before.

But thinking back about all the Oktoberfestbier at Oktoberfest over the years, I don’t think I have would been able to distinguish them at all, unlike the ones at the beer tastings. The difference being of course that in all the taste tests, the beers under test were always from bottle or can, while at Oktoberfest, it’s always poured from tap, either as tank beer (for most brands) or from large 200 litre wooden casks (Augustiner only), the taps barely ever close, and the beer is properly cold (which probably doesn’t exactly help with tasting finer details in the beer).

So does the difference in beer at Oktoberfest even matter? To me, it doesn’t seem to, because I honestly don’t think I could taste the difference between Spaten, Löwenbräu and Augustiner. Is the preference of draught Oktoberfest beer at the festival itself just brand loyalty, and has nothing to do with the actual taste? To me, it seems like that at the moment, and it’s not just because people (including me) just get hammered and then nothing else matters. In fact, I never actually got drunk at any of my Oktoberfest visits because I like to pace myself by also drinking Radler and/or alcohol-free beer.

A Maß of Löwenbräu Oktoberfestbier at Schützen-Festzelt, 2025

And the latter is what actually matters in brand differentiation: at Marstall in 2023, they only had Radler as low-alcohol beery option, at Augustiner last year, they had their then new alcohol-free Helles on draught (which is otherwise only available in bottles, even in Augustiner restaurants and beer halls in Munich, so they must have been really sure about shifting a lot without developing microbiological issues in the draught system) which was excellent, and this year, the Schützen-Festzelt only had Löwenbräu’s alcohol-free beer which was a sugary, worty mess that I couldn’t even finish.

So at least for me, while the Oktoberfestbier brand doesn’t seem to matter, it does matter if you want to drink something other than the regular Festbier and explore some of the other options, like the non-alcoholic beers for pacing purposes.

Beer Styles, History

1980s Altbier and Kölsch

August 15, 2025 ak 5 Comments

I like going to the library, in particular the GGB library at the VLB in Berlin. Less than 15 minutes on the bus, a few minutes of walking, and I’m there. Earlier this week, I spent two days researching for my new book. When you go through a lot of historic material, there’s inevitably some bycatch, random articles in journals or paragraphs or sections of books that you didn’t intend to look up, but stumbled upon, that turn out to be super interesting.

One of these articles is one about top-fermented beers in West Germany in 1980, written by Dr. Karl-Ullrich Heyse and published in Brauwelt (issue 45, 6 Nov 1980), a Germany-based journal for the brewing industry. At the time, 14.3% of the total beer production in the Federal Republic was top-fermented beer, partially driven by Bavarian wheat beer which had a 12.1% share in the Bavarian production output, while other top-fermented styles, in particular Altbier, Kölsch and Malzbier (a barely-fermented malt-based beverage that is very sweet) were quite dominant in North Rhine-Westphalia.

The descriptions of Altbier and Kölschbier (sic!) are particularly interesting because they are essentially a style guideline (before there were any comprehensive style guidelines) and a short guide how to brew both styles.

Altbier was described with an original gravity of 11.2-12%, a colour between 25 and 38 EBC, a pH of 4.15 and 4.4 and a bitterness of 28 to 40 “EBC units” (which I assume are equivalent to IBU). The grist was described as “arbitrary”, while a common suggestion of grist composition was also provided: 70% Vienna malt, 20% Munich malt, and 10% wheat malt for rounding off the flavour. An optional 1% or less of roasted malt (from barley or wheat) could also be used for colour correction. The common mashing methods were ranging from infusion mashing to double decoction mashing. Hops were given in 3 to 5 additions, usually high-quality aroma hops.

Fermentation and maturation are described in greater detail: top-fermenting yeast is pitched at a rate of 0.5 l/hl wort and a temperature of 12°C. The maximum fermentation temperature should be 16°C. When fermented in tanks, fermentation is done under pressure of 0.5 to 0.8 bar. Under these conditions, the yeast can be pitched at 18-20°C and that temperature can be held until fermentation is finished. After chilling the green beer to 14-16°C, some of the yeast is taken off. Reduction of diacetyl should take 2 to 4 days. Only then the beer is cooled down to 0°C. Under more conventional conditions, maturation can also happen at cellar temperatures of 4-5°C. The maturation phase takes about 1 to 2 weeks. If Kräusen (freshly fermenting beer) with bottom-fermenting yeast are available, they can be used for improving secondary fermentation (this is actually permitted under specific circumstances in German beer law).

