German beer

Beer is a major part of German culture.

German beer is brewed according to the Reinheitsgebot, which only permits water, hops, and malt as ingredients and stipulated that beers not exclusively using barley-malt, such as wheat beer, must be top-fermented.

In 2012, Germany ranked third in terms of per-capita beer consumption, behind the Czech Republic and Austria.

The Reinheitsgebot ("purity decree"), sometimes called the "German Beer Purity Law" or the "Bavarian Purity Law" in English, was a regulation concerning the production of beer in Germany. In the original text, the only ingredients that could be used in the production of beer were water, barley, and hops, which had to be added only while the wort was boiling. After its discovery, yeast became the fourth legal ingredient. For top-fermenting beers, the use of sugar is also permitted.

There is a dispute as to where the Reinheitsgebot originated. Some Bavarians point out that the law originated in the city of Ingolstadt in the duchy of Bavaria on 23 April 1516, although first put forward in 1487, concerning standards for the sale and composition of beer. Thuringians point to a document which states the ingredients of beer as water, hops, and barley only, and was written in 1434 in Weißensee (Thuringia). It was discovered in the medieval Runneburg near Erfurt in 1999. Before its official repeal in 1987, it was the oldest food-quality regulation in the world.

Kellerbiers are unfiltered lagers which are conditioned in a similar manner to cask ales. Strength and colour will vary, though in the Franconia region where these cask conditioned lagers are still popular, the strength will tend to be 5% abv or slightly higher, and the colour will tend to be a deep amber, but the defining characteristic is the cask conditioning. Kellerbier is German for "cellar beer".

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Wikipedia