Vienna is a GREAT and under-appreciated beer destination, in my opinion; I really couldn't believe the availability and the opportunity to find some very rare beers.
I've NEVER , EVER seen even remotely close to this much unfiltered lager ANYWHERE. I'm not sure if this is something that's new or old or whether it's isolated to Vienna or exists all across Austria but there are unfiltered and unpasteurized fresh lagers available ABUNDANTLY in Vienna. -WHY OH WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME THIS?!
The small Austrian brewers, like the small Dutch brewers in the Netherlands, appear to have a fall/wintertime obsession with bock beers. (Which, to my best educated guess just means "stronger than normal beer brewed for cold weather" and nothing approaching either of the BJCP bock style definitions.)
[i:37feco36]Note: Don't confuse me here, the definition of "Bok" in the Netherlands is very different and seems to normally mean an exceptionally strong, phenoly, usually dark ale brewed with a Belgian strain while all versions I've seen in Vienna and Germany are brewed with lager yeast, stronger than the normal non-"bockified" versions of the beer and can be light or dark or anywhere in between.[/i:37feco36]
A grocery store in the underground level of the Vienna airport was selling a 9 pack of beer that included one bock beer from 9 different Austrian breweries; I was incredibly sad that I did not have the ability to bring these back as my bag was already EXACTLY at the 22KG weight limit from my other beer and wine purchases.
BJCP needs to send some high ranking judges to Vienna in a hurry because it absolutely DESTROYS the BJCP guidelines and most pre-conceived notions of of beers bearing the names of "Zwickel" & "Märzen"$$ even "lager"$$ Horst Dornbusch's style description of Zwickelbier even seems to fall apart when stood next to the Zwickel beers of Vienna, anyway (I haven't had any German Zwickel beers so I can't speak to them.)
The Märzens I found in Vienna were quite light in color and pretty low in finishing gravity and not remotely orange or sweet; they were also unfiltered and cloudy and hoppier than their Munich fest beer modern day cousins. (I was incredibly surprised and happy to see almost every brewery I visited advertising unfiltered and unpasteurized beers as a positive attribute.)
"Vienna Zwickel" (I made that term up; it means nothing more than Zwickel from Vienna) was served from keg at normal keg temps and CO2 levels both places I tried it (I still have a bottled version to sample) and very effervescent and cloudy (this tracks with the "German Beer Institute's" description so far), but extremely lemony both from acids (alpha acids) and late hop additions; this is where the Vienna version of Zwickel didn't standup to the German Beer Institute's description that hints at lower hop levels to Kellerbier. -According to them Zwickel and Kellerbier are one at the same but Zwickel is served earlier than Kellerbier, which I absolutely believe as Zwickel had a LOT of yeast in solution, looking identical to a weiss beer, and has less hops. The Zwickel that I had was all kegged and quite cold, cloudy, identically lemony (same or extremely similar hop variety) and slightly bready from the yeast, but just as hoppy as any Kellerbier that I had.
In my limited experience so far, I've found Zwickel and Kellerbier to be almost identical except that Kellerbier was warmer, had less carbonation, and was clearer because yeast was allowed to settle out although it still had a distinct haze.
I'm very sad that I didn't get to try an example of a Vienna Red Lager, although I tried. Ottakringer supposedly makes a "red Zwickel" ("rottes Zwickel") that is supposed to be the closest thing to the original old Vienna lager. The "Marzen" that I had at Salm said it was brewed with a "darker malt that wasn't caramel" which is essentially a description of Vienna malt but the color ended much too light for really anyone to call remotely red so I don't think it was too close.
Vienna is a paradise of what seem to be very old beer traditions continuing and is a rare/unheard of to me, anyway, bastion of support for unfiltered lager. They have 15-20 local, often tiny microbreweries and brew pubs in the middle of a city steeped in wine culture.
I feel an incredible urge to go back and find the beers and breweries I missed. One weekend is NOT enough in Vienna; not even close.
If you have a sweet tooth they have an incredible number of unique baked goods including the famous (and over-hyped, IMO, "Sacher Torte" chocolate cake with apricot jam filling and a chocolate ganache frosting).
It's a happy, happy place and the Christmas markets are brilliant so convincing your other half should be easy this time of year.
Adam
" title="Very Happy" /><!-- s:D --> (not because of the beer - more just the place itself).