The story
Schwarzbier — literally “black beer” — has its roots in the eastern German regions of Thuringia and Saxony. Dark beers have been brewed there for centuries, and the town of Bad Köstritz has a brewery that traces its history back to 1543. For much of the twentieth century, the style was a regional specialty kept alive behind the Iron Curtain. After German reunification in 1990, Köstritzer’s black lager found fans across the whole country and then abroad.
The style also has a surprising second home in Japan, where brewers have made dark lagers for well over a century, often very much in the schwarzbier mould.
What it tastes like
The first surprise is how light it feels. Schwarzbier pours deep brown to near-black, often with ruby highlights when held to the light, topped with a tan head. The aroma suggests dark chocolate, cocoa, and soft roasted grain. But the body is medium-light and the finish crisp, without the thick, burnt intensity of a stout. The roast is gentle and smooth, the bitterness moderate, and the beer ends clean and dry. It is a dark beer you can happily drink on a warm day.
How it’s made
Brewers start with a base of pilsner and Munich malts and add a modest amount of roasted malt for colour and flavour. Many use dehusked roasted malts (such as German Carafa), which give dark colour and chocolate notes with very little acrid bitterness. German hops keep things balanced. A clean lager fermentation and cold conditioning give schwarzbier its polish, which is what separates it from dark ales.
Fun fact
A long-standing story holds that the poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe relied on Köstritzer black beer during a period of illness when he could barely eat. The tale is repeated proudly in Thuringia, and while it is hard to verify every detail, it has earned the beer a place in German literary folklore.