craft beer Kaliningrad - Expat in Kaliningrad, Russia

Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)

Introduction

Published: 30 June 2020 ~ Variety of Beer in Kaliningrad

Everybody knows that vodka is Russia’s national tipple, but it may come as surprise to learn that the second favourite is beer. From personal observation, I would say that here in Kaliningrad young people tend to favour beer over vodka, which would explain why the variety and availability of different beer types and brands have mushroomed in pace with the numerous new bars, restaurants and hotels that have opened in recent years.

Previous article: Preface (Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)

Gone are the days when if you felt like a beer you either went to the billiard hall or stopped off for a jar and