Dying to Taste a Wonderful Beer? Do German!

The Germans are known for a lot of things; one of them is beer. Beer is an essential piece of their tradition and heritage, with more than thirteen-hundred various breweries spread across the country. The Czechs and the Irish are the only countries above the Germans with beer drinking per capita. The monks began to experiment with brewing around one-thousand A.D. at the origin of German history Eventually, brewing started to become extremely profitable for the monks and the nation's monarchy began to regulate the manufacturing of the brew. The Bavarian Reinheitsgebot, or purity requirement, was written in 1516 and is still the most well-known and influential factor to effect Germanic brewing.

The Bavarian Reinheitsgebot was authorized by Duke Wilhelm IV of Bavaria to guarantee Bavarian beers were only of the highest quality. Hops, barley, and water are the only ingredients allowed in beer according to the law. The Reinheitsgebot is the oldest legislation placed on beverages in the world and has not been changed in nearly 500 years. Yeast is the only extension to the list of essential ingredients in the proclamation. Brewers in the past before that had just used the yeast that was naturally in the air. Because of the stringent standard of quality following the purity standard, Bavarian manufacturers were soon known as the best manufacturers of beer. As the prominence of the Bavarian breweries spread around the nation other manufacturers started to follow the proclamation as well.

German beers have a long-standing notoriety of producing quality beers made only from the best ingredients as a result of the Reinheitsgebot. Many places became famous brewing locations as time went on and Germany started to export beer. By fifteen-hundred, Scandinavia, Holland, England, and even as far as India mainly recieved their beer from one of the six-hundred breweries in the town of Bremen. Einbeck and Braunschweig were a couple of other famed brewing cities. Because of it's robust flavor and right amount of head foam the majority of modern Germans still prefer fabbier, or draught beer, over bottled beer. Used still today, German beer steins became popular about the time the purity standard came along in an effort to stop more breakouts of the bubonic plague.

During the time of the bubonic plague, Germany started several regulations to stop its people from getting ill. Large amounts of infected flies would fly in citizen's food and spread the disease. This led to the German beer stein, a drink holder with a hinged top that is used with the thumb so somebody could stop infection and still be able to drink with their free hand. Beer consumption went up exponentially as citizens began to realize the plague spread in unsanitary conditions with stagnant pools of water. German beer steins were originally made of stoneware with pewter lids. As the pewter guild grew, steins began to be manufactured entirely of pewter and stayed that way for over 300 years. Eventually, porcelain and silver steins were introduced and continue to be produced today.

Nowadays there are over thirteen-hundred and fifty breweries within Germany's borders that manufacture more than 5000 brands of beer. The oldest beer maker in the world still in operation in the present is the Benedictine abbey Weihenstephan, that has been manufacturing beer since 1040. The Franconia region of Bavaria near the city Bamberg is the highest concentrated area for beer makers in Germany. German beer makers produce a wide variety of flavors and kinds of beer with the majority of them able to be categorized under ales or lagers. Some kinds of beer can have an alcoholic content as high as 12%, making them stronger than many wines even though the majority of beers have an alcoholic content ranging from 4.7% to 5.4%.

Michael Usry is a top affiliate with beertaps.com, a website for household draft beer accessories and a site that has authentic German imported beer steins.