A blog resurrected!

It’s been two years since the last blog post, so most of you probably thought that this blog was dead. Well, not quite. It may be on its last legs, it may be having a mini-revival, it may go on to unforetold greatness, we shall see. Suffice for now to say that a new post has been blogged, and that the topic is beer.

Travelling is, as the avid reader of this blog will have discovered by now, one of my main hobbies. There’s nothing more exciting than checking out new places, countries, cities, bars and pubs. However, having been to almost all the countries that are fairly easy to get to, the number of new countries I manage to add to the list seems to diminish every year. This year, however, has been a bit of an outlier – I have been fortunate enough to visit no fewer than two new countries: Ukraine and Cyprus.

Ukraine has been in the news for all the wrong reasons in the last few years, mostly due to the conflict in the east that never seems to quite get resolved. This country is, however, massive – if you’re in the west then all the shooting is at a safe distance, so that’s why I booked a long weekend for my lovely wife and myself in Lviv, only 70km or so from the Polish border.

If you want everything to be clean, efficient and predictable, then you should go to Switzerland. If, on the other hand, you like a city to have contrasts, charm, history, a great vibe and ancient trams you could should consider Lviv – seldom have I been to a place with such a youthful spirit mixed with centuries of history and ancient trams. Oh, and to top it all off they have ancient trams which rumble around at just over walking speed where the fine you have to pay if you get caught without a ticket is less than the cost of a normal bus ticket in most western European countries. Did I mention that Lviv has trams? You probably think that I have gone off the rails (as it were). Time for a beer.

Beer drinking in Lviv is an absolute pleasure, not least because it’s dirt cheap, but also because the beer is surprisingly good. The standard brands are OK, though owned by the big multinationals – I guess the foreign investment has improved quality from what it was back in the Soviet days, so from that point of view I approve. The real excitement for beer lovers is, as usual, the microbreweries, of which the main one in Lviv is smack in the middle of the town centre: the Pravda Beer Theatre.

The Beer Theatre is something quite extraordinary. It’s a cavernous bar/pub/restaurant building with multiple floors, multiple bars, and a shop. Their beers are very interesting, not least because of the political nature of their labels and the unabashed support for Ukrainian independence. Suffice to say that political correctness is not a priority, and that Russia is not a popular country in this place. For example, they have a beer called “Frau Ribbentrop” with the picture of the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, on the label. The label helpfully explains that, just like the Nazi foreign minister Ribbentrop did in 1939, Merkel has made a pact with the Russians that does not help the Ukrainians at all. Other politicians, including Trump, Putin and Obama also get their beers with labels that aren’t exactly overflowing with praise. The Obama beer was a very good dark lager, and the Trump beer was orange and tasted awful. The pub’s atmosphere was good though, so regardless of your views on said matters, I think you’ll end up having a good time.

Lviv has a boatload of places to eat and drink where the quality is high and the prices low, and it has not yet been overrun by tourism. Therefore, the contrast between Lviv and the second new country of 2019, Cyprus, was big.

Cyprus is a small island anchored at the very east end of the Mediterranean Sea. Its economy relies heavily on tourism, and the tourists come to enjoy the sunny and warm climate, I presume – in any case, I’m pretty sure they don’t come because of the beer, because the beer is not good. The main local beer brand is called Keo, which tastes of cat piss. Judging by the number of stray cats that roam the streets it would not surprise me if this assessment is more accurate than most people like to think. There’s another beer called Leon which tastes a bit better, and locally brewed Carlsberg (as far as I could tell), which is probably not the best beer in Cyprus. My advice: avoid if you can.

So, is the situation all bleak? Is there nothing for those who fancy a decent pint of beer? Those who search will find, they say, and I discovered that the trick was to go to the capital, Nicosia, and search for the local microbrewery (named "Pivo Microbrewery"), situated right on the border to North Cyprus – a border that runs right through the middle of the city almost like the Berlin Wall in the olden days. Crazy stuff, but at least it’s possible to cross over without too much hassle these days, which we did – it’s definitely worth checking out the other part of Cyprus if you can. Or bottle? I prefer bottles to cans. Check out the other part of Cyprus if you bottle!

