Our first destination was Vienna. Vienna is a big city, but nowhere could we find a Vienna-style lager. This was somewhat expected from earlier readings; however, we did discover some nice treats though. Around the corner from our hotel, the Hotel Karntnerhof, there was a nice little pub that advertised in red neon "Budweiser Budvar vom Faß", i.e. on tap. Budweiser Budvar is totally unbelievable; the freshness and the hop character kept us coming back to that pub for more during our stay. Also in Vienna we became acquainted with a beer style with which I was unfamiliar, zwickl. The waiter in the restaurant described zwickl as an unfiltered lager that was not as hoppy as the usual lager. Later in the trip one of my company's Austrian salesmen told me that zwickl could be almost anything, like a mixture of a light and dark beer. He also commented that Austrian babies probably had zwickl before mother's milk.
After three days in Vienna we took the train to Salzburg, the birthplace of Mozart. Prior to the trip I had listened to German language tapes in my car for three-four months. Now while most people we encountered could speak English fairly well, my limited German came in handy at the train station. The person at the ticket booth said he didn't speak English, but fortunately I was able to get our tickets, find out which platform and what time our train was leaving. We soon discovered that the trains in Austria and Germany do run on time. When he told us the train was leaving in two minutes, we ran up the escalator to find the doors on our train had just closed. The conductor watched as I tugged, in vain, to reopen the door to one of the cars. He obviously took pity on us and released the lock so I could reopen the door. We hopped on the train, out of breathe, found a vacant compartment, and settled down for the four hour trip to Salzburg.
Salzburg, without a doubt, is one of the most beautiful cities I have ever visited. While I don't see the need to visit Vienna again, I would definitely want to return to Salzburg. This is the city where they filmed "The Sound of Music". It is also the city where my favorite beer hall was located. This made the rest of the trip somewhat difficult, since I was always comparing the other beer halls to the one in Salzburg. The Augustiner Brau Salzburg has retained much of the old style beer hall ambiance that the beer halls in Munich did not have. Granted there wasn't an oompah band playing. This was the only beer hall that we visited where the beer is still served in porcelain krugs; all the places in Munich have switched to the cheaper glass. The procedure was to select either a half- or one-liter krug from a large rack, give it a quick rinse from a special, centrally located water fountain, pay the cashier for your beer and hand the krug over for a fill-up. The only beer available was dunkel, but the lack of selection didn't matter. The beer was brewed on premise and was malty, rich and full-bodied. There were several food stands located just outside the main hall where one could get sausages, cheeses, breads, sweets and many other kinds of food to accompany the beer. It definitely deserved the five mug rating that The Guide had given it.
I have to mention one humorous incident that occurred while we were in Salzburg. One evening my wife and I found ourselves at a nearby bar to have one more beer before we returned to the Hotel Wolf where we were staying. I had been teaching my wife a few key words and expressions in German, like hello, good-bye, one beer please, where is the bathroom, etc. As we were leaving this bar, my wife turned to the bartender and said in her best German, "Eidelweiss". I wasn't sure what she had said and luckily I don't think the bartender heard her, but I asked her when we were outside what she had said. She repeated it and realized immediately that she had not said good-bye. I don't know if it was because we had taken "The Sound of Music" tour earlier that day or had drank some Eidelweiss beer, but it sure gave us a good laugh.
From Salzburg we took the short train ride to Munich, then the S-Bahn to Aying, where we stayed at the Brauereigasthof Hotel Aying. Germany has many brewery guesthouses that are listed in a guide that is obtainable from the Germany Tourist Office. I could easily see doing a tour around Germany where the only places you stayed were at these guesthouses. Aying happens to be the only one near Munich and fortunately has great beer. They are the producers of the famed Celebrator doppelbock. We really enjoyed Aying. It is an extremely small town and I am sure most of the people who live there work in some capacity at the brewery. Our hotel room was decorated with painted Bavarian furniture and the bed was a large canopy-style. Unfortunately the brewery was not open for tours at this time of year, but we were able to enjoy several of the beers, e.g. Jahrhundertbier, Pils, Dunkel, at the truly wonderful gourmet restaurant at the guesthouse. In addition, when we checked in and every time the room was cleaned, there were two beers left on the table for our enjoyment. Ayinger also makes a terrific obstler, or apple schnapps. We managed to bring back a bottle of that to enjoy.
In Munich, we visited several beer halls. The Hofbrauhaus was the first and definitely the most well-known. There is a band playing almost all the time and after a few beers you will find yourself joining in singing the songs even though you don't know the words. Like most of the other beer halls, the choices were helles, dunkels or weizen. The beer also comes mainly in one size, a full liter. I found it difficult in the beer halls to do any serious beer appraisal, because the halls were smoky and thus the only aroma detected was smoke. The Hofbrauhaus is definitely worth a visit, because nobody would believe that you could visit Munich and not visit the Hofbrauhaus. It is also conveniently close to Marienplatz, the central shopping area.
We visited Augustiner Grossgaststatte, which is on the main shopping street, but it was nothing memorable. We tried to visit Forschungsbrauerei, which translates into "experimental brewery", but it had closed for the season. At this point my wife returned to the U.S., since the remainder of the trip I was going to attend a technical conference in Munich. This left the remainder of the beer hunting to me.
After taking her to the airport, I went to Salvator Keller where Paulaner was the beer on tap. Salvator Keller is the principal outlet of the Paulaner brewery next door. What made this place so special is that Salvator doppelbock is served year round, while most of the breweries in Germany only serve doppelbock during a two-week period in March. This place is definitely a must visit. It was snowing in Munich (they actually had their first snowfall of the season a few days earlier) and the weather had turned cold. But after three half-liters of Salvator doppelbock I was feeling quite warm and content. Wow, what a beer! Rich, warming, full-bodied, malty, yummy!
That evening I visited the Weisses Brauhaus, where really the only beer served is Schneider Weisse. It is located just around the corner from the Hofbrauhaus and serves probably one of the best weizens in Munich. The next day I visited Munich's Augustiner Keller, but it didn't have the charm of the Augustiner in Salzburg. I have heard really good things about their beer garden though.
The last beer hall visited was with my company's European salesforce. There was probably close to twenty of us and we went to Mathaser Bierstadt, where Lowenbrau is served. This place has indoor seating capacity for 5,000 beer drinkers! For comparison, the Hofbrauhaus can only seat 2,000 people indoors. They also have a band playing traditional, and not so traditional, German music. Loud, noisy and fun to go to with a big group of people.
Both my wife and I are anxious to return, probably at a warmer time of year. We really enjoyed ourselves and found the people of Austria and Germany to be extremely friendly. I have found this to be the case with most people who enjoy good beer, though, haven't you? We definitely would return to Aying and try to visit the other small towns (and breweries) outside of Munich, like Andechs (Kloster Andechs), Freising (Weihenstephan) and Erding. Salzburg is also an easy day trip by train and definitely worthy of a visit. I just need to convince my company to cultivate some development projects with Siemens to help defray the travel costs.
Last Updated: 18 February, 1996
Die Bierjägerseite - The Beer Hunter Page: http://www.tiac.net/users/tjd/bier/bier.html