Poles apart
Adrian Tierney-Jones visits Polish brewery Zywiec and discovers two completely different beers being
brewed on two completely different sites
Midweek Krakow and the party is kicking off. A bunch of local football fans parade across the main square, shoulders draped in massive flags, grunting their team’s virtues. A column of nuns passes by and provides an intriguing counterpoint. The insistent thump of dance music is everywhere – the countdown has begun to the weekend when herds of British stag and hen party-people will be jetting in. Time for a drink, time for a bar in which to escape this new Poland.
Down a backstreet, a sign outside an establishment called Bacchus promises Zywiec (rather than wine). This is one of the country’s biggest beers, second only to Tyskie – and is a clean, easy-drinking Eurolager with a fresh, lemony and sprightly grassy feel and tangy finish.
Inside the small and smoky space (no ban here) which looks like a kitchen, there are lots of vodka bottles, a font for Zywiec’s everyday lager and, most gratifyingly, a tap for the same brewery’s intensely flavoured porter. Having once scoured unsuccessfully the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius for a Baltic Porter, I thank the gods of barley for this meeting.
In the glass it is as dark as a moonless night and topped with a rocky cappuccinocoloured head. Chocolate, mocha coffee, roast barley and vinous fruits such as currants all jostle for attention on the palate. It has a creamy character with a bitter, dry, roasty finish; it’s a luscious, sensuous Venus di Milo of a beer. It hardly feels like 9.5% alcohol by volume (ABV). This is old Poland.
Th.....
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By Adrian Tierney-Jones
Section : International Brewery
Page number : 30