However, it’s even worthier to check out the aforementioned microbrewery, run by some very friendly gentlemen who know what they’re doing. We happened to visit on a day where the brewery was technically shut, but since we looked thirsty and forlorn, one of the owners took pity on us and let us taste the beers in the beer garden while he continued to label bottles and whatnot. They have three beers: one Bavarian wheat beer, one Czech-style Pilsner, and one amber IPA. They were all exceptionally good and true to style – in fact, much better than most microbrewed beer I have come across. Sadly, the number of restaurants and shops that stock these excellent brews is very limited, so you have to either travel or be very lucky.

All in all, 2019 has been another good year for the beer blogger, aka me – two new countries and a few hundred new beers have been added to the log. I’ve also invented a new word – “knurgelsmack” – but I’m not yet sure what it means. We live in interesting times! Until next blog post I wish you all a happy festivity of your choice, where you can raise a glass of excellent beer of your choice, shout whatever “cheers!” is in a language of your choice, and have a really splendid time whilst doing all this.

C'est la bière

Paris is the city of love, allegedly. It is also a city of culture, fine wining and dining, history and the Metro. What Paris is definitely not known for is beer, and for this reason (as well as some minor other ones) I’ve always had a bit of a love-hate relationship with the French capital. It’s definitely an interesting and, at times, a great city to explore, but I’ve also had bad experiences with insane traffic, rude people, dog turds on almost every pavement, and last, but for me definitely not least, expensive and bad beer.

My birthday gift to my lovely wife last year was a pair of tickets to a concert with the acapella group King’s Singers, who happened to be singing at a festival on the outskirts of Paris. One thing the French do better than most is trains, and they’ve been considerate enough to build an insanely fast high-speed line between Strasbourg and Paris, which makes it possible for us to travel from our home in the south of Germany to Paris in just over five hours – and so it came to pass that we headed off towards Paris on Armistice Day 2016. Naturally, my secret plan was to do some beer drinking when there was nothing else to do, which luckily was most of the time.

France’s history as a beer drinking nation is almost laughably pathetic. There are essentially two regions of this rather big country that can claim any historical beer culture at all, and both just because the beer culture of the neighbouring country accidentally or through repeated invasions spilled across the border. The north-east region, known as Flanders in English, has a solid tradition for the Saison beer, a style similar to one of the many found in neighbouring Belgium, whereas the historically contested area around Strasbourg in Alsace, which has changed hands between France and Germany more times than anyone cares to remember, unsurprisingly has a beer culture inspired by the latter. The most visible and well-known remnant of this is the enormous global beer brand Kronenbourg.

Paris, on the other hand, has nothing. If you feel like a beer in Paris, you will most likely be offered a choice of Kronenbourg on tap or some Belgian beer from the bottle – and you’ll be required to pay the best part of 10 euros, a price that only Oslo, as far as I know, comfortably beats. Either way, it’s a disaster, and since you’re likely to choke on traffic fumes, be spat at by rude waiting staff, have your wallet pickpocketed and repeatedly step in dog shit, you’d be well advised to go nowhere near this god-awful city.

Pondering the next blog post...

At least, this is what I feared. I am happy to report that things have taken a massive turn for the better in the world’s favourite French capital. First and foremost, someone has cleaned the pavements – there was hardly any turds to be seen, so instead of constantly checking where you put your shoes, you can instead look out for crazy motorists and try not to get run over. Except that even these were not as bad as they used to be – Paris now has cycle lanes everywhere, and a few roads, including a scenic one along the Seine, have been pedestrianised! Whatever next – perhaps there’s even good beer to be had?

The selection from the Guette d'Or microbrewery.

A quick bit of googling revealed three promising locations – a microbrewery called Guette d’Or and a bar called Super Coin, both not far from Gare de L’Est, as well as “Academie de Biere” or something like that a bit further away. Since the bar did not open until 5pm, we headed for the micro first, and what a wise move that turned out to be. We rolled in around 4pm to find a guy basically serving up free samples to anyone who was vaguely interested, including an older couple from Portland, Oregon – home to the greatest concentration of microbreweries in the USA (or so they claimed), so I was curious to know why they even bothered leaving home, never mind travelling halfway across the world to the beer desert that is Paris. The beers on offer were good – fairly typical for a microbrewery, with the mandatory IPA as well as a Red Ale, a Saison, and an interesting one brewed with chai that tasted a bit like old shoes in the positive sense (i.e. ones that had never stepped on a turd).

Super Coin taps.

