Beer House, Estonia

Beer House is a microbrewery in the medieval town of Tallinn in Estonia.  It has a good selection of beer brewed on the premises and boasts a tradition honey lager and a premium lager supposedly endorsed by a Prussian king.  The story goes that the Prussian king was passing through the town and tried Beer House’s Premium and deemed it the best beer in the land so it was brewed under his royal seal.  It is a pretty good beer, an instant fave with me for its sweetness.

Beer House also offers a great selection of food – their pizza is pretty good – and a great atmosphere with old style wooden benches and tables and an inside back patio set up like a medieval village.  The wait staff are even in period costume with buxom wenches and lederhosen clad fellas

If you are in Estonia you should definitely go check it out.  I’m only sad I may never get the chance to drink some BH Premium again!

Check out their website here

The Heineken Experience - Amsterdam

While I was in Amsterdam back in April I visited the Heineken Experience.  This is more of a museum and activity center than a brewery tour as Heineken hasn’t been brewed in the old brewery since the 80s, but it is still worth a visit for those of us interested in beer.

Half of the Experience is about how the company was built through four generations of the Heineken family and how they developed the world renowned beer we know today.  The second half of the Experience explores the marketing side of the company, which has played a huge part in its success.

I was very interested to learn that currently the company is owned by a woman, Charlene de Carvalho-Heineken.  She gives you a little speech via video part way through.  When you get into the old brewery proper with the mash tuns and old equipment on display you get a chance to taste the wort made from the ingredients Heineken brews with.  I didn’t realize how sweet and like warm cereal it would taste!  I also had a go at stirring the wort while wearing traditional brewers garb.

One of the activities you can take part in is being brewed.  You are shown a video discussing the brewing process while standing on a platform that moves.  It shakes and mixes you while the temperature in the room also changes and you get sprayed with water!  I apparently now know how malts feel.

There is of course the obligatory beer tasting at the end of the Experience.  With your ticket you get a wrist band with three tokens on.  One token is good for a half pint.  You get a half pint in the tasting and then at the very end can get more in the World Bar. 

Overall I found the Heineken Experience interesting, it is definitely a different approach to a beer tour.  A lot of the information is about the company and its marketing process however so if all you really want to know about is the beer and the brewing process, that side is a little light.  I still think it is worth seeing though, but you definitely have to be a beer or business enthusiast to really enjoy it.

American Craft Beer Week!

I think I've mentioned that I work on cruise ships and that gives me the opportunity to travel a lot.  Well, I just did a quick fill-in contract that took me to 8 different European countries in 3 weeks.... my beer adventures from there will be blogged soon :-)

While I was away there was an excellent radio programme on BBC Radio 4 about craft brewing in the USA called The New Beer Frontier.  I finally got to listen to it this week (the internet on cruise ships is a bit sketchy) which falls in line quite nicely with American Craft Beer Week.

Here's a summary of what I found interesting in the programme:

Originally, American brewing was influenced by British brewing techniques but this changed in the 1850s when an influence of German and Czech styles took over.  In fact, brewing in American became almost entirely German oriented, with meetings even been held in German.  Prohibition (from 1920-1933) skuppered the industry and when it was revoked, after WW1 a happy eye was not cast against an industry that was German run.

American brewing soon found the innovation of bottom fermentation, which led to the popularisation of lager beers that lasted longer but didn't have very complex taste (I'm looking at you Budweiser!)

The Craft Beer scene that we know and love today really took off in 1979 when home brewing was declared legal practice.  Also around this time air fairs were slashed so more people were taking trips to Europe and experiencing the beers available there.  The Americans came back from their European adventures and wanted to replicate the amazing flavours they had discovered.

In the 1980s, Boston was the place to be to taste new and exciting beers - Harpoon Brewery being one of the main culprits.

The Americans are now experimenting with many different styles and techniques.  New World hops are giving beers bigger, fruiter flavours and aromas and breweries like Cambridge Brewing Co in New York are trying out barrel ageing with wine, spirits and port wine barrels.

There are a few breweries mentioned in the programme that I need to look up the next time I am drinking beer in America.  The programme is still available on iPlayer here if you want to listen for yourself.