Hopfenland - the Wolnzach Lehrpfad

The Alps are a little too far away from the Hallertau region for hard-core hiking or trekking. However, biking is big here, and over a dozen towns have well-marked nature walks.  Many of these family-friendly trails include information signs along the way about flora, fauna, or culture so they are called a "lehrpfad" (learning path).

(Note:  like hops in Hallertau, many towns in wine regions have a similar path through vinyards.)

Our home base for the weekend in this German "Hopfenland", Wolnzach, has a Hops Lehrpfad that we walked:

The lehrpfad is about 4km long (under 2 miles) and has 26 signs along the way (like the one in the photo above).
It takes 2-3 hours to walk the circle, is open year round, and has a small parking area at the start/finish point.

We were interested in seeing hops fields close-up and learning more about hops and the region in general.
The hops field at the very beginning of the path was already harvested, but shows the grid structure clearly...

...with the poles, wire lines where the bines are attached, and rows of hops plants (now cut back) on the ground:

We read further about the "largest hops cultivation region in the world" (translation below):

From the sign:  Hops have been cultivated in Germany for over 1000 years... for a long time only near Monasteries and breweries... only in the last 200 years has Hallertau developed into a major production region...
today they export to over 100 countries throughout the world.

Hallertau has 14 official areas (each with their own "seal") that control and track quality across more than 1500 production entities and their 15,000 hectares.  Almost 50% more area is farmed today than in 1970. 

Sign #4 shows what to expect in the fields throughout the year, from the winter rest (Oct-Feb) to first growth (Apr-May) to bloom (July) and harvest (Aug-Sept).  The bines are cut back aggressively after the harvest for the winter.

Each hectare of hops requires 250-300 hours of labor a year, compared to grains that require only 10.  Wow.
Guiding the bines (3x a year, to help climb) and cutback is done by hand, although the harvest is semi-automated.

The hanging lines are 7.5m tall (24.6 ft).  Each hectare of hops field has 3500-4300 lines (2 per bine); this plus the main structure requires 30 kilometers of wire.  At harvest, one hectare yields 1500-2500kg of dried hops.

By signs #5-6 we still had not encountered a non-harvested hops field!  But we carried on and learned more:

From Sign 5:  hops bines have three stalks (we knew this from our hops wreath-making)... the plant can live up to 50 years but is mainly productive from 3-18 (then removed)... in May & June they grow 35cm a day, by harvest reaching 7m... only the female flowers are used (seeds aren't useful so pollination is prevented).
 

From Sign 6:  99% of hops production is used in brewing beer; the remainder is used in herbal medicines and as flavoring in liquors... beer brewing can use the flowers directly (like Lamplbräu) or extract syrup/pellets.

The flowers from one hops vine contain ~450g of resin, which is enough for 350 liters of "helles" beer.
As a rule, weizenbier uses 80g of dried hops per 100 liters, helles uses 120-150g, and pilsner uses 200-400g.
 

Finally, we rounded a corner and came directly to some "ripe" hops fields -- very tall and very full:

You can see the tire tracks in the background that the tractor and harvesting machine will follow:

The smell of the flowers was rich and fresh:

 

The next stretch along the lehrpfad had long hops fields...

... and the landscape in many directions was end-to-end hops fields:

The rest of the information signs were about nature in the area:  forest trees, insects & animals, etc.
At one point, cattle pastures took over, along with a Christmas Tree farm!

The sign below says:  this is a field of northern pines... trees are 8-12 years old when cut for Christmas.

In one of the cutest things of the day, the farmer has built a "wild bee hotel" in the edge of the woods:

Of course nothing in Bavaria is complete without at least one shrine:

The Wolnzach "learning path" was really quite fun to walk and photograph (plus we had great weather).
It's another of those things to do when you schedule your beer pilgrimage to Germany and Bavaria.

