Another edition of Hopfen und Malz, this time with a more historical take on German double bock beers and the fasting period of Lent. Enjoy!
Ok, so this is a pretty broad and impersonal grouping to qualify as a “saint.” Then again, I could probably do a whole series in this column just on the contributions that monks have made to beer. No experienced beer drinker needs to be reminded of the contributions Belgian monks made to the cause of expanding our palettes. But in this season of dopplebocks and starkbiers, it is really to the German brothers …read more

Some time ago a few friends and I did a head-to-head comparison of a number of lovely Munich Starkbiers in honor of the end of Lent, and the winner was – Korbinian!
I’ll write a little more about Starkbier later, but you should know that the traditional Munich Starkbiers are all named with names which end in -ator. Korbinian is an exception to this rule, and it isn’t even the beer its brewer, Weihenstephan, mentions with respect to the season known as the “fifth season.” For those of us who tasted it, the winner was clear.
My ranking of the beers we …read more

If you haven’t looked at airfares recently, travel to Europe in the winter is pretty darn cheap (although the exchange rate will make your stay pretty darn pricey). Nonetheless, if you’re looking for a way to spend some of that money on a beer-related trip, Munich’s Starkbierfest may be the answer. The Starkbierfest, also called the fifth season, is a remnant of the days when the monks, fed up with fasting, tapped kegs of extremely thick, high-alcohol beer to get them through the rest of Lent. Nowadays there’s not much fasting going on, but a trip to Paulaner’s Nockherberg during …read more