Franconian Beer Country

Upper Franconia has more breweries per head than anywhere else on earth, most of them small, village-owned and selling little beyond the next valley. The styles stay local rather than national: unfiltered Kellerbier and Zwickl poured cloudy and cool, dark lagers, strong seasonal Bocks in spring and autumn, and around Bamberg a smoked malt beer, Rauchbier, which tastes distinctly of bacon on first acquaintance and stops being strange by the third glass. The other half of the tradition is the Keller, a cellar dug into a hillside for cold storage and planted over with chestnut trees for shade, which in time became the place people drink on summer evenings, often bringing their own food.

What you actually see

• Kellerbier - unfiltered, cloudy lager served cool and straight from the cask.
• Rauchbier - Bamberg's smoked malt beer, an acquired and then a habitual taste.
• The hillside cellars - chestnut-shaded terraces above the villages, used from late spring.
• Seasonal Bock - stronger beers tapped to a fixed calendar in spring and autumn.

When to go

The hillside cellars run roughly May to September and are the reason to come in summer; many open only in the afternoon and shut early. Forchheim's late July festival on the Kellerwald is the largest gathering of them. In winter the tradition moves indoors and the villages go quiet, which suits a slower, colder trip with fewer people about.

Honest expectations

Village breweries keep short and irregular hours, often closing one weekday entirely, and few take cards. The beer is strong and the measures are large, so driving between villages is a bad plan; the regional trains and cycle paths exist for a reason. English is scarce outside Bamberg, and kitchens can stop serving by eight in the evening.

Nearby

Bamberg's old town on its hills, the limestone valleys of Franconian Switzerland and the brewing museums at Kulmbach.