The beer on its most beautiful white © Frank H. Jump
© Frank H. Jump
Maisel’s Weisse Original
Maisel is known to some beer-lovers for an ale-like speciality called Dampfbier (“Steam Beer”) but has in recent years given more emphasis to its popular wheat beers.While the city of Bayreuth is best known for its Wagner festival, it is also a brewing town. It is in Germany’s most breweried state, Bavaria, and in the district that makes the most colourful brews, Franconia.
Bavaria has several breweries owned by families called Maisel, not necessarily related – at least, not closely. The best known is this sizeable regional brewery, dating from 1886-7. The original Maisel brewery, magnificently castellated, is kept in working order and beautiful condition as a museum of beer-making and coopering, and is open for tours. It has a 1930s steam engine and a remarkable collection of early equipment, blueprints, and advertising enamels Next door is the remorselessly modern, 1974, premises.
The old bottling hall has been converted into a bar intended to reflect the Roaring Twenties. Franconia may be a long way from New York or Chicago, but one of the owning Maisels married an American wife. – Michael Jackson’s Beer Hunter
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