The characteristics of Kölsch (which the article calls Kölschbier) are a bit different: an OG of 11.2 to 11.8%, a colour of 7.5 to 14 EBC, a pH of 4.15 to 4.4, and a bitterness of 16 to 34 EBC units. The article states that most breweries use 100% Vienna malt (an unusual choice from today’s perspective), while some use up to 20% wheat malt to improve the body and round off the flavour of the beer. As typical mashing methods, infusion mashing and single decoction mashing are named.

Fermentation could be either done in a tank like with the Altbier, or in open fermentation at temperatures of 14 to 18°C, which should take 3 to 4 days, followed by chilling it down to 8 to 10°C and then moving it to maturation tanks. Cold maturation times and temperatures vary, where some breweries mature for 40 to 60 days at 4 to 5°C, while others with cellar temperatures of 0-1°C reduce that time to 14 to 40 days.

Beer Styles, History

Oktoberfest-Märzen in the 1950s

August 13, 2025 ak 6 Comments

Earlier this week, I did a bit of research in the VLB/GGB library, and by chance came across analyses of Oktoberfest-Märzen in the 1950s, in particular the beers served at Oktoberfest in 1953, 1954 and 1956.

I. Bartek of Wissenschaftliche Station in Munich conducted these analyses and published them in Brauwelt. They analysed 8 different Märzen beers from the Oktoberfest for colour, specific gravity, alcohol content and unfermented sugars, and derived residual extract, attenuation and potential terminal gravity from it. None of the actual breweries are revealed, they are only numbers 1 to 8. When you look at the raw data, the numbers 1-8 of 1953 and 1954 match up (i.e. it’s the same brewery), but it’s not clear whether the same order was kept up for 1956. Interestingly, the 1954 article says that the beers were from 8 Munich breweries. I was wondering which breweries these were, and could only come up with 7 (Augustiner, Paulaner-Thomasbräu, Hacker, Hofbräuhaus, Pschorr, Löwenbräu, Spaten-Franziskaner-Leistbräu). A report about 1954 Oktoberfest only talks about 7 large tents of the big breweries without naming any specific ones. Did one of them serve more than one beers? Augustiner maybe? Their Wiesn-Edelstoff, the archetypal pale Festbier as we know it nowadays, was only released in 1953, but it’s not clear whether Augustiner continued selling the old-school Märzen beside it. I don’t know.

When looking at the data, a few things stand out: in 1953, two of the beers had an OG of only 13.3 resp 13.5%. While technically a Märzen, it would nowadays not be allowed as Oktoberfestbier, as those need to have an OG between 13.6 and 14.0%. The attenuation was lower than what we’re used to, and this also shows in the alcohol content, which is between 4.6% ABV (converted from ABW) and 5.6%.

In particular beer #1 combines a fairly high OG (13.8%) with a relatively poor apparent attenuation of 63.9% and lots of unfermented but fermentable sugars. That beer was probably very sweet.

Similarly, 1954’s beer #5 has an even higher amount of unfermented sugars with an OG of 13.5% and 5% ABV. Probably also rather sweet. There is also another outlier in the same year, beer #6, with over 75% apparent attenuation. With 5.5% ABV, it was probably still quite malty, but otherwise quite highly attenuated and thus not nearly as sweet-tasting as any of the others.

The same beer was also by far the darkest, with a colour (according to the Brand scale) of 3.0 to 3.5. As a very rough approximation, this would be similar to about 50 to 58 EBC, while most other beers are recorded as 1.2-1.4 °Brand (=20-23 EBC), 1.4-1.6 °Brand (23-27 EBC), 1.6-2.0 °Brand (23-33 EBC) or 2.0-2.5 °Brand (33-42 EBC). Compare this with the BJCP guideline for Märzen, which sets the colour at 8-17 SRM (15.8-33.5 EBC), or the Brewers Association’s style guidelines at 8 to 30 EBC.

Please note that these colours are only rough approximations, as the Brand scale and similar systems were problematic and unreliable. This article explains it all in detail (shoutout to Thomas Ascher for the pointer!).

By 1956, the beers seem to have changed a bit: the OG is now generally at 13.6% or over (all but one are actually in the 13.8-14.0% range), while attenuation is higher: just one beer with 69% apparent attenuation, the rest all 70+%, one even at 78.8%. This also shows in the alcohol content: one beer (the poorly attenuated one) has 5.0% ABV, while the others are all between 5.4 and 5.8% ABV.

For 1956, we also got measurements of pH and carbonation. All but two beers actually had a pH over 4.5, which means microbiologically less stability than the recommended pH of less than 4.5. This is not ideal, but for a beer festival with a large throughput, it was probably not that big of an issue.