After the tasting session, we were in the mood for somewhere warmer and cosier, and the Super Coin bar could not have been a better choice. There were three beers on tap – a Czech pilsner and two ales from France, including one that was surprisingly tart. The real treasure was the bottle collection, though – including a few red ales from local and not-so-local microbreweries at very sensible prices by Paris standards. The bar, empty when we arrived, filled up rapidly with happy Parisians clearly enjoying the opportunity to drink some good ales instead of having to force down another glass of crappy red wine. Sadly, their food selection was much more limited, so it was with heavy hearts that we had to bid adieu to this great place after a couple of hours in order to locate some food. The food selection in Paris is, of course, legendary – but do take care not to be dragged into tourist traps by sleazy men trying to cajole you into their dodgy restaurants where you’ll inevitably end up paying an arm and a leg for pretty sub-standard food. We found a great Moroccan place, always a good choice in France – and could confirm that though the food was excellent and the wine list extensive, the beer choice was either “crappy” or “none”.

Beer drinking in Paris can be a nice experience if you know where to go!

In conclusion, Paris took a big step up the list of my favourite cities starting with the letter P after this visit. It will never be a beer lover’s paradise (unlike several other cities starting with the letter P), but in some ways the treasure hunt is even more rewarding when the gems are hard to find, so in that sense I enjoyed the beer scene very much. I probably won’t be heading back there for some time, but once I do, I shall look forward to finding even more little gems hidden in obscure alleys. For those of you who plan to go there before me, I hope that this post has inspired you to go a bit out of your way when you search for good beer, and thereby increase demand – paving the way for even more little adventurous breweries and beer bars to try their luck in this winey city. C’est bien – bon voyage, et santé!

Happy birthday eh!

Canada’s national day is July 1^st every year. This day is known across the world as Canada Day, which I have persistently campaigned to be shortened to “Canaday”, though this has yet to catch on. The day commemorates the joining of the colonies Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Ontario and Quebec to form a “kingdom in its own right” within the British Empire known as the Dominion of Canada. This momentous event took place in 1867 – exactly 150 years ago today! If this isn’t worth celebrating, nothing is.

Canada is a huge country even if it’s not that old by global standards. Somehow those pesky Canadians, most of whom are of European descent, managed to grab, discover, buy or steal enough land to make it the second biggest country on Earth, only surpassed by Russia. If you were to fly from its eastern to its western edge, say from St. John’s in Newfoundland (airport code: YYT) to Victoria in British Columbia (airport code: YYJ), the distance would be just over 5000km. However, Canada’s population is relatively small – only about 35 million people call this massive chunk of land (and ice) home – which means that, in theory, each person has about 350,000 square metres (that’s 86 acres) for him or herself – yet almost 90% of the population lives within 100 miles of the US border, presumably because the rest of the country is pretty much uninhabitable due to cold, black flies or both.

The Yellow Belly Brewery in St. John's - worth a visit!

OK, that’s enough facts about Canada. This isn’t a history lesson, this is a blog about beer. What, then, could I write about to celebrate Canada’s birthday yet stay on topic? Well, one particular subject springs readily to mind: Canadian beer! I bet you didn’t see that one coming! I have written about Canada, beer and Canadian beer several times already in this blog, so in order to avoid repeating myself, I shall not read my previous posts to avoid repeating myself. This makes perfect sense, since nobody likes reading my blog posts when I repeat myself.

Beer was introduced to Canada by European settlers, the most famous being John Molson, who founded a brewery in Montreal in 1786. Others followed suit, including Alexander Keith and John Labatt – names that sound oddly familiar to anyone who’s ever tried to purchase beer in Canada. In fact, by the 1970s, the brewing industry was almost exclusively dominated by Molson and Labatt, both brewing the same tasteless industrial lager that we nowadays love to hate. Luckily, things began to change in the 80s and 90s when craft breweries started appearing, so if you wish to raise a glass of Canadian amber liquid to celebrate today’s anniversary, you have the choice of more than 500 breweries – most of which are small craft breweries that produce very tasty beer indeed.

Visiting one of the 500-odd breweries in Canada.

