Here you see the website of my favorite beer. Click on "ja, ik ben ouder dan 18 jaar"and then, on "ga naar Brand"(the right of the two, so don't click on the left picture).
For possible copyright reasons, I cannot show you a photo of the beer but you can see it on the site. It's simple "Brand Pilsener".
It's the Brand brewery in Wijlre in the utmost South of the Netherlands, I lived in the area during the seventies. I knew the owner because of my work. Yes, his family name was "Brand" and his huge, ugly brewery which is a curse in the landscape and the village spoils much of its tender beauty. Mr. Brand was alderman of the village and disapproved many requests of citizens for a building permit to change their house, to build a small barn or shed, etc., I found it weird at the time, because his own building had to be rejected totally if it wasn't there already! Anyway, it wasn't his fault, and he merely did his duty. He and his company were very hospitable and I had the occasion to visit the brewery two times in my life and take care not to get drunk, and also the food we got was excellent.
Of all Dutch beers I find the taste of Brand come closest to the taste of the famous original Pilsner. Dutch people never order "beer" in a pub, café or restaurant, they always say: "pils", except when you belong to the nobility or exclusive student associations, then you say: "biertje"" ("little beer").
Wijlre (with brewery out of sight) and Wijlre from a distance
The brewery.... it produces excellent beer, and are hospitable, but keep it out of reach of the camera.
2 comments:
I'm afraid I'm not a beer drinker. I prefer a nice glass of shiraz (sometimes spelled syrah). There are several Australian wineries that make excellent shiraz at reasonablie prices.
Evie, I don't want to convert you into a beer drinker. I like both beer and wine, and shiraz is also my favorite grape. Goethe mentioned Shiraz as a city in Iran in his poetry bundle "West-östlicher Divan", so traditionally they have been cultivating wine over there, although their religion forbade them to drink it themselves. Some poets did, however, and the mullahs declared them as "forbidden literature", but people didn't care. Goethe wrote about it already 200 years ago.
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