00:00It's the mother of all beers, or at least most of them, the Pilsner.
00:05The Pilsner is special in them that we brew it for taste, not for alcohol.
00:12And as its name suggests, the Pilsner comes from here, Pilsen in the Czech Republic.
00:18The Czech Republic is by far the European leader in per capita beer consumption.
00:23In 2023, every Czech drank an average of 128 litres.
00:29In second and third place were Austria and Germany.
00:32But what exactly is Pilsner? How was it invented?
00:35And what should you bear in mind while tapping it?
00:40It all started in the western Czech city of Pilsen. More on that in a moment.
00:45There are several breweries in Pilsen, but the best known and by far the largest is this one, Pilsner Urquil.
00:52Six and a half million bottles of beer are produced here every day and exported all over the world.
00:59Václav Berka is the head brewer. Even as a teenager in 1971, he was brewing beer with the traditional Pilsner recipe.
01:07Pilsner Urquil means three ingredients. Pilsner soft water, sass hop and malt from our own molting plant.
01:16And we add the yeast which are take off on the end and sets pills.
01:23And here's how it came about. In 1842, the German master brewer Josef Groll was invited to Pilsen as a kind of plea for help.
01:32At the time, almost every family in the city brewed their own beer, but the product was almost undrinkable.
01:39It was Groll's job to change that, so he combined pale malt with the regional zatz hops and used the city's water to brew a beer that was clear, light and had a hoppy bitter taste.
01:50It was the birth of Pilsner and this brewery.
01:56To this day, Václav Berka and his colleagues use regional ingredients and continue to brew using the original recipe.
02:05We are still using copper kettle for meshing with direct heating.
02:11We are still using cold and long fermentation and maturation and to be sure that the taste of the beer is the same, like in time Josef Groll.
02:25After adding yeast, the beer ferments in these copper kettles, resulting in alcohol.
02:31After around 10 days, the Pilsner is matured in the historic brewery cellar.
02:37This underground cavern is 9 kilometers long.
02:40At consistently low temperatures, this is where the beer acquires its distinctive taste.
02:47A month later, it goes into the bottling hall and out into the world to more than 50 countries.
02:54The largest market is Germany.
02:56Today, around two-thirds of all beers are brewed with this legendary recipe.
03:00Countless varieties of Pilsner have been created around the world.
03:04In Pilsen, Ú Zajcmanu is the go-to place for locals and tourists with a passion for beer.
03:10But in the Czech Republic, there's more to beer than meets the eye.
03:13How it's tapped is also crucial, an art in itself.
03:17First, I make a hladinka.
03:19Hladinka is a favorite style in the Czech Republic.
03:32And second, I make schnit.
03:34Schnit is a small beer in a big glass and a half-half.
03:40Now, I make mlíko.
03:49Mlíko is only phone in a big glass.
03:55And this beer is very sweet and without bubble.
03:59And the last, I make čochtan.
04:06Čochtan is beer without phone and with more bubble.
04:14And in mouth, you have very strong.
04:18How the beer is tapped also matters to Czech guests, as is being together while drinking beer.
04:25I prefer schnit, because it's the smaller beer, but you get it into a bigger glass.
04:32So even when we talk with my friends, it can last longer and it still stays fresh.
04:39So even though we chat and we have some fun, we can still have the fresh beer, the good quality beer.
04:46Thanks to its high quality, Pilsner became a success story.
04:50It may have been invented in Pilsen, but today it's the basis for most beers worldwide.
04:55And it's an important part of Czech identity.
