Origin of Pilsner

In the Western Bohemian city of Pilsen (Plzeň) in the Czech Republic, the beer-loving citizens were fed up with the lack of quality in their local brew, so they looked for help in neighboring Germany—specifically Bavaria—where the brewers had already earned a reputation as master beer makers. Brewmaster Josef Groll was hired to take on the task of creating a new Bohemian beer brewed with Bavarian quality. Groll chose to brew a beer using local Czech ingredients—sweet and nutty Moravian malt and lightly bitter but aromatic Saaz hops—combined with lager yeast imported from Bavaria. The Moravian malt was made in a new type of kiln which used indirect heat to produce very pale malt, and when combined with Pilsen’s naturally soft water resulted in the world’s first pale lager. In October 1842, this combination of circumstances—history, location, and technology—created a style which would grow to dominate the beer world for more than a century.