Sadly, I have yet to visit all 500 or so breweries, though I have had the pleasure of sampling quite a few on the Niagara peninsula, the area where my lovely wife was born and raised – to be precise, in Niagara Falls, which is both a well-known beautiful waterfall and a town that caters mainly to honeymooners who seem to think that watching billions of litres of water crashing down in a ravine whilst being surrounded by casinos, chain hotels and tacky museums is the perfect setting for consummating their marriage. Personally, I got married a few miles to the north, in Niagara-on-the-Lake – and, luckily, so did my wife. This town is the exact opposite of Niagara Falls – quaint, quiet and quaffing – the latter due to the presence of no less than three craft breweries, the best of which is simply called Oast House Brewers. I’ve been there twice now, the last time on a scorching hot summer’s day when I sat outside and found it very hard to stop having another one, something I sadly had to do if I was going to be able to cycle home without ending up in the river. Their beer range is extensive, so I’m just going to say that this place is well worth travelling a few thousand miles for – and you could always combine it with a pleasant stroll through downtown where you’ll find a very nice pub called The Olde Angel Inn.

Happy blogger!

I’m now sat at home in Germany. Since it’s more than a year since I last visited Canada, I’m starting to miss the place. My wife’s favourite sister recently went on a holiday with her husband to the Maritime Provinces – New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. They sent us no less than four (4) postcards, only one of which mentioned anything other than beer (not quite sure why). It sounded like a fantastic trip. The agenda was simple, yet exceedingly clever: travel for a bit, find a craft brewery, order the sampler (anything between 4 and 12 small glasses containing the different beers and ales on offer), go to the next one, locate another one, pitch the tent within stumbling distance of the final one of the day…. and repeat this for two weeks. Do throw in a walk or two in some national park or other to build up thirst, though.

Celebrating Canada Day in Germany.

Anyway, time to start wrapping up here. Since it’s not just July 1^st, but also Saturday, I’ve just cracked open a Canadian beer from the Hopcity brewery called “Barking Squirrel”. Suffice to say it’s nutty and delicious, and the fact that this great nation celebrates its 150^th anniversary today simply adds to the pleasure of drinking this brew. There is no finer way to celebrate, unless you’re actually in Canada, in which case you can drink beer and watch some fireworks. On that note, I hope you will all raise a glass to this country, also known as The Great White North, Canuckia, Lumberjack Land and The Sensible Part (of America). Inuuhiqatsiaq!

Land of Hops and Barley

Every so often, I just have to sit down and see what happens. I don’t mean on the toilet – that’s much more predictable – I mean in front of the PC, with a blank sheet of virtual paper in front of me, a couple of beers down the hatch already, and another one sitting nicely in the glass, just waiting for me to nip into it. I guess I’ve had a bit of blogger’s block lately, which explains a very long dry patch where little or nothing has been written despite a serious amount of beer drinking going on. What can I say? Well, nothing, since this is a blog.

Now then. As you can tell, I’m off-piste and slightly pissed (in the British sense of the word) here. The title of this blog post is actually a play on a very famous ultra-patriotic British song with a great sing-along tune. Every year in London, there’s this thing called the Proms Series, which culminates in the Last Night of the Proms, a pretty grand spectacle in the Royal Albert Hall where people from seemingly all over the world come together to sing a selection of the most British songs you can imagine, including “Rule Britannia!” and the one I have shamelessly mangled for the title here. I kind of like the idea of Germans or Norwegians or whatever travelling to London to sing along to these tunes. What does this have to do with beer, I hear you scream? Nothing, my friends, absolutely nothing. It does however, bring me nicely on to the main topic of this blog post: beer.

The United Kingdom is a country which consists of Britain and Northern Ireland, and Britain is an island consisting of the three countries England, Scotland and Wales (in order of population) or Scotland, Wales and England (in order of highest mountain). I spent 13 years of my life living in England, and I guess this is where I really learnt to love beer. When I arrived in 1996 things were not so great. Most pubs had a few beers on tap, some of which were so-called “continental lagers”, most often Carlsberg, Kronenbourg or Stella Artois, all of which tasted very little if you were lucky, or a bit like industrial waste if you were not. A few pubs also had English traditional beers, commonly referred to as “bitter”, which were a bit better – though many of these were, unfortunately, poorly kept, and together with the fact that they were lukewarm and flat it took a little while before I grew to like this style of beer.

Being born in the early 70s turned out to be one of the cleverest things I ever did. Not only did this mean that I grew up before the internet and mobile phones, which means that there are loads of things I can enjoy that young people today don’t even understand (and no, I’m not referring to analogue porn), but most of all it means that I have experienced almost the entire beer revolution that’s swept the planet, from the first tiny experimental breweries to the recent explosion of choice both in terms of new and crazy beer styles and in terms of variety in pubs and supermarkets. USA led the way here, but England wasn’t far behind, and I was delighted to experience the biggest expansion in quality and quantity of beer in modern and ancient times.

