Beer Styles

What is Salzburg beer, really? From Maxglan to Obertrum am See, it essentially comes down to two bottom-fermented styles: the pilsner and the Märzen. Then there's the Zwickl, a naturally cloudy, unfiltered cellar beer served straight from the lagering cellar.

Trumer Pils comes in at 4.9% ABV, according to the brewery. It's pale, lean, and dry, with a fine hop spiciness and a head that lingers. A German-style pilsner follows the same direction but tends to stay a touch more bitter.

The Märzen gets its name because it was traditionally brewed in March and lagered in the cellar until summer. It's stronger than a pilsner, malt-forward and round. The Märzen beers at the Bräustübl in Mülln are, according to the house, brewed with relatively mild hopping and poured straight from the wooden cask.

So what's the difference between pilsner and Märzen? A pilsner is paler, drier, and more bitter. A Märzen has a higher original gravity—meaning more dissolved substances from the malt before fermentation—and so tastes fuller and sweeter.

The Zwickl takes its name from the Zwickelhahn, the tap once used to draw samples straight from the lagering cask. It's unfiltered, still contains yeast, and is therefore cloudy. It tastes yeasty, fresh, and somewhat softer than a clear beer. Order a Zwickl in Salzburg and you'll often get it fresh from the cellar; compare it to a pilsner and you'll immediately notice more body and less sharpness in the bitterness. Both styles belong to the lager family, but the Zwickl shows what a pilsner tastes like before it's filtered.