 |
Christmas
Markets and Christmas Festbier Season
T'is the Season to Sip Hearty Brew
Gingerbread
cookies, scrumptious stollen, roast goose, buck steak with boletus—substantial
foods for the wintry season...and the palate craves for a hearty quaff:
It craves for the dark and strong Christmas and Winter Festbiers made
by Bavarian brewers for the cold part of the year. These beers come in endless
varieties, often decorated with yuletide or snowy motifs on the labels.
They may be ales or lagers, and they may be made either with barley or with
wheat, or with both, but they are
always matured and mellowed for months at low temperatures in the dark recesses
of the brewery’s fermentation
cellars. These Bock-type beers are just right
for warming body and soul after an outdoor shopping
stroll, in the crisp air of an early December dusk, past the stalls and
stands of the
local Christmas market.
The
Munich Christmas Market, called the Christkindlmarkt (the
Christ Child Market) takes place every
year at the Marienplatz in front of the old city hall. A dusting of
snow reflects the glittering lights from some 140 carts and stalls huddled
around a towering, 30-meter
(100-foot) tall Christmas tree decorated with
some
2,500 lights. Musicians perform Advent music
from the city hall balcony and spread Christmas
magic among the crowd as vendors offer
everything from woolens, to roasted almonds, to hand-carved nativity scenes,
to dried plums, to toys, to mulled wine, to sugar-puff candy...and, of course,
nutcrackers, and Christmas ornaments. The Christkindlmarkt
is one of the largest and oldest Christmas
markets in Germany—its traditions dating back
at least to the 14th century. 
Bavarian
brewers try to do justice to the season by keeping their Christmas Festbiers
particularly malty, with just a touch of residual sweetness in the aftertaste.
These beers are rich and satisfying, but their sweetness is never cloying,
due to a good dose of noble hop aroma which counterbalances the brew’s
strong maltiness. Bavarian Winter Festbiers always remain smooth, rounded,
and drinkable, in spite of their heftiness. During the Christmas season,
you can spot Munich natives, both men and women, imbibing in a Festbier
at any time of the day. Some even like it warm as a nightcap and swear by
it as an antidote to the common cold.
