hangover

What's the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the word “Germany”? Mercedes Benz, BMW, or beer? Or maybe Heidi Klum perhaps.

One of the perks of managing the KT Workstream is that you get to travel once in awhile. If you‟re lucky, you get to dance samba with the beautiful people of Brazil, try Kimchi in Korea, or shop for Murano glass in Italy. But if you’re really lucky, you get to fly to Germany and get to taste the best beers in the world.

Germany has around 1,300 breweries. Philippines, I think, has less than 10. And these Ger-man breweries adhere to the reinheitsgebot or “purity order” dating from 1516, which man-dates that the only al-lowed ingredients of beer are water, hops, and barley-malt. Ger-mans do take their beer seriously. Only real beer should be served. No excuses. Germany also ranks 3rd in per capita consumption of beer, only behind the Czechs and Irish. Ger-mans, despite being stereotyped as stiff and very serious, know how to party. I only stayed in Germany for six weeks. But I went home with a se-verely damaged liver. Kidding. I went back to Manila with a wealth of knowledge and experi-ence in managing KT, and of course a noticeable beer belly.

Some of my favorites. I highly recommended them.

Bitburger Premium Pils – It has a bitter finish. Ideal for cooling off on sun-drenched days and taming the heat of spicy food.

Konig Ludwig - a Ba-varian beer, safe choice for hefeweizen. It‟s full-bodied with complex taste, and characterized by strong banana flavor.

Paulaner Hefeweizen – Paulaner is proudly from the beer-guzzling capital of the world, Munich. This beer is the
epitome of Hefeweizen.

Spaten Optimator – a classic German dark beer. Full bodied with a deep dark color and rich roasted malt flavor. It has a slightly higher alcohol content that most beer, 7.2%, which is actually a good thing for some, including me.

Krombacher – If you like San Miguel Beer Pale Pilsner, you will love this. Brewed in the small town of Krom-bach, this German beer brand is one of the top sellers throughout Ger-many

Beck’s – probably the most recognized German beer. This world-famous beer is a favor-ite of many because of its balanced flavor and dry and crisp finish.


Work was tough during those six weeks. But I didn’t mind it that much because there’s always a bottle of first-rate German beer waiting for me at my apartment (I would’ve preferred Heidi Klum over a bottle of beer though).

Cheers!

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something i wrote for 20 minutes for the office newsletter. once a crammer, always a crammer :)