Reinheitsgebot

Celebrating 500 Years of Pure Beer
April 23, 1516 is a date that probably doesn’t mean much to you, unless you’re a Brewniversity Ph.D. Luckily, we have our Brewniversity upper classmen at Taco Mac to help inform novices about these things.

So, what happened in 1516?
Well, on that date in history—500 years ago today—Reinheitsgebot (pronounced “rhine-heights-ge-bow”, aka the German Purity Law) was adopted. This meant that all beer produced in Germany (or, at the time, Bavaria) could only have barley, hops and water. No adjuncts, no other types of grain – just those three ingredients. Like most things, this was done to prevent price competition and taxation.

Okay, so why do we care?
By dictating what could and could not be included in brewing, the German government set the stage for the future of beer styles in the region. German pilsner became a staple of the European lifestyle because it was the only thing available to drink.

Also cool – Reinheitsgebot is still around. It’s been revised (to allow the addition of yeast), but staying true to these old world brewing traditions is still a big deal to the Germans.

 On Saturday, we joined beer geeks around to the world to celebrate this holiday. At all of our Taco Mac locations, we offered a special release beer—Radeberger Zwickelbier—to restaurant guests. We tapped kegs of this beer, which has never been served in the US before, and encouraged customers to raise their glass to pure beer. It was a great time!