Want to Sample a Good Beer? Do German!

One of the various things the Germans are renowned for is beer. With over 1300 various breweries spread across the country, beer is an essential piece of their culture and heritage. As far as per capita beer drinking, the Germans are only below the Czechs and the Irish. The monks began to experiment with brewing about 1000 A.D. at the beginning of German history The nation's monarchy eventually started to regulate the manufacturing of beer as brewing became more and more lucrative. The most famous and influential component to effect Germanic brewing came about in fifteen-sixteen with the Bavarian Reinheitsgebot, or the purity requirement.

To ensure that Bavarian beers were only the best quality the Duke Wilhelm IV commanded the Bavarian Reinheitsgebot. Hops, barley, and water are the only ingredients allowed in beer according to the law. The Reinheitsgebot is the oldest regulation placed on beverages in the world and has remain unchanged in almost five-hundred years. The only addition to the proclamation is the adding of yeast to the cache of essential ingredients. Manufacturers before had just used the yeast found naturally in the air. Because of the stern standard of quality followed by the purity standard, Bavarian breweries were soon considered the best producers of beer. More and more manufacturers started to adhere to the proclamation as the prominence of the Bavarian breweries continued to spread.

As a result of the Reinheitsgebot, German beers have a long-standing reputation of producing quality beers made from only the purest ingredients. Some locations became famous brewing locations as time passed and Germany began to ship out beer. By fifteen-hundred, Scandinavia, Holland, England, and as far as India generally recieved their beer from one of the six-hundred breweries in the town of Bremen. Two more famous brewing towns were Einbeck and Braunschweig. Because of it's robust taste and perfect amount of head foam most modern Germans still choose fabbier, or draught beer, over bottle beer. In use still today, German beer steins became popular about the time the purity standard came along in an effort to prevent further outbreaks of the bubonic plague.

Germany enacted a lot of regulations to prevent its people from getting ill during the time of the black plague. Large amounts of diseased flies would fly in citizen's food and spread the disease. This led to the German beer stein, a beverage vessel with a closed top that is used with the thumb so a person could stop infection and still be able to drink with their free hand. Beer drinking went up exponentially as people began to realize the disease spread in unclean conditions with stagnant water. Originally crafted from stoneware with pewter tops, steins rose in popularity. German beer steins began to be made entirely of pewter for nearly 300 years as the pewter guild grew. Eventually, porcelain and silver steins were introduced and continue to be manufactured in the present.

Over five-thousand kinds of beer are made nowadays from more than thirteen-hundred and fifty breweries within Germany's borders. The oldest brewery in the world that continues operation in the present is the Benedictine abbey Weihenstephan, that has been producing beer since 1040. The most concentrated area in Germany for breweries is the Franconia region of Bavaria near the city Bamberg. The majority of beers can be placed by ales and lagers but German breweries make a wide variety of flavors. Most beers have an alcoholic content ranging from 4.7% to 5.4% but some types can be as high as 12%, making them more powerful than most wines.

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.