Beer Garden Culture

If you want to sample Löwenbräu where it originated, go to Munich. Ask for the “Löwenbräukeller” and you might get the following directions: “Take the Underground to Stiglmayerplatz and then you will hear them roar.” What, hear the Löwenbräu’s lions roar? “No, not the lions. The tourists visiting the Löwenbräu.”

No kidding. A beer garden is a loud place, even if there is no live band in lederhosen playing the “Mmhmpftatta” sound that is typical of Bavarian brass music. (Don't worry if you cannot pronounce “Mmhmpftatta”: only Bavarians can.)

Noise aside, the first challenge is to find ourselves a seat. There are 1,800 seats in the beer garden (and more than 3,000 in the adjoining beer halls), but on a fine summer evening, all the regulars of the Löwenbräukeller plus all the tourists in Munich seem to unite in this particular beer garden. (A common misperception: All the other beer gardens will be just as full, so you better stay where you are and find a seat or two.)

It really is unlikely that you can find a table, or find someone who will show you an empty table. They all seem to be taken, but most often, not all the seats at a table will be occupied. So point to an empty chair, ask the people at the table “Gestatten?” (or “is this free?”), and take a seat.

Even if you don’t speak German, the Bavarians will usually be helpful and show you how to order beer and get food if you have not brought your own.

Yes, you may bring your own food and buy only beer in the beer garden. This is still okay in many places. But don’t think about food now. Think about beer. About lager beer, rather than the hefeweizen that you can buy in most beer gardens. Lager is the traditional beer for the beer garden and there is a historic reason for that. Get yourself a helles, the golden colored and most popular beer these days, and look around.

The Product of Invention

The Löwenbräukeller may not be Munich’s largest beer garden—the one around the Chinese Tower in the Englischer Garten seats four times as many patrons and serves exactly the same beer—but the Löwenbräukeller, as well as the even larger Augustinerkeller and the Salvatorkeller (a.k.a. “Nockherberg”), are among the true sights of Munich. Built in 1882, the Löwenbräu beer garden and the surrounding buildings still reflect the traditional meaning of a “keller” (cellar) for brewing and the attached area for beer drinking.

The invention of the beer garden was a by-product of the invention of bottom-fermenting beer, which was based on a technology that was discovered rather than invented. Centuries ago, brewers noticed that fermentation would be slower and deliver a different kind of beer if they brewed in winter rather than in summer. In the 15th century, different styles for summer and winter brews developed. While summer beer was a relatively light beer to be consumed within days, winter beers proved to be stable and could be kept for months, if not for years, provided they were brewed and treated properly.

At that time, the nature of fermentation was a mystery even to professional brewers. Prior to the 19th century, brewers had only some empirical evidence that they could collect the yeast from one brew and pitch it to the next to quickly start fermentation. But depending upon the temperature in the brewing cellar, the yeast would either rise to the top (being top-fermenting yeast) or settle to the bottom of the fermenting tub in cold cellars. The saying was, Ein kalter Keller ist ein halber Brauer, meaning that a cold cellar would perform half of the brewer's work.

About 250 years ago, brewers found out where to build cellars that would stay cool even in summer—first with natural ventilation inside caves, and later on with vast quantities of ice collected in rivers or artificial ponds during the winter. The ice was stored in specially designed parts of the cellar, from which cool air would flow over the beer storage vessels.

One of the problems with natural cooling was that the ice accumulated during winter had to last till the next autumn to keep the bottom-fermenting winter beer at low temperature even during hot summer months. By that time, a new style of winter beer became popular: märzenbier, so named because the last batches of winter beer were brewed in March with slightly higher gravity and a generous amount of hops to preserved them into the summer. Large cellars—the märzenkellers—were dug outside the brewing towns and trees were planted on top of them. Brewers found out that different kinds of trees would provide more or less cooling effect, and that the chestnut tree gave an advantage by having lots of big-surfaced leaves. Not only did the large treetops throw their shadow on the cellars below them, but the big surface of the leaves evaporated lots of water, thereby effectively cooling the surroundings.

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NEXT: Tavern Replacements

This story originally appeared in All About Beer Magazine in November 1999.