Hopfenland - the Hops Museum

During our weekend in "Hopfenland Hallertau" (that grows 25% of the worlds hops) we saw the Hopfen Museum:

Right outside the front entrance the museum had a hops "field" - you can see their size relative to Frau A:

Each row was a different variety of hops, with small white signs identifying the type and characteristics:

For example, "Hercules" has stronger bitterness while the classic Hallertauer is subtler & more aromatic:

          

Here is a close-up photo of a hops flower:

And a basketful of dried hops:

If you tear a flower apart you can see the golden resin/powder inside, which is the part used in brewing.

The printed information gets into great detail about the different hops/flower varieties... but only in German:

You also get a good view of how the rows are cultivated in the hops field, kinda-similar to asparagus mounds:

Inside, the museum had more hops growing -- probably so that in winter you can still see & smell live bines:

An interesting fact from the Museum plaques:  the amount of hops used in brewing "helles" beer today is only one-fourth of the amount that was used 200 years ago (from 400g per hectoliter in 1806, to 100g per hl in 2003).
Our guess:  it's a combination of more efficient/stronger extract, less need for preservations, and taste change. 

A similar chart showed how farmers have improved the field structures and processes to increase efficiency.
The chart below shows hours per hectare -- was manually intensive even in the mid-1950s, but then wow!

 

Of course engineering came into play somewhere -- they had examples of early processing machines that separated the flowers from the bines.  Interestingly, the first machines were British and US, then Germany caught up:

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, they used simple drying racks for drying the hops flowers, before later constructing more complex drying buildings:

The museum also had old-fashioned presses used to compress dried hops flowers into more efficient shipping bundles/sacks:

As is typical for Germany and Europe, the towns within the Hallertau geography have always been careful to control and market the quality of their product - regional branding.  You can see the metal seal press/stamp on the left and labeling template on the right that were used to identify sacks containing true Bavarian hops: 

Just an hour away, nearby Nürnberg because the largest hops trading center in the world at one time:

Nürnberg Hops Market, 1914, courtesy of Photo Archive of Nürnberg

Today, Nürnberg is not needed as a hops way-point.  Plus, many of the merchants were Jewish and their businesses were ruined during the Third Reich.  These sacks contain just dried flowers - resin/powder not yet extracted:

Even though the above bundles are very old, the herbal scent of the hops flowers was still quite strong.

There was surprisingly little on the resin extraction process, perhaps because the focus here is agriculture.
We did learn that many processing firms sprang up in the 1950s, but there are only three large ones today.
The output is usually dry pellets, but also cans of extract/syrup(?) are made as well:

Germany brews a lot of beer, but they grew enough hops in 1900 that they exported 1/3, and today it's 70%!
You can see where all the pellets go to below -- note how much the beer-loving Czechs get!  (And Italy?)

In addition to commercial and technical topics, the Hops Museum also had a history of the region and hops cultivation.  I found the old books most fascinating:  "Hops as brewing material" from 1901.  Notice that "Prof" (professor) Braungart wrote the book -- hops has been a long-standing topic of serious study for Bavaria! 

Hops bines are grown on complex wire systems that must stand up to heavy winds.  As the wires on which the bines grow are cut during the harvest, they have to be reinstalled each season.  A dangerous task, and one that still must be done by hand (today luckily they have things a bit more sturdy than these ladders from the 1920s and 40s!)

But after we (successfully!) strung the wires together in this puzzle version in the museum, we gained an appreciation for how complex the wire system has to be to support everything...not as easy as it looked!

The Museum offers weissbier tastings, and beer & chocolate tastings... but only during the week.  (???)
So we didn't (and probably will never) have a chance to try them -- too bad, not very customer friendly.

The entire Museum is relatively small (two floors, takes maybe 1-1.5 hours to see everything).  Audio guides are available in English and it really makes for an interesting and educational "beer stop" in northern Bavaria.

And don't forget to get the two local beers from the Museum store, including Lamplbräu (our tour here)!

Bavarian Hopfenland and Wolnzach - introduction

After hosting the German Beer Tournament, Frau A and I wanted to learn and experience more about the brewing art.  So we planned a weekend in the Hallertau region of Germany, which produces one-quarter of the world's hops.