The traditional beer style in Britain is ale. This means a top-fermented brew, which typically gets more of its taste from the yeast than the bottom-fermented varieties do. Furthermore, since the beer has less carbonation and is served at a higher temperature than most beers elsewhere in the world, it is actually possible to taste quite a few different flavours, such as gun powder, treason and plot. Or was that a poem? I forget. Anyway, where many countries have generally regarded beer as something that has to be ice cold and fizzy, the Brits have always hung on to the notion that beer should taste of something, probably because the weather is generally rubbish. To cut a very long story short – Britain is nowadays a fantastic place to drink beer. If you choose your pub wisely, you will get some of the best beers in the world in your glass, and you get to drink the beer in one of the nicest environments imaginable, namely the Great British Pub.

Classic English Pub

You may not be surprised to hear that I spent a great deal of time in the pubs when I lived in England. Normally, it happened a bit like this: someone would say that it was a “special occasion”, or it was Friday, or some other day of the week, or it was a rare sunny day, or it was cold and rainy, or there was some other great excuse, and we’d head down to some pub for “a swift half” or “a couple of pints”. This would usually lead to an all-night session where we’d sit and drink beer and talk bollocks continuously for however many hours we had until the barman called “last orders” at 11pm, at which point we’d all shuffle out and head home. This may sound like a terrible idea during the week, but it was actually pretty OK due to the fact that British beer tends to be a bit weaker than the continental ones (around 4% instead of 5.5%), so even after half a dozen pints I could survive the next day at work.

I do miss those days. I don’t spend nearly as much time in the pub these days – I guess the culture here in Germany is slightly different, though there are places and times, especially on weekends and during the summer, when it comes close. I guess I am phenomenally lucky to live in a day and age where it is actually possible for a Norwegian to move around Europe and live in different countries in order to drink beer, and it is sad to see that Britain and other countries are taking steps to become less open to us foreigners. Much as I respect the right of any nation to decide its own future, I also think that the best way to avoid sliding towards a situation where war is no longer unthinkable is to encourage people from as many nations as possible to spend as much time as they can in the pub together whilst drinking good beer. On this thoughtful note I shall wish you all a happy 2017 even though a large chunk of it is already behind us, and hope that I will meet all of you in some pub or other somewhere in the world, where we can say “CHEERS BIG EARS” and clink glasses. I can’t think of a better plan to save the planet than that, at least not right now.

Beerection day!

I have noticed lately that every fourth year is a lot longer than the intervening three. This is partially due to the fact that this is the leap year and therefore contains an extra day – February has the cheek to add an extra day even though it’s in the middle of winter – but the real reason this particular year is so incredibly long is that it happens to be the year when Americans elect their president. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of democracy and the idea of chucking your ballot into a box to say “good luck” to your chosen candidate and “bugger off” to the rest, but for some reason or other, the good people residing in the United States of America have decided to make this contest into a year-long event. This would not be so bad were it not for the fact that the rest of the world, containing 95% of the members of the human species, also decides to fill 95% of available space in their newspapers with speculation and analysis concerning the aforementioned American election. In contrast, the main (parliamentary) election in my own home country of Norway, home to almost 0.07% of the world’s population, has never generated as much as a comma in any foreign newspaper.

Now I am also, through this very blog, part of the world’s media, so it would seem foolish not to write about the election at all. As you may have noticed by now, the main topic of the blog is beer, which also happens to be the most wonderful and diverse drink on the planet. It has therefore surprised me very much that neither of the two main candidates have, as far as I can tell, ever mentioned what their policies are regarding the juice of the barley. It is therefore my duty, dear readers, to investigate this important issue, and to write about it.

I had no idea how to approach this task, so I basically googled “how should I approach this task”. Evidently, Google has some clever algorithms, because it simply suggested “google it”, which I really ought to have thought of myself. Anyway, having been enlightened, I proceeded to google “Trump beer” and “Clinton beer”.

