Here comes a new challenger

Bamberg, capital city of beer culture in Germany, is not known for a here-today, gone-tomorrow approach to breweries. The establishments that put it on the map for the beer tourists of recent decades are, well, established: all with at least a century under their belts and some famous far beyond Bamberg. I idly assumed that that's how it works: with the exception of the 2004-vintage Ambräusianum, the list of breweries is pretty much fixed. I was wrong though. Perhaps because of the city's reputation, new players have been setting up their kettles and fermenters in recent years, hoping to get a piece of Bamberg's beer action. Attracting pilgrims has been Bamberg's core business since the beginning.

Apart from beer, the other thing Bamberg is famous for, at least locally, is market gardening. Zollnerstraße runs up behind the railway station, and from the street side seems perfectly normal, urban and commercial, but behind the buildings is a lot of green space and greenhouses. Kris Emmerling's family owned one of these gardens and when he inherited the site he was determined to continue growing produce there. He added Bamberg's smallest brewery -- Hopfengarten -- to the premises and in 2021 converted the former flower shop at the front into a taproom. Hopfengarten specialises in exotic recipes using botanicals grown onsite, and you get a hefty portion of horticultural education as a side order.

He introduced us to Hopfengarten's beers with Koala, a sweet and clean kellerbier-style lager at its base, but with added eucalyptus for an extra sweet and herbal complexity. Without knowing what it was I guessed rosemary as the interloper: while it has the wintery oily quality it didn't taste as full-on herbal as I would expect from eucalyptus. There's a subtle lightness of touch here, suggesting that they're not out to make gimmicks. Bamberg's reputation still counts for something.

Rauchbier is part of that reputation. I mentioned yesterday that Klosterbräu seems to have decided that adding one to their roster is essential. At Hopfengarten they have too, though given it their own twist. Where everyone else uses smoked malt, Hopfengarten smokes the hops. Rauch Hopfen is broadly a Märzen, I think: 5.8% ABV and amber coloured. The smoke is mild but present and there's a dominant savoury aspect, tasting a little like tomato seeds to me. Again, it's decent lager and not just a gimmick or a joke recipe.

For gimmickry, we finish on their Chilibock. They grow chillis out back and fifty different varieties go into this dark red-brown doppelbock of 8% ABV. It smells quite innocent, all smooth with sweet caramel and biscuit. Stylistic concerns, and indeed sanity, leave the equation from the first sip, and sip is all you can do. There's a ferocious chilli heat which drowns any beer character it may have had, while I also get a strong kick of acidic vinegar, suggesting the peppers have been pickled rather than boiled. They sell this by the big bottle, but not to me.

Down in the city centre, you would be forgiven for thinking that the brewery/inn Gasthus Zum Sternla had been operating for centuries: it fits the model of the rambling restaurant with onsite brewery perfectly. But while the site is historic it only took its current form in 2019 and the brewhouse out back is very high-tech and shiny. Despite having this small batch production set-up, they're not constantly producing new recipes the way a brewery like this at home would. Instead there were two permanent beers and a seasonal, all of them pale lagers.

Sternla Märzen is a bit of a lightweight at 5% ABV though is a healthy amber colour and sports a heavy bitterness. I get a rye-like grassy pinch and some cardamom or poppyseed spicing. Märzen isn't meant to be quaff-and-go easy drinking, but I found this one demanded my time more than most. While hard work to drink, it's fun and rewarding too.

A different hefty lager style is on the other permanent tap: Sternla Export. Although a much paler yellow colour it's just as dense, and slightly stronger too: 5.1% ABV being perfectly acceptable for Export. That said, it's generally a malt-forward beer, and this one really lays on the hops, with bags of celery and fresh spinach. That makes it a little busy, though it gets away with it by being super clean, allowing each flavour to play its part separately and distinctly, not all smushed in together. There's a poise and precision here that's very unusual for something produced onsite at a large German restaurant.

It seems quite topsy-turvy that Sternla Helles -- an accessible 4.7% ABV -- would be the special-edition seasonal, but here we are. It's almost completely clear and supremely smooth. There's a dry and husky aspect to the flavour, as well as a soft candyfloss malt middle. That doesn't leave much space for hopping, and I would have liked a little more green, even given that it's a Helles and an especially light one at that. More than anything, however, this was drinkable, and I could easily have opted for a second and third Seidla. That's the whole point of Helles so I can't say this one didn't achieve its goals.

