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Sometimes you’ll see alcohol percentage listed on a can of beer you buy in a store in the Czech Republic, but more often you’ll see a beer designated as 10°, 12°, etc. There are also some smaller local, but big-volume brands brewed in different regions. This brewery doesn’t have the long heritage of the others, but it has a partnership with a sizable Dutch brewery and is expanding distribution.
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If you can find a Bernard beer, which is unpasteurized, don’t pass up the chance to try it. Czechs have been pouring it since 1753 though, so they’ve been doing something right. Hey, sometimes you just stick with what’s working.īreznak pilsen is widely available since it’s now owned by Heineken. (Surprisingly though, it’s only 3.8% alcohol.) This brewery has been operating for 144 years, but these are the only two styles they make. I ordered one in a Czech neighborhood in Prague with dinner and ended up getting two more when I found out they were $1.60 a pint. The lager style pale one is good, the amber-colored dark and malty one is fantastic. Their Kozel brand is a reliable choice if you like full-flavored beers. I probably drank this one the most and never got tired of it.
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They also own Radegast, which is very popular in the southern part of the country. Try the unfiltered lager if you get the chance. Pilsner Urquell you’ve probably had before and it’s reliable, but locally their Gambrinus brand might be more popular. Their maltier red beer Velvet is better and looks good in the glass. In my opinion the heavily marketed Staropramen is the least interesting of the bunch, but you can tour their brewery in Prague, so that’s worth doing if you’ve got the time. I did my best to sample all of the major Czech brands while I was in the country this time and was rarely disappointed. Unlike the poor substitute with the same name across the Atlantic, the original Budweiser here (Budejovicky Budvar) actually tastes like beer. This is the original home of pilsner, after all, with a heritage going back centuries and a town called Pilzen, so they’ve had plenty of time to work on their craft. The big name brands of beer in the Czech Republic are known in European countries, in the case of Pilsner Urquell, known around the world. So you’ll have to venture outside the big cities, how many places in the world can you find a half-liter/pint of beer you’re going to really enjoy for $1? If you’re European, you’ll frequently find one-euro pints. Those are “village prices,” not the prices you’ll find in Prague. As I write this, the exchange rate is US$1 = 22 Czech koruna. That chalkboard pub sign here is from a small town called Krasna Lipa, the gateway to the Bohemian Switzerland National Park that I profiled earlier. This is some of the cheapest beer in the world, but also some of the best. A 500 ml large beer will usually be somewhere between 25 and 39 Czech koruna, or in U.S. Beer is cheaper than soda, coffee, or often even bottled water. Prices can get out of whack in touristy Prague, but in most parts of the country you can feel secure ordering what the pub or restaurant is serving customers without looking at the price. You can buy a round of beers for yourself and three friends here and probably not spend what you would on a single 12-ounce craft beer in a U.S. That’ll usually be a pilsner, but in most cases they’ll have something else on offer too, like a dark beer or an amber. So even if you walk into a pub and they only have one brand of pivo, it’s probably going to be good. There you’ll be in sudsy nirvana.Ĭzech beers are uniformly tasty, without all the shortcuts mass breweries have sunk to in most parts of the world. There are plenty of places around the world where you can buy cheap-tasting beer for cheap, but if you want to drink well without spending lots of dollars or euros, head straight to the Czech Republic.