Trump’s first google hit was that gay bars in Pennsylvania and Maryland have apparently decided to boycott Yuengling beer because of the brewery’s support for Trump – it seems that Yuengling has taken the step of actually endorsing Trump, and that this has caused a bit of a backlash amongst the drinkers who don’t share the brewery’s view on this matter. Next comes the story of a Chicago brewery not quite as fond of Trump that renamed some leftover beer they had “Chinga Tu Pelo”, which is Spanish and translates to “fuck you hair”. Nice.

Clinton’s results weren’t quite so interesting. She apparently went for a beer sometime in May to showcase the fantastic American craft brewing industry, and was pictured pretending to like some mysterious concoction that looked a bit like a chunk of black hole in a glass. The only other noteworthy hit on the first place was that someone had come up with the ultimate election night accessory – a Chillary Clinton Can Holder. What more could beer drinkers want whilst either celebrating or drowning their sorrows?

So there you have it – neither candidate has made a big effort to win the beer drinker’s vote, and neither seems to have spent much time in pubs drinking beer. Herein lies the problem, I think. The campaign will be remembered mostly for being the nastiest in democratic history, with each candidate spending most of the time telling the unfortunate voters what a terrible person the other candidate is. Beer drinkers don’t tend to act like that, mostly because we’re a sensible bunch, but also because we realize that there are more important things in life than politics, such as beer. In fact, I am convinced that televised political debates would be much less venomous, as well as much more fun, if they were conducted in a pub serving great beer. You only hear the truth from children and drunk people, they say, and I could imagine the debate ending after like the seventh pint when Clinton and Trump embrace and declare their love for one another whilst agreeing to move the White House to an old brewery in Wisconsin from where they will share the presidency and brew great beer. Then they would invite all the world leaders over for a giant beer festival where, simultaneously, no boring lager would be served and all the world’s problems would be solved.

On this optimistic (though perhaps ever so slightly unrealistic) note I shall wish you all a happy November 8^th, regardless of which country you may reside in and whether you have the opportunity to vote today or not. Remember, though, that if you’re in the supermarket, the pub, or perhaps somewhere else where different beers are on offer, you can always vote for your favourite beer by exercising your power as a consumer. Vote and drink wisely, my friends! Cheers!

Annibeersary!

Humans are very weird. For some strange reason, we have decided that the number 10 is a great base for counting when 12 would have been much better, and for some even stranger reason we find it endlessly fascinating when we’re dealing with so-called “round” numbers – such as the numbers 5, 50 and 500. Imagine my delight, then, when I dis-covered that these particular three numbers all ganged up on me last weekend to provide me with the ultimate excuse to both drink beer and then subsequently write about it.

The number 500 should require no explanation. It is, after all, the main anniversary of 2016 since it marks 500 years since some Ludwig or other suspected that brewers at the time added too much dodgy stuff into their brews – apparently, some were chucking in horse manure, soot and various poisonous herbs to make the beer taste better or last longer – and thus declared that beer was only allowed to be brewed using three ingredients, namely water, hops and malted barley. Of course, brewers have since discovered that a fourth ingredient sneaks into the beer as well, namely yeast – without which there would be no alcohol in the beer – so the actual law has been updated accordingly. However, apart from this, the law has remained in force for 500 years except that it hasn’t since the EU banned it after the Belgians complained.

The Beer Blogger seeking inspiration for his 50th beer blog post

The numbers 5 and 50 both relate to this very blog, though – for it was here, 5 years ago, that I took my first beerful steps into the world of online, unedited publishing, hoping that my ramblings may reach an audience of millions and providing me with endless product placement opportunities from all the good breweries in this world. It hasn’t quite gone to plan, but I have still managed to keep writing – and what you’re reading is blog post number 50. I hope you’ve enjoyed the journey as much as I have, and feel free to send me more beer.

Back to the aforementioned law. It is known either by its German name, the “Bayrische Reinheitsgebot”, or by its somewhat meek English translation, “the Bavarian Purity Law”. You can discuss until the cows come home whether or not German is a beautiful language, but you cannot deny that some of the words carry more weight than their English equivalents, mostly due to them being about ten times longer. What is beyond reasonable doubt though, is the fact that the law was signed in the Bavarian city of Ingolstadt, a smallish town sat nicely on the mighty Danube about halfway between Munich and Nuremberg.