The carbonation of the Oktoberfest-Märzen beers is also interesting, between 3.5 g/l and 4 g/l. Compared to modern lager beers, this is pretty low, and closer to the expected carbonation of cask ale or rustic “ungespundet” (unbunged) lager beers in Franconia.

Finally, one observation: as late as 1954, you could drink Oktoberfest-Märzen in Munich which, at least when looking at original gravity and final gravity, and thus alcohol content, was very similar to the Märzen that was served in Vienna in 1876. Only the colour was darker. In that sense, these old-school Oktoberfest beers seem like the remnants of 19th century lager brewing, a proper look into the past. And by 1956, they seem to have been slightly cleaned up to reduce some of the sweetness and further increase the alcohol content.

If you’re interested in all the details, here’s the raw data for 1953 (Brauwelt No. 84, 19 Oct 1954, p.1266):

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Colour (Brand)	1.6-2.0	1.6-2.0	1.6-2.0	1.2-1.4	1.4-1.6	1.6-2.0	2.0-2.5	1.6-2.0
SG	1.01968	1.01660	1.01453	1.01517	1.01362	1.01347	1.01747	1.01541
Apparnet extract [%]	5.0	4.2	3.7	3.8	3.5	3.4	4.5	3.9
Real extract [%]	6.7	6.1	5.6	5.8	5.5	5.3	6.2	5.8
Alcohol by weight [%]	3.7	4.1	4.1	4.1	4.5	4.1	3.8	4.1
OG [%]	13.8	13.9	13.6	13.5	14.0	13.3	13.6	13.6
Apparent attenuation [%]	63.9	69.6	72.4	71.4	75.2	74.1	67.3	71.1
Real attenuation [%]	51.3	56.0	58.3	57.5	60.7	59.6	54.2	57.3
Final apparent attenuation [%]	70.7	73.5	75.0	75.0	82.6	75.9	80.8	74.2
Still fermentable extract [%]	6.8	3.9	2.6	3.6	7.4	1.8	13.5	3.1

Raw data for 1954 (Brauwelt, 19 Oct 1954, p.1266):

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Colour (Brand)	1.6-2.0	1.4-1.6	1.6-2.0	1.6-2.0	1.4-1.6	3.0-3.5	2.0-2.5	1.4-1.6
SG	1.01622	1.01719	1.01603	1.01603	1.01617	1.011324	1.01581	1.01646
Apparnet extract [%]	4.1	4.4	4.1	4.1	4.2	3.4	4.0	4.2
Real extract [%]	6.0	6.2	6.0	6.0	6.0	5.4	5.9	6.0
Alcohol by weight [%]	4.0	4.1	4.2	4.1	4.0	4.4	4.1	4.1
OG [%]	13.6	14.0	13.9	13.8	13.5	13.8	13.8	13.8
Apparent attenuation [%]	69.6	68.6	70.7	70.2	69.1	75.5	70.7	69.7
Real attenuation [%]	56.1	55.7	57.3	56.6	56.1	61.1	57.3	56.5
Final apparent attenuation [%]	73.4	75.7	72.5	73.0	81.0	78.4	78.2	78.1
Still fermentable extract [%]	3.8	7.1	1.8	2.8	11.9	2.9	7.5	8.4

Raw data for 1956 (Brauwelt, 5 Oct 1956, p.1428):

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Colour (Brand)	0.9-1.0	2.0-2.5	2.0-2.5	2.0-2.5	2.0-2.5	2.5-3.0ß	2.5-3.0	2.0-2.5
SG	1.01278	1.01490	1.01476	1.01390	1.01150	1.01287	1.01430	1.01661
Apparent extract [%]	3.3	3.8	3.8	3.6	3.9	3.3	3.7	4.2
Real extract [%]	5.3	5.7	5.8	5.5	5.0	5.3	5.6	6.1
Alcohol by weight [%]	4.5	4.3	4.3	4.2	4.6	4.5	4.3	4.0
OG [%]	13.8	13.9	14.0	13.6	13.9	14.0	13.8	13.8
Apparent ttenuation [%]	76.5	72.6	73.1	73.8	78.8	76.5	73.5	69.4
Real attenuation [%]	61.7	58.7	58.8	59.8	63.7	61.9	59.3	56.1
Final apparent attenuation [%]	80.6	75.6	78.0	76.9	79.5	78.3	76.9	77.0
Still fermentable extract [%]	4.1	3.0	4.9	3.1	0.7	1.8	3.4	7.6
pH	4.52	4.56	4.66	4.52	4.63	4.15	4.44	4.57
CO₂ [mg/kg]	3880	4100	4090	3650	3610	–	3540	4030