[ Beer Culture ]

The Prague Daily Monitor has a story today that the Černá Hora brewery will open its own four-star hotel, including a beer spa, within two years. It’s not the first Czech brewery with its own hotel — in fact, the “Brewery Hotels” index in Good Beer Guide Prague and the Czech Republic lists 16 such places, ranging from brewpubs to industrial brewers and located in just about every corner of the country.

But the story isn’t about Černá Hora. Finally, the phrase “beer tourism” is starting to appear in the Czech press. And finally, people — especially people at smaller, regional producers — are starting to think about what beer tourism could mean for their business.

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The Czech lands have given the world the original Pilsner, the original Budweiser and many other significant firsts in the world of beer and brewing. Now a Czech company has started a line of health and beauty products made with beer, including beer shampoo, beer shower gel and beer soap.

Called Czech Beer Cosmetics, the beer beauty goods come from Manufaktura, a Prague-based firm known for its traditional wooden toys and tools, as well as bath salts, lotions and soaps. Introduced last fall, Czech Beer Cosmetics have quickly become one of the company’s top sellers.

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For this year’s SPP awards, most of us in Prague first met for breakfast at Hotel Beránek, near metro station I.P. Pavlova. Before getting on the bus, we were able to try Hotel Beránek’s house beer, brewed and bottled for the hotel by Chodovar.

What a great idea, I thought. Why don’t more places have their own beers? Of course a bottle of beer is fairly hard to fold, but it would still make an interesting holiday card. Or a thank-you gift. (Personally, I’d love to use one as my business card, but that would present logistical problems involving pockets, weight and my own thirst that I shouldn’t go into here.) Homebrewing’s easy enough. How hard could it be to have a beer made, maybe just for a special occasion?

And then before Christmas, I was told that my local, Pivovarský klub, had a new beer coming out for its regular customers and friends of the house. Called Florenc 14:14, it’s a polotmavý (half-dark) lager brewed from three kinds of malt at 14° Balling, lagered for more than a month and finishing with 5.5% ABV, produced in a limited run of less than 70 bottles of 330 centiliters. (more…)

The Czech Republic is home to a whole bundle of brews from specific places: known quantities like Pilsner Urquell (from the West Bohemian town of Plzeň) and Budějovický Budvar (from České Budějovice), as well as rarer birds like Žamberk’s fantastic Žamberecký Kanec, Pardubice’s Pardubický Porter, Velichov’s impossible-to-find (but oh-so-worth-it) Velichovský Forman, along with about 500 other truly outstanding local faves. But in the midst of this very rich beer culture, what we don’t have are many brews that are specific to a certain time of year. One of the few exceptions is showing up right about now: Vánoční piva, or Christmas beers.

Occasionally called sváteční piva (holiday beers), Christmas beers are brewed at higher gravities than standard Czech lagers, generally starting at 13° and heading north fast, resulting in slightly (or much) higher alcohol than normal. (more…)