Hops

Almost no hops grow in Hungary anymore. As recently as the 1980s, trellis installations covered around 550 hectares; by 2011, only five hectares remained. So drinking Hungarian lager today usually means drinking hops imported from abroad.

Since then, there's been a restart. Heineken Hungária and a Hungarian aid organization established a twelve-hectare hop garden in Kastélyosdombó in the south of the country, which has become the center of domestic cultivation. Compared to Germany's Hallertau hop region, which spans roughly 17,129 hectares, it's a very modest patch.

Hops give beer two things. Bitterness comes from alpha acids that dissolve during the wort boil, balancing out the malt's sweetness. Aroma comes from essential oils that survive when hops are added shortly before the end of the boil or later, contributing notes of herbs, flowers, or grass.

A Vienna-style lager is lightly hopped, with the style guideline calling for around 18 to 30 bitterness units, or IBU, a scale measuring bitterness. This leaves the malt center stage while the hops stay in the background.

Budapest's craft breweries take a very different approach. They hop their IPAs aggressively, showing just how far the journey has come from plain factory beer to hop-forward variety. The big brands like Dreher or Soproni, by contrast, still favor restraint, since their audience expects a mild beer that can be enjoyed in larger quantities without the bitterness becoming tiring.