"Hallertau" lies in Northern Bavaria.  It's a bit like "Franconia" -- not defined by municipal boundaries, but rather by common history and culture.  Hallertau includes parts of 3 districts and it lies 1.5 - 3 hours from Munich.

The earliest documents available show hops being cultivated in the Hallertau region since 736.  They were only "medicinal" at this time because hops' use in brewing beer started around 1079.  Today Germany is the world's #1, producing over 34,000 metric tonnes of hops each year (80% thereof are grown in Hallertau).

"Hallertauer hops" are one of the original four "noble" hops varieties (low in bitterness, high in aroma).
However, this type has been replaced by "Hersbrucker" because the former were highly susceptable to disease.

Interestingly, some towns here are also main figures in production of German white asparagus (Schrobenhausen, Abensberg).  Others are more known for being on the shores of the Donau river (Neustadt/Vohburg an der Donau).  We decided to stay in Wolnzach because it was centrally positioned for the excursions we had planned...
and it's home to the German Hops Museum (of course, this will be addressed in detail in another blog post).

We've taken the autobahn north from Munich many times, and always see this sign on the road side...

...and this weekend we finally took one of the exits to "Hopfenland".  You can see some hops fields from the autobahn, but once you get onto the local roads you really start to get a sense of their size and scope.  In the second photo below you'll notice that it was harvest time - we saw tractors loaded with hops bines running all weekend:  

Note:  "hops bine" was not a typo in the previous sentence.  Hops are bines, not vines because they climb using stems and stiff, downward facing hairs/bristles (rather than vines, which climb using curling tendrils and suckers).

The weekend started well:  we photographed a small hops processing barn right across from the hotel.
Tall hops bines were hung onto a conveyor, which fed them into a machine that separates the flowers.
Only female plants are grown, to prevent fertilization - the flowers' resin is useful, but seeds are not.

Here's a video of the machine in action - halfway through it zooms in on the "picked" flowers coming out:

More on hops farming and processing in some following posts...

Wolnzach, our base for exploration that weekend, is a town of 11,000 inhabitants.  It is also called Markt Wolnzach, because its roots (as early as the year 814) start with an important crossroads and market there.
Interestingly, the German Rail System does not go here directly -- you would have to take a bus from a nearby town.  Due to hops farming expansion and newer small industrial firms, Wolnzach has grown 50% since 1987.

Translation: Welcome to the Hops Metropolis of Wolnzach

The new rathaus (town hall) was completed in 1880.  It was built with areas to weigh, inspect, and seal hops: 

The Saint Laurentius church had its foundations laid in the year 800 and was expanded slightly in 1080.
In 1717 it got a new altar & pulpit, then in 1912 was rennovated to its current size and "new baroque" style: 

We were looking for lunch on Saturday, and found the perfect spot at the old post office - a biergarten.
Makes sense - traditionally there was an inn and restaurant at this center of activity, right on the town square:

We joined some locals in the shade.  The biergarten serves Augustiner, so we shared a helles and a dunkles. 

Later that afternoon, we wanted some eis (ice cream)... the local place on the Marienplatz had 5 menus (4 for ice cream, 1 for coffee)!  Also, typically German, it had abundant flowers around the outdoor seating area:

On the walk back to the hotel, we saw yet another hops processing barn in action - right there in town!
Rather than using large central processing centers (probably like the U.S. has) Germany has hundreds of small, independent facilities.  Many are located right near the fields, while others are in the town center like this one. 

That explains why we saw tractors loaded with hops bines moving constantly through town, past the church:

We took the rental car on a number of hops excursions, like the already-posted hops wreath-making. 
We'll post the other stories soon, but you should know we traveled in style:  upgraded to a BMW 535i!
(Photo below is Frau enjoying the sun, with an empty/just-harvested hops field in the background.) 

Coming next:  walk through hops fields, the Hops Museum, and visits to a micro- and medium-size brewery...