An authentic recreation of the first proclamation of the Reinheitsgebot

The Germans usually know how to put on a good party, whether it is the world’s biggest – Oktoberfest – or a small village event in some dog-forsaken place that no-one’s ever heard of. These parties usually revolve around drinking loads of beer and listening to some oompah band playing cheesy tunes whilst dancing on the benches in a big tent. It was therefore exactly such an event I foresaw when I spotted an ad for Ingolstadt’s 500-year celebration party, to take place on the weekend of the 23^rd of April 2016, exactly 500 years to the day after the Reinheitsgebot was signed. For this reason, it came as a big surprise when we finally got there and discovered that the theme was distinctly medieval and based on a surprising number of bands sporting bagpipes and drums in various combinations of bagpipes and drums, though I also spotted a flute. These bands toured around three or four stages set up in a couple of streets in the old city, farting their pipes and banging their drums so loudly that the only thing to do was to buy beer and sit down to listen and tap a foot or two. Needless to say, it was fantastic fun.

What was also nice to see was that this fest actually did celebrate beer instead of merely using beer as a lubricant to get the party going. Nine different breweries had set up stands where excellent beer was dispensed and where real choice was on offer, from standard Helles through Rotbier to a hearty Bock.

We made loads of friends in Ingolstadt

Furthermore, there was an absolutely superb guided tour that took you through the history of the Reinheitsgebot – unlike many such tours, this was anything but dry since was it both extremely well narrated by people who knew how to entertain an audience, and more importantly broken up nicely by visiting all nine brewery stands for tastings. These were supposed to be 0.2 litres each, but every time our goblets were filled we seemed to “accidentally” get a fair bit extra, so by the end most people had imbibed at least two litres plus perhaps what their other halves could not handle. The general mood of the tour was, therefore, continuously getting more boisterous – and then, the grand finale! A water fountain was ceremoniously turned into a beer fountain, thus finally making sense of the concept "drinking fountain", and we were once again allowed to fill our tankards to the brim. I have since decided to start a political party with the sole aim to get all drinking fountains to occasionally dispense beer. What a day – and it was not yet 3pm!

The popularity of the fountain increased exponentially once it started dispensing beer

Sadly, we had to catch the train home just after this, which turned out to be a major anticlimax. However, looking back at Ingolstadt, the Reinheitsgebot and everything I have ever known about German beer, I think I can safely say that this was one of the highlights of my beer-loving life. A lot of beer aficionados debate whether the Purity Law is good or bad these days – some think it stifles innovation, others think it encourages brewers to maintain or improve quality. What is beyond unreasonable doubt though, is that Germany has some of the best beer in the world and that the Law has done its reputation no harm whatsoever. Having witnessed a tendency for German brewers to be a little bit “stuck in the past” over the last decade, I am also happy to announce that the beers on offer in Ingolstadt included several made by young, enthusiastic and innovative brewers who seem happy to experiment a little, even though they may prefer to do so with only water, malt, hops and yeast.

Anyway, this turned out to be a relatively long 50^th post, but I nevertheless hope that you’ve enjoyed reading my beery ramblings for the last 5 years or so, and if you haven’t then you should probably try and read them all again since they’re awesome. In some ways I’ve come full circle – I intended the blog to be mainly about German beer, but it has turned out to be more international than I had anticipated – so on this massive occasion of the 50^th post it is nice come back and give my adopted home a good whatever the opposite of bollocking is. Don’t worry, I shall be back writing about foreign lands soon enough, I’ve got several plane tickets booked and I’ve packed a toothbrush. As they say in Kuala Lumpur: Sorakan!

A smokin’ cold country

The Nordic countries are, as the name indicates, situated to the north of just about everything except the North Pole. Made slightly warmer than the latitude would justify by the presence of the Gulf Stream, these countries are populated by people who enjoy lots of daylight in summer, endure lots of darkness in winter, and imbibe lots of beer all year. The Nordics consist of five independent countries: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland, which together measure about 1.32 million square kilometres (about three-quarters the size of Alaska) and are home to about 26 million people (about 35 times the population of Alaska). By far the least populated, most mysterious and furthest away of these is Iceland, a volcanic pile of rock situated so far out in the Atlantic that you can practically smell North America.

