Wednesday 5th August 2015
Bob Thompson
Another city, another new micro-brewery. Today we in were Trier, the ancient Roman city on the River Moselle. As can imagined, wine is very important here with many wine houses dotted around town. However beer is not forgotten as one of Germany’s largest breweries is in this area and that’s Bitburger. The last large brewery in the city was Löwenbräu (Trier), established in 1890 and closed down in 1993 following its take-over by Karlsberg of Homburg five years earlier.
In 1998 Kraft-Bräu opened in the suburb of Olewig. It is located in the Hotel and Restaurant Blesius Garten. It is very pleasant indeed and on the bar you often find their signature Helles served direct from a wooden barrel. This is quite unusual for a new-wave German brewery and I’m struggling to think of another, and I can’t. Thereafter the beer scene in Trier was dominated by Bitburger and Karlsberg until 2013.
November was a pivotal month in 2013. That was when Petrusbräu started brewing around the corner in Windmühlenstrasse in the building of an old carpet warehouse.. Unlike Kraft-Bräu, this was a stand-alone microbrewery and they distributed their beers through pubs, drinks supermarkets and shops.
It was founded by four partners who quickly established a market for their beers. However what was needed was a dedicated brewery tap (Brauerei Ausschank).
So, when I visited on behalf of BeerVisits, along with Rich, Russell, Steve, Richard, Trev and Andrew, the tap had only been open for six months or so.
It was a built specifically as a pub in 1904. In recent years it has been a bar / pub in many different guises.
More recent titles have been Mephisto, Cuba Viejo and Delicia and they were all doomed to failure, maybe it’s in the name?
The pub opened its doors on 12th February 2015 and the gate to the Biergarten opened on 23rd April. This has its own service area.
In good weather, as is the case with many pubs here, all the service is in the garden, the main building being used just for the toilets and kitchen. This was the situation when we visited and found a table in the corner. The garden is medium sized and can hold around 200 customers.
There a three regular beers and these were: Pilsener (4.8%), Spezial (dark) (5.5%) and Weizen (wheat) (5.0%).
There is always a seasonal beer offered and so far these have been: Alt (Düsseldorf style) (4.8%), Sommerfestbier (5.0%), Zwickel (cloudy kellerbier, abv unknown) and Winterbock (7.0%). All of the core range are available in bottles.
Whilst visiting the facilities I had a look at the main room of the pub. Wood is very prominent as all the furniture is made of it. There is also a wooden bar which has some stools. The windows are large and made with leaded glass; a lot of light floods in. The tiled floor completes the picture. It would be wrong to say there is a full menu yet there are several main courses and enough to satisfy most tastes.
Important Information:
Trierer Petrusbräu, Kalenfelstrasse 3 54292 Trier. Tel: 01651 1705 9991
Open: Monday-Sunday 12.00-24.00. Kitchen: 12.00-22.00
The pub is to be found between the pedestrianised old town and the river.
There are two bus routes (1 & 81) that go to the area where it lies. However they are of little or no use as neither runs from the station. From the old town it would take less than 10 minutes to walk there. From the station about 20-25 minutes.