The oldest monastery brewery in the world – what a strong statement! A monastery, whose precursor dates from the year 617, and whose brewery was founded in 1050, about 1000 years ago: Klosterbrauerei Weltenburg! Despite this seemingly endless history, the brewery does not exclude progress, and is even prone to throw overboard its old traditions when it comes to economic thoughts and action: It is a significant part of the beer portfolio, which is not brewed on the Weltenburg premises anymore, but in the Bischofshof Brewery in Regensburg and sold under the trademark of Weltenburger.
Nevertheless, a visit to the monastery is still worth the effort, and the brewery with its nice beer garden is perfectly located at the pebble beach of the Danube – a place where the beer tastes twice as good as everywhere else!
For the first time, I visited the brewery on 20th August 2003. We just left the car at the other side of the Danube, crossed over by boat, and then entered the wonderful beer garden, where we enjoyed the rustic, but delicious food and the very good beer.
Post Scriptum 14th August 2011: It was almost eight years later, when during the Tour de Bier 2011 I had the opportunity to visit the Klosterbrauerei Weltenburg a second time – and this time the visit included a brewery tour.
Already in the early morning of 14th August 2011, we arrived with one of the first ships going through the Danube Gorge this day. The beer garden was already open, but not too many people have been sitting in the warm morning sun, yet. Plenty of seats were available, so we could find a comfortable place, have a beer and wait for the brewery tour…
…which in fact, due to some misunderstandings, took place at half past one instead of eleven o’clock – but better late, than never! Given the notoriety of the Weltenburger brand, the brew house is surprisingly small – a large portion of the portfolio is outsourced to Bischofshof Brewery in Regensburg.
Surprisingly however, the fact that during the brewery tour we got the opportunity to taste three of the great beers produced on the premises, but they were poured from the bottle – very unusual! Anyway, they tasted good, and it was a nice gesture from our tour guide to allow us to take the pretty glasses as a souvenir.
Klosterbrauerei Weltenburg GmbH
Asamstraße 32
93 309 Kelheim
Bayern
Deutschland
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