Why German Beer?

Ask people what they associate with Germany and beer is likely to come up within a few answers, usually along with a tall glass, a pretzel and a very large tent in Munich. Some of that is cliché, but beer really is woven into German history: monasteries brewed it, princes taxed it, a sixteenth-century Bavarian law about its ingredients is still quoted today, and an annual festival that began as a royal wedding party now draws millions of visitors. This opening chapter explains why the subject deserves a course, sketches how beer is made so that later chapters make sense, sets out what the course covers and leaves out, and shows how to tell solid history from the stories that cling to beer. Dates and names are given from general knowledge and checked as each chapter is written.

Why German Beer?

Few drinks carry as much history as beer does in Germany. It was a staple food and a source of tax revenue long before it was a leisure product. Rules about it are some of the oldest food laws in Europe. The country has hundreds of breweries, many of them small and local, and a large number of regional styles, each tied to a town or a district. Beer shapes the calendar through festivals, the map through brewing towns, and the language through words and customs that most visitors only half notice. A course on beer is therefore also a course on food law, regional identity, religion, industry and public life.

A One-Paragraph Version

People in the German lands were brewing beer well before the Middle Ages, and monasteries became important brewers in the medieval period (check the details). Hops gradually replaced older herbal mixtures as the bittering and preserving ingredient. In 1516 the Duchy of Bavaria issued an order about the ingredients of beer that later became known as the Reinheitsgebot, or purity law (check the date and the wording). In the nineteenth century, cold storage and a better understanding of yeast helped bottom-fermented lager to spread across the world. Munich's beer festival began in 1810 as part of a royal wedding celebration (check). Today Germany has a large brewing industry alongside a growing craft scene. Each point is developed in a later chapter.

How Beer Is Made: A Short Guide

Later chapters assume you know the basic steps, so here they are in outline. The detail of each step differs by style, but the sequence is the same almost everywhere.

What the Course Covers

Scope: Germany at the Centre

The course is built around Germany, and within Germany Bavaria gets a large share of the attention, because so much of the best-known beer history happened there. Neighbouring brewing traditions matter too. The Czech lands gave the world Pilsner, Belgium has a very different tradition, and Britain and Ireland have their own. They appear where they are inseparable from the German story, and the course says where they come from. Edinburgh readers will find British comparisons, such as cask ale and Scotch ale, where they help.

A Note on Drinking

Record, Reputation and Legend

Beer history attracts stories. Three kinds of claim need different handling.

Where to Read and Taste

• Museums and brewery visits. Several German cities have beer museums, and many breweries offer tours that explain the process. The tour guide's stories are best treated as entertainment, and checked.
• Trade bodies. The German Brewers' Federation and regional brewers' associations publish facts about the industry (check the current names).
• Reference books. Look for histories of brewing and encyclopedic guides to beer styles, which put individual beers in context.
• Festival publications. The city of Munich publishes information about Oktoberfest, which Chapters 7 and 8 use.
• Tasting, in moderation. If you taste German beers, try a few styles side by side and compare them with something from home, as a way of learning what the chapters describe.

Exercises

Next chapter: Brewing Before the Law, which looks at how beer was made and traded in the German lands before the purity order.