The "Beer Me" Blog: Oktober Reise, Day 7: Prague Brewpubs

Saturday, October 8. Time to see Prague for real.

Cabs can get you into the general area where you want to be, but a whole lot of this town is pěší zóna, pedestrian zones, so there's a lot of walking involved too.

There are at least five breweries very near the apartment, so we walked down to the far end of the chain and worked our way back.

One of the buildings along the way had some interesting statues overlooking the street.

The "far end of the chain" happened to be the famous U Fleků. Everyone who enjoys beer wants to visit this place, and for good reason. The beers are magnificent, the food is delicious, the buildings and gardens are spectacular, and they've been at it since 1499.

There are only two beers here, but they're both desert island beers. I had never had them before, and I can't wait to have them again. The first was a pilsner, the Flekovský světlý ležák 13°. Grainy, bready, yeasty, floral, complex. The very definition of a meal-in-a-glass. The other is their "standard" dark beer, the Flekovský tmavý ležák 13°. This is the one they'll bring you if you just ask for "a beer". Rich, toasty, malty, chocolatey, with a hint of licorice and a mild floral hop character. Both beers go nicely with their goulash and garlic soup.

I would have been perfectly content to stay at U Fleků and enjoy these beers all day long, but there were plenty more breweries to explore.

Not far from U Fleků is Pivovar Národní brewers of Czech Lion beer. It's a relatively small place, founded in 2015. They also serve food, but I was still full of goulash.

First up was the filtered version of their pilsner, Czech Lion 11° Filtrovaný Ležák. Light and smooth, grainy and floral, with some diacetyl. Not bad.

We followed that with the unfiltered version of the same beer, Czech Lion 11° Nefiltrovany Lezák. A little more floral and a little less bitter than the Filtrovaný.

Their Czech Lion 13° Nefiltrovany Polotmavý is more like a Vienna-style lager, richly toasty and nicely sweet. This was the best of the bunch.

Finally, their speciál na čepu beer was called Summer Ale 11, an American-style pale ale. It was well past its prime.

Up the street and around the corner is Pivovar U Medvídků. It's a brewery, restaurant, hotel, and yes, a spa, where you really can take a beer bath.

I had the Blondgott pilsner, and it was excellent. I would have liked to try more of their beers, but the waiter didn't seem too interested in bringing us more than one, so that was that.

Three minutes' walk got us to the final brewery of the day, Pivovar U Tří Růzí. Real nice comfortable place with real good beer and food.

I started with their excellent Weizenbier, as good as any I've had in Germany, followed by their dark lager, Tmavý Speciál which was also fantastic.

A bit of lunch laid down the foundation for a couple more Tří Růzí beers. The Výroĉní 10° pilsner was another great beer, mild but still complex and interesting. And the Videňské červené was a fine Vienna-style lager.

The original plan was to go to the second Sharks game, but Paris was exhausted, and Mario wasn't keen, and to be honest, I was kind of feeling it too. So instead we made our way past the Karlův most to a good dinner at Kozlovna Apropos.

Back at the apartment, there were still beers waiting for us, and we even found a stream of the game.

So we watched the game — which the Sharks lost — and had a couple nightcap beers, the first being Gambrinus Original 10 from Plzeňský Prazdroj. Clean, mild, and actually kinda bland compared to the day's earlier beers.