Crisp, clean, and transparent, the pilsner is a beer style often used to gauge a brewer’s skill. Its simple recipe and light body, as well as the German purity laws (Reinheitsgebot) under which pilsner was historically governed, help make any brewing flaws immediately apparent. Recent scholarship has discounted the often-told story that the brewer responsible for Czech-style, or Bohemian, pilsner smuggled lager yeast out of his native Bavaria to the precursor of Urquell Brewery in Plzen (in the then-Austrian Empire, now the Czech Republic). But one thing is certain—that innovative combination of pale malt, bittering hops, and cold fermenting lager yeast has resulted in a beer style that’s often used as a brewing benchmark.
Today, American brewers undoubtedly look to traditional German and Czech pilsners as models of the style. Although they’ve each created their own renditions, these American brewers agree that since their inception, clean and refreshing pilsners have stood the test of time.
Bavaria or Bust
Ro Guenzel is about as Germanophile as it gets. The Nebraska-born head brewer at Left Hand Brewing Company in Longmont, Colorado, was a former brewer at Kaltenberg Castle Brewery in Germany. “Working under Bavarian brewmasters, I had it beaten into my head that there’s Bavarian beer, and then there’s everything else,” he says.