Growing up in Norway, we learnt a fair bit about Iceland in school, mainly because the country was settled by Norwegian Vikings who seemed to think that it was a great idea to abandon the relatively mild (!) climate in Norway and start a new life in conditions that even then would have pushed the boundaries of harshness. Naturally they brought their language with them, but because of the remoteness of the island the language evolved much slower than back in Norway, with the end result that to this day, Icelandic is essentially the Old Norse that was spoken by the Vikings more than 1000 years ago – vaguely familiar to modern Norwegians when written, but utterly unintelligible when spoken. Having learnt all this in elementary school back in the 1980s, I have always been fascinated by this place, but never had the chance to visit – that is, until a couple of weeks ago.

In the end, work sent me to Iceland, and the capital Reykjavik to be specific. Reykjavik is actually a fairly big city, housing around two thirds of the entire population of the country. It’s a pleasant place to stroll around unless you’re facing the icy wind, and it’s also full of nice pubs, bars and restaurants that serve up food and drinks of high quality with prices to match. Of course, my main interest once work had finished for the day was to explore the beer scene. On that note, Iceland has possibly the saddest history of all European countries when it comes to beer. After a failed experiment with prohibition of all alcoholic drinks in the early 1900s, wine and spirits were allowed back in the shops in the 1930s, but for some utterly unfathomable reason beer remained banned for another half century. No doubt they knew that the soon-to-be-famous beer blogger would turn 18 in 1990 and thereby start his quest to drink all the beer in the world, so Iceland decided to legalize beer a few months before, on March 1^st 1989 to be precise. Iceland has not looked back since, though they may have looked forward to my finally getting around to visiting.

As in almost all countries, a couple of big breweries have risen to become the suppliers of the industrial lager that most people drink – regular readers know what I’m talking about. Of course, since the total population of Iceland is only about a third of a million, there’s a limit to how big these breweries can actually get, and I did not expect a big selection of interesting beer. Imagine my unbridled delight then, when I discovered that there are surprisingly many microscopic breweries on this island, some of which brew very good beer indeed. The main craft brewer seems to be one called Einstök from Iceland’s second city Akureyri, and it was also this brewery that, in careful consideration of my visit, had sent a selection of their finest brews to the first restaurant I happened to stumble upon.

The beer was much better than this picture

I went about the tasting job methodically by ordering one of each. First up was “Icelandic White Ale” which proved to be surprisingly tart and fresh, much better than most continental European equivalents. It was an excellent aperitif beer which doubled nicely as a starter. Next up was Arctic Pale Ale, a pleasantly hoppy interpretation of this style which also had a firm malty body. It was an excellent second beer which also doubled beautifully as the main course. Finally, the highlight of the evening: Icelandic Toasted Porter. Unfortunately, I had not brought a tuba with me because this beer was so good it was worth at least one oompah session, maybe two. As the name hinted, the toasted barley was as much in evidence on the palate as on the label, and since it also avoided the normal porter-trap of being too sweet – in fact, it was delightfully dry – it was perhaps the best porter I have ever sampled. The only problem with it is that my wife also likes it, which means that the small selection I brought home for my fridge is in constant peril. It was an excellent dessert beer which also doubled exquisitely as the cheese plate, espresso, grappa and cigar.

The Toasted Porter.

Impressed and very satisfied, I left the restaurant to explore the city. There were definitely more bars than volcanoes, and loads of people out drinking even on a Monday. It looked like a fun place, but the real Iceland is elsewhere – and you don’t have to travel far to find it. Hop in a car or a tour bus and you’ll find somewhere that emits some kind of steam and/or reeks of sulphur within minutes. The whole place looks about to blow up, but in the meantime you can dive into various hot springs for a revitalising dip. Just make sure that you check the water temperature before you do, since some of them are more suitable for boiling eggs. You can also gawp at wonderful scenery, especially if the fog lifts to reveal it, and if it doesn’t you can always check out Google Street View to see what it would have looked like if you’d visited in whichever year the sun last paid a visit.

The scenery is quite impressive despite some low clouds

In conclusion, Iceland should be on the shortlist both for beery and non-beery reasons. It’s a fascinatingly remote and wild country, and the population speaks excellent Icelandic when they’re tired of showing off their flawless English. I only sampled a tiny portion of both the beer and the country, but I was very impressed. An added bonus is that you can fart as much as you like, because the hot water is not heated, but tapped straight from some sulphuric hell-hole that causes everything to stink anyway. So, go ahead and read up on a few of Snorri Sturluson’s old sagas to get in the proper mood, then book a flight, bring a weatherproof jacket and head off. As the Vikings used to say before cracking open a beer or a skull or whatever happened to be in the path of their axes: Skál!