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About Stumblingpiper

I've enjoyed my hobbies in many different states/countries. I like homebrewing, mountainbiking, bagpiping, and many others.

Another Special day for me!

Today is one of my daughter’s birthdays, so I chose to drink another special beer to commemorate the occasion!  Today’s beer? Another nice beer from the Ettaler Kloster — their Kloster Pils.  It was definitely in style, it went down smoothly … I just wish my daughter had been here to sample it with me! LOL

Beer Mentor

St Paddy’s Day? Yes, a Green German Beer

Today was a little bit of a let down for me.  This is my favorite holiday, St Patrick’s day.  I usually am playing my bagpipes somewhere (either with a band or by myself).  It’s usually a pretty crazy time with a lot of nice Irish Stout flowing.

This year, Stuttgart happened to be playing Barcelona in Soccer on this day, so all of the pubs were ‘reservered’ to watch the game.  Wow.  How disappointing.  So, I just settled for drinking a German Green Beer … Beck’s Green Lemon.

Probably won’t do this again next year, but it was an interesting Radler…

Beer Mentor

25 years of wonderment!

Today is a very special day for me — it is my 25th wedding anniversary.  Of course, I’m married to a fantastic woman … a little know fact; she was named after a Bond Girl … so I have my very own Bond Girl — yes.

So to celebrate, I’ve picked a very nice beer:  Weltenburg Hefe-Weizen Dunkel.  This particular beer has won both a Gold and Silver medal.   Not too bad … I will be trying some of the other Weltenburg Beers later…

Beer Mentor

Continued the Kloster Theme tonight

Since we just came back yesterday from the oldest Kloster brewery, I decided to drink one of the beers I had from another German Kloster Brewery: Ettal.  I had their Edel Hell … well, this was a nice beer … it is an Export.  The previous one of theirs I had was not that great, but this one hit the spot tonight!

Beer Mentor

Oldest Breweries Tour … Day 2

Ok, we are slightly recovered.  I’m cheating today and counting last night’s / this morning’s beer as my beer for today: The Aventinus Weizen Doppel Bock.  This is an award-winning beer and deservedly so.  Wow.  This beer kicked my behind — but it was awesome!  I brought some home to enjoy again … And I have to say, Schneider-Weisse makes great beer.

We continued our journey today (actually concluded it) by visiting the Weltenburg Kloster.  This place is beautiful … and they make award-winning beer as well.  I will tell more about the beers as I drink my six-pack of beers (over six different days).  In the meantime, enjoy a couple of pictures from this Baroque style Abbey/Church.


Oh, for the successful trip — see this picture of my “Beer Booty.” LOL

Beer Mentor

Oldest Brewer(ies) Weekend Tour!

Today my friends and I started on a journey.  It was to visit 4 different breweries … we figured two a day would work for us!  The rough itinerary was as follows:

SATURDAY

1) Visit Weihenstephan Brewery (oldest active brewery in the world: 1040 AD).

The “German Beer Purity Law” was announced on the steps of the Weihenstephan Monastery in 1516 … We planned on stopping here for lunch at their “Braustuberl” … it was excellent!  The beer for today was actually the Weihenstephaner Vitus.  “Nummy … this beer is delightful.”  It is a Weizenbock (a theme for the day …) and really went down smooth.

2) Visit Schlossbrau au Hallertau (brewing since 1590 AD).

(We are visiting this place because it’s in the middle of the Hallertau hops growing region.)

After a short drive, we arrived at the Schossbrau au Hallertau … we went down into their beer cellar and took the time to enjoy one of their cold brews … very nice, very smooth.  They had several interesting displays set up — many incorporated hops/hops flowers.  In one of the pictures below, I’m standing in front of a large wort chiller — yes!


From here, we made our way to our hotel in Kelheim (and our hotel was actually in an old brewery …).  From the hotel we walked over to the next stop on our trip.
3) Visit Schneider-Weisse Brewery (oldest Wheat beer brewery in Bavaria).

This brewery in Kelheim has been brewing wheat beer since 1607 AD.  This place was the highlight of the trip! We were very lucky (in the right place at the right time) and were able to tour the brewery (that will be another post).  We were also trying to find some tickets to this brewery’s annual (38th actually) Aventinus Fest — this beer is their Weizen (doppel) bock.  Wow!  What a kick this beer had!

We were very fortunate to meet the Braumeister himself – Georg Schneider the sixth.  He was a very nice man and humored us by taking a picture with us.

We eventually did get tickets to the fest … and it was a grand time.  The beer glasses kept getting bigger … yes.  A great evening at a great event!


Tomorrow’s post will follow up on the fourth stop on our oldest brewery tour:

SUNDAY
4) Visit Weltenburg Kloster Brewery (oldest Kloster brewery in the world: 1050 AD).

Beer Mentor

A Croatian Beer: Karlovacko

My friend recently made a trip to Croatia and graciously brought back a beer for me to try.  It is called Karlovacko (except the c has a little thing over it on the can).

This was a pleasant enough beer.  It is brewed by Karlovačka pivovara in Karlovac. (thanks Wikipedia!)  This lager beer was in style for the type of beer .. and since it was free, it was even better!

Beer Mentor

A Glass of Bright Joy!

I brought back a few beers from my trip to Norway since I didn’t have time to finish them there PLUS I needed some for different days — you know, 180 beers in 180 days!  While I was in Norway I met a couple of Austrian fellows and they were kind enough to provide me a couple of Austrian beers.  I posted one on an earlier link … today’s beer is made by the Zipfer brewery.

The actual beer is their Maerzen.  A nice brew with subtle characteristics.  This is a beer to be enjoyed … and I did!

Beer Mentor

A Philippine Beer! San Miguel

There are some who will find this choice for me ironic — others will just wonder why I’m drinking a Philippine beer while in Germany.  Let’s just say — that’s what was available at the Mexican Place again — LOL.

So, today’s beer comes from the Philippines (actually, i think this one is brewed in Europe somewhere under contract) – San Miguel Premium Pilsener.     Actually, both today’s and yesterday’s beers … although from different parts of the world … have their roots in Czech Pilseners … something the German’s have used as well.  So, it’s like I’m having German Beers with these different countries’ beers…


I enjoyed drinking this one — probably not my favorite, but a nice beer in style.

Beer Mentor