The Sandbank Prison is one of Bamberg's landmarks, and with closure and repurposing imminent, the area around it is ripe for redevelopment. The Ahörnla brewery has stolen a march on this, with their brewkit installed and operational in a tower above their Ahörnla im Sand pub, and a sister hotel on the way nearby.

There are two flagship beers in production, and I'm starting with Sand Hell. This also seemed low-strength for the style, at 4.8% ABV. It was also much less polished than the Sternla fare, tasting of sweet caramel with added strawberry and raspberry. "There'll be butterscotch too" I thought, and sure enough the telltale diacetyl arrived a second or two later. Despite being unlikely to win any homebrew competitions, it does manage to stay enjoyable. I think there's merit to the fruity complexity, even if it's quite untypical.

Ahörnla Rot is quite a different proposition. This is 5% ABV and a clear red. Burnt caramel is the first impression I got from it, but exploring further gave me fruitcake, and tea brack in particular, with a sprinkling of coconut complexity. The overall impression was of a wholesome and old-fashioned teatime treat. Again, this is perhaps not how lager should be brewed by-the-book, but again it's enjoyable and drinkable.

One more brewpub finishes this whistlestop tour, and it's as different again as the others. Like Hopfengarten, Landwinkl stakes a claim to be Bamberg's smallest, crammed into a side room beside the poky corner pub that's been serving the beer since 2019.

There's a rauchbier in the set here, called A Rauchigs. This is a garnet red-brown and 5.4% ABV but packs in a lot of flavour to that package. Tar, salty fish, brown sugar and cola all feature, and I was reminded of Schlenkerla's delicious but slightly extreme Ur-Bock. Like it, the smoke is smoothly integrated into the weighty dark-malt-driven body and it makes the beer incredibly satisfying to drink. This is the kind of beer that one might expect to find on every street corner in Bamberg but which is sadly rare.

With time for just one more, I thought I'd go for a cleansing Helles. Landwinkl's is called A Hells. I give up kvetching about relative strengths, because this one is only 4.7% ABV too. Though dry and chalky at first, the flavour evolves into a beautiful summer-meadow floral quality before bringing a balancing spinach bitterness in the finish. As at Sternla, there's none of the roughness of what is essentially a kellerbier, and it's completely clear to boot. I loved how it adheres to the strictures of Bavarian pale lager while also showing superb creativity in its complexity. Very nicely done.

After four nights and a lot of legwork, time was up in Bamberg. Phase two began with a train journey westwards.

Light motif

Low-strength German oddities isn't a theme I've tackled on here previously, as far as I can recall, but I do like to mix things up, so here goes.

Radler isn't really odd, but then it doesn't count as beer either, in Germany. This one is Grevensteiner Naturtrübes Ur-Radler, 48% lager, 52% lemonade at 2.5% ABV. I expected it to be hazy and yellow because radlers are, but it immediately confounded me by being a dark bronze shade and almost completely clear, at least for the initial part of the pour. Perhaps I should have given the bottle a rattle before opening. It smells of dried lemon and herbs, like the sort of mixture you might use to season fish in Mediterranean cookery. The flavour is very sweet, but not in the usual radler way. It's cleaner and smoother, with a dry and tannic lemon tea quality. There's even a mildly herbal hop bite. This doesn't taste like some fizzy pop topped up with lager. It's altogether classier, refined and refreshing. The sugar doesn't hang around on the palate, nor lump together in the stomach. A nice twist from Team Veltins.

But if even that is too rich for your blood alcohol, Schlenkerla has an offering, which I think is new, at 1.2% ABV. Hansla is the same dark brown colour as the rest of the stable, and has a familiar aroma of the burnt crunchy bits around the edge of a roast ham. They haven't compensated in the texture and it's quite watery as a result. This means there isn't the same meaty richness as with the classic Märzen, though it calls its intense flavour to mind. Instead there's a dry acridity, like real wood smoke at its most stinging and inconvenient. That works well in the high-ABV end of the series -- the urbock and oak doppelbock -- but is an encumbrance here. The aftertaste is a lingering raw beechwood that's a little out of character for the brand. Yes, it's thirst-quenching, despite the smoke, but so thin that it doesn't really feel like beer, more a smoked savoury soft drink: I could be persuaded it's a variant of kombucha or kvass or the like. Interesting as an experiment, but not something I would make a habit of, even if I found myself labouring in the fields around Bamberg. For more on the historical background of what's going on here, see Andreas's blog.

I like when German beer shows its reputation as staid and samey to be inaccurate. There's always more to explore even when you think you've seen and tasted it all.

Where all roads lead

Following on from Monday's post on the Italian beers I found last month in Rome, this one is about the foreign selection. I did try to drink local as much as possible, but some things were just too interesting to pass up.

My reasoning behind choosing Lervig's Johnny Low in Il Maltese is that I had a whole evening of talking ahead of me and wanted something I could sip safely while waiting for the event to start. A Norwegian IPA at 2.5% ABV seemed like just the ticket. It's lovely too: pale yellow with loads of lemon sherbet. Yes, the body is watery but not in a bad way -- it adds to the quenching power and drinkability. In fact, it was tough going to keep sipping it, this beer virtually pours itself down your throat.

I'd been through most of Il Maltese's draught selection by the time I got to Hoepfner Porter, exported from Baden-Württemberg. It's a wan pale red colour and very sweet, to the point of sickliness. It lays on cherries and milk chocolate without the weight of body to support the strength of the flavours. Just a mildly dry finish and a sudden sharp burst of cherry sourness rescues it, but I wouldn't be rushing back for another.

Before leaving I got a small taste of Amager's Wookiee 9% ABV double IPA, before it all ran out. I can see why it's popular: pale blonde and with a super clean pithy hop flavour, unsullied by booze heat or crystal malt sweetness.

I mentioned on Monday that I found Ma Che Siete Venuti A Fà in the middle of celebrating German beer. It would have been rude not to join in. Besides, turning down a Schlenkerla beer I'd never tasted before is simply unthinkable. And so a large glass of Schlenkerla Fastenbier was acquired. Funny, I thought this style was usually super-strong, but this one is a mere 5.5% ABV, arriving a rich chestnut red colour. It has a lot in common with other beers from the Bamberg brewery: bags of beechwood smoke, of course, and a little bit of the tarryness you find in the Urbock, though not as pronounced. The real genius of this beer -- I opined to myself as the glass emptied itself more rapidly than one would expect for something so powerfully flavoured -- is the finish: there's virtually none. All the action happens while it's in your mouth, and when it's gone, it's gone. Which means you have to take another mouthful. And then order another glass when the first one empties. "Moreish" barely begins to cover it.

But I'm made of stronger stuff, me, and worked my way heroically across the taps. Freigest Salzspeicher caught my eye, a 6% ABV sour raspberry porter. This squirted flatly from the tap, forming a loose-bubbled head over a black body. A wary sniff revealed something that smells like the bottom of a punnet of elderly raspberries. The flavour is fresher, but still all raspberry and hardly any porter, only a tiny touch of dark roasted grain. The sourness kind of gets buried too: while the high attenuation is tasteable, the tartness of the raspberry dovetails very neatly with the inherent tartness of the beer and it's hard to tell which contributes what. It's an interesting experiment, but after the genius that is Schlenkerla it tasted like amateur hour.

There was an English stout on the handpumps: Siren's Sweet Dreams. This has a heady cocoa aroma tempered by the acidic tang of curing tobacco. The flavour is simpler, dominated by that chocolate and nicely smooth to drink. It's unusual for a beer that's not a pale ale to be worth it just for the aroma alone, but this is one of those.

I couldn't resist a swift tot of Gänstaller-Bräu Affumicator before moving on, an all-time favourite. Magic.

Later that evening, wandering alone in the depths of southern Trastevere I popped into Birrifugio for one. There's a small but eclectic selection in this vaguely English-style neighbourhood pub, with a beer each from Adnams, Carlow Brewing, Weihenstephaner, Dark Star and Amager on tap. What caught my eye, however, was Bayerischer Bahnhof Original Gose, as far as I know the only example of this style-of-the-moment brewed in the city most associated with it: Leipzig. It arrived looking and smelling like a simple witbier: hazy straw-coloured with mild herbal aromas. Its true nature is much more apparent on tasting as the salt and coriander are right up front giving it a lip-smacking crispness and offering cold ocean-grade refreshment. I'd loved to have stayed for another, and loved even more to be in a city where this is the sort of beer you get when you ask for a beer. I could drink a lot of its simple complexity.

But that's where this trip's beers end. A big thank you to Silvia and the team at Associazione Degustatori Birra for making it all possible. I did little more than scratch my major itches regarding Rome's craft beer pubs but I'm aware there's still plenty more to explore on future visits and that the local beer scene is expanding at a phenomenal pace. Forza la rivoluzione!

Smoaken!

You know that Change is afoot in the beer world when even staunchly traditional Bavarian breweries start turning out extensions to their seemingly immutable brand lines. In the wake of Schneider's welcome decision to make Edel-Weisse (now called "Tap 4: Mein Grünes") and Hopfenweisse (Tap 5) regular parts of their range, we have a new offering from smoked beer specialist Heller of Bamberg. Aecht Schlenkerla Eiche is an 8% ABV doppelbock based on malt they've smoked over smoldering oak instead of the usual beech.

The first thing that strikes me about the beer is the colour. Paler than the other Schlenkerlas, it's an eye-catching clear shade of mahogany. And then there's the texture. It's a while since I've had a doppelbock but I don't remember any of the more normal ones being this light. It's clean and crisp, with not a lot of residual sugars: easier drinking than their rather stickily delicious 6.5% ABV Urbock.

So easy drinking, in fact, that I'm not going to attempt a run-down of the flavours: Barry's already done that very well here and suffice it to say the beer is definitely as full-on an experience as he suggests. What I'm wondering is what difference the oak makes. I'd been expecting maybe some of the character of an oak-barrel-aged beer, since that's my sole reference point for oak. But it's not like that at all. It's very similar to the regular beech smoke, but there's something a little different about it: a slightly herbal, sappy fresh wood flavour that I wouldn't normally associate with oak at all. I reckon it'd be a sharp palate indeed that can identify the smoke variety in a rauchbier.

All in all, though, this is top-notch stuff, and well worth the nearly €4 I stumped up for it at DrinkStore. The lightness of touch compared to the Urbock makes for a very drinkable smoke-laden flavour powerhouse, if you catch my drift.

Stone are nice

Thanks to Aer Lingus rescheduling my flight it was 1.30 by the time I got to the Great British Beer Festival on Tuesday, and the trade session was well under way. My fellow Irish Craft Brewer members had established Camp Ireland near Bières Sans Frontières and had already lured Ally (An American Alewife In London) into their midst. By the time I arrived, Knit Along With Bionic Laura was already in full swing.

I don't know if it was just because there was no Lost Abbey or Dogfish Head on cask, but I got the impression that the beer list was rather less geek-intensive compared to last year. Topping my hitlist were the beers from Stone: a brewery that has built itself a reputation of being hoppier-than-thou in a most immodest fashion. Barry had given a couple of them a bit of a pasting recently so I was dying to find out what the truth of the matter was. First up was Levitation, a pale ale with an uncharacteristic 4.4% ABV. The aroma is pungently hoppy, but the flavour is actually quite balanced, with a gentle sherbety character on a smooth body. This combination of big hops and big body made it extra hard to believe how low in alcohol it was: this beer does a very convincing impression of an 8% west coast thumper.

Next up was Stone IPA, the only one that Barry also tried and the only one he enjoyed. I enjoyed it too. It lures you in with quite a cute and fluffy hop aroma and after the first sip I was waiting for the bang of acid harshness. But it never came: it continues on this easy-going fruity note and it's only on burping (is there a more connoisseury word for this?) that the raw bitterness comes out. I was charmed.

Last of this lot was bottled Ruination, a beer which makes massive claims on the label about how much of a hop-monster it is. (Actually, I just looked, and "massive hop monster" really is the brewery's preferred description.) It's a clear pale yellow and at 7.7% ABV is inching toward palate-pounder territory. It certainly has quite a big chewy body with toffee malty undertones, but once again the hops sitting on top are quite balanced and not in the least bit harsh or difficult. In fact, I'm not even sure I'd go so far as to describe this 100+ IBU beer as "bitter". Fruity and hoppy yes, but bitter I dunno. It was the last beer I had before hitting the road so it is perfectly possible my palate was utterly shot to hell by then, but the point is I loved this beer and will be looking out for it, and other Stones, when I can.

Stone claim to be the demons of American craft brewing, but they're pussycats really, and all the better for it.

Only one other beer was a non-negotiable must-have: Schlenkerla Urbock. I've been looking forward to this since I first tried the Märzen. "It tastes a lot like Schlenkerla" said Boak, tasting it blind. And she's right, it does, which is why it's brilliant. Identical hamminess and just a slightly heavier body to it. With Märzen on weeknights, this is the Schlenkerla for Friday evening. In my Bamburg fantasy anyway.

When I went along to the bookstore to gawk at the captive Pete Brown which CAMRA had on display there, he told me I should wean myself off Schlenkerla. He even wrote it in my copy of Hops & Glory (great book; you should read it), suggesting Worthington's White Shield as an alternative. I've never had this oh-so-English IPA so, after leaving Pete to be taunted by his captors some more, Thom and I hit the bottled beer bar. Again, this could be palate-fatigue, but I found White Shield to be very much a malt-driven ale: rich and full and warming. The bitterness is a sideshow to this and the whole experience had me wondering how suitable it would be in a hot climate as opposed to beside a log fire in the depths of winter. I think I'll have to come back to White Shield, if I ever see it again. Pete seems determined to ensure we all will.

I don't have much else to say on the pale ale front: Moor's Revival, courtesy of Boak, was a bit thin and worty despite having a pleasant aroma. I was little more impressed with Thornbridge Kipling. The promised Pacific hops are there, lending a tasty grapefruit character, but not enough: my overall impression was of a grainy porridgey beer lacking in body, hoppy oomph and warming malts. It got better further down the glass but it just didn't hit the spot for me. My pontifications on Thornbridge being Britain's most over-rated brewery garnered incredulous looks, but I'll say it again here regardless. Flame away.

I was later leaving than I intended, sprinting out of Earls Court at 6.40. The usual drill at Heathrow: checking if my flight was on time; being annoyed that it was; then, with a whole half-hour to take-off, sprinting up to Wetherspoons to see if there's anything on that takes my fancy. I threw down a half of Bath Spa, finding the blonde a bit dry and musty, before dashing (nonchalantly, of course) through security and flopping into my seat with just enough time to throw a disappointed look at the final boarding passenger behind me, whom I'd elbowed out of my way at the gate.

I'll cover the darker beers tomorrow, but for the moment just a big wave to all the Internet beer folks I met, and especially to those like Barm and Woolpack Dave with whom I didn't take the time to have a proper chat. Another time, in more conducive surroundings, I hope.

And to those whose ear I bent probably a bit too much over the course of the afternoon, I can only apologise. I had travelled to London for some erudite and thought-provoking conversation on the finer points of the contemporary beer scene in Britain and beyond. You can judge for yourself how that went:
See you next year!

The Bamberg Amber Hambeer

OK, it's not really proper amber: it's a deep treacly ruby red-brown, but the title was irresistible. I've been waiting for this one for a long time. My only previous experience of smoked beer (rauchbier in German) was in the Craft brewpub in Athens and I was smitten. So I'd been keeping an eye out for proper German rauchbier, a speciality of Bamberg in Franconia, for some time. This week I gleefully brought home a bottle of Schlenkerla Märzen. It certainly has the smoke character in spades, with roast smoked ham being the closest parallel. However, I found the underlying beer to be a little watery. I expect märzen to be quite a full smooth lager, but this one just didn't cut it. However, you don't buy Schlenkerla for its lager-like qualities. You buy it for the smoke, and I could very happily neck a couple of these with gusto.

There are other beers in the range, and I'll definitely be keeping my beadies peeled for them. That, and putting Bamberg firmly on the travel agenda, preferably in Urbock season.