German Brewing

I’ve posted before about encountering a beer style called, simply, “Export” in Baden-Württemberg, which was about 10% stronger and maybe a little more bitter. I believe, based on very little evidence, that this style was originally brewed in Bavaria for export to neighboring states, and eventually breweries in those states started making it on their own. I never saw a regular Helles in Baden-Württemberg — only Export.

I tried to replicate it using a very simple recipe of 90% Pils, 10% Carahell, Hallertau Mittelfrüh for FWH, and Magnum at 60 minutes for an OG of 1.054 and 22 total IBUs.

The resulting beer compares favorably to what I had in Germany. Some of the examples I‘m comparing against are Hoepfner Export, Carlsberg Gould Tuborg, and Schmucker’s Export.

That said, I don’t think this beer would fare well if entered in a BJCP competition as a German Helles Exportbier — I think it would get marked down for not being bitter enough.


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Try a Dortmunder Helles, pilsner, Munich light mix 75/25, around 28 ibu, that might be the flavor your looking for.

I know exactly what you're saying I was stationed in Stuttgart for quite a while and I drank stuttgarter Hofbrau but for the life of me I can't duplicate it yet the closest I've been able to get was a dortmunder helles

That minimal recipe I put in was just kind of a starting point feel free to adjust it anyway you want to it's by no means set and perfect to me it just sounded like that's kind of what you were looking for

I wouldn’t argue against your theory that it has Bavarian origins. Maybe Nico can lend more insight into this.

I think you got some inexperienced judges, which is very common with the German categories in homebrew comps. Many of them are expecting American versions, like Prima Pils, regardless of whether you are entering helles, export or pilsner.

Vollbier, Export, Bock and Doppelbock are referring to OG due to historical tax reasons. There is no assumption as to recipe and provenance.

For e.g. Augustiner Helles is a Vollbier (OG 11.5%) whereas Augustiner Edelstoff is an Export since it is 0.1% over the Vollbier Threshold (12.6%) at 12.7%. Edelstoff is at 18 IBU FYI

All German states and city-states.

However, what differed across states was the tax levied and the OG for each band. This gives rise to a lot of confusion since nowadays one expects such things to be standardised across territories. These are references to very old denomination systems, and they have little relevance today.

Most people use it as shorthand for Dortmunder Export--which is quite different from the Munich Export or the Vienna Export even.

Export on it's own tells you very little.

After the 1st Reich was dissolved after nearly 900 years of existence (the holy Roman empire of German States), the territory then consisted of loads of small kingdoms and free city states, each of which ended up going about things in their own way. Therefore this sometimes stunning fragmentation across the German states, whose origins date back to the fall of Rome.

I won't tell you what I make of Prima Pils, but you can imagine...