small wonder: tiny girl; giant beer

June 10, 2011

Single file line in the Pilsner Urquell brewery

The Pilsner Urquell brewery located in Pilsen, Czech Republic is largely responsible for the Czech ranking as number one in per capita beer consumption. Packaging about 120,000 beers per hour, this brewery houses a significant amount of beer -- so much, in fact, that you couldn't drink through one of their holding tanks in a lifetime. Leave it to the Czechs to have that much beer on hand. 

Drinking on average 179 liters of beer per every man, woman and child, beer is a pretty significant part of Czech culture. Not to mention, the second-runner up in the consumption contest, Germany, falls behind by about 50 liters...and everyone knows Germans know how to drink. I certainly would not have given the Czechs that much credit for holding such an elusive title, unless I had heard the facts from a reliable source. For the time being, I'm considering our Czech professor fairly reliable -- and the brewery seemed to back up his statement. 

Down in the bowels of the brewery, the pilsner beer lies in wait. After we went through the whole hop to beer process, we bundled up and carefully tiptoed over the wet cobblestones of the fermentation basement. The basement was wildly aromatic of all the pleasant beer smells you can conjure up, and the occasional waft of mold and mildew. Down at the end of this row of beer barrels stood an elderly man serving up unfermented, unfiltered hearty and delicious Pilsner Urquell beers. We sat down in basement enjoying each savory sip of a beer you can only get in this particular basement, in this particular brewery, in this small town of Pilsen -- the only place brewing Pilsner Urquell beer. 

I took this photo because I really liked the lighting and the scale of beer barrel to person. I also thought the wet and damp feel came across nicely.