Budweiser Budvar and Saaz hops
Ing. Josef Tolar, brew-master of Budweiser Budvar
Budweiser Budvar represents one of the two currently most sought after brands of beer on the domestic market. Volume of domestic sales have increased 2,5 times since 1989.
Budweiser Budvar currently holds first place in beer exports in the Cyech Republic and with a share of export of 50% of its production it is an exception not only amongst other domestic breweries but also in the entire Europe. With 30% share on the Czech beer export Budweiser Budvar is a worthy representative of Czech industry in 53 countries in all continents of the world.
Every single bottle that leaves the gates of Budweiser brewery for any place reached by a distribution net of Budvar is a testimony to not only art and experience of many generations of Czech brewers but also to extraordinary quality of raw materials of which the final product is composed, that is melt and hops. Every vignette of Budweiser Budvar states that "12% light lager is produced from the finest Saaz hops, the choicest Moravian malt and top quality water, drawn from own 300 m deep wells."
Budweiser Budvar is currently the only brewery in the Czech Republic that uses solely Saaz hops and of that only coned hops from the Saaz region. This principle remains the same for all products, without any exceptions between domestic and export production. This makes Budweiser Budvar the largest single user of coned hops of domestic production.
It is necessary to point out, that from this perspective it is a historically supported principle which was cited even at public and court hearings in the past times. For example New York brewer of Czech origin, Mr. Robert Schwarz, which studied brewing in Germany, and then taught at Brewing academy of the USA and published a number of articles about the production of beer, stated nearly 100 years ago that "... beer Budweiser ...is respected as a unique type of beer of light yellow to golden green look, characterised by hop aroma, but less hopped than Pilsner beer", This evaluation, although a hundred years old, still applies today.
When compared to other Czech beers, the unique individuality of Budweiser Budvar beer lies in lower bitterness, constituted by the average value of 22 m.u.w. in the lager, followed by significant part of hop aroma in whole sensorical composition of beer aroma. This apparent paradox can be explained by the sole use of Saaz aroma hops whose strong aroma component with unique alpha and beta bitter resins combination at relatively low value of bitterness and important content of hop polyphenols constitutes optimal raw material for beer of Budweiser type.
More productive hops with cruder profile of bitterness enables on one hand economically beneficial decrease of hops addition yet on the other hand means a shift from historically typical fine bitterness of Czech beers to stronger and cruder profile of German type Pilsner beers.
Similar shift of bitterness character of produced beer could be caused by installing modern technology of multi-volume cylinder-conical tanks, where again slightly different process of fermentation, lower separation of oxidised hop substances or shortening of maturing time could bring a shift from a typical character of bitterness in direction to a stronger and cruder impression.
We could ask a question, why the consideration to uniqueness of Saaz hops is not given also in other Czech breweries. In my opinion there are two reasons for that which are both connected to market-economical changes shortly after 1989. The deflection of breweries from domestic raw material was caused firstly by a rapid price increase of Saaz hops welcoming the foreign competition and secondly by an interesting extension of offers from new partners. Only the development of prices of Saaz hops in recent years and perhaps also sensoric evaluation of effects during brewing of other types of hops will bring the attention of Czech breweries back to domestic offer. Certainly this means not only stabilising the sensoric profile of Czech beers but also a long-term security of domestic demand for hops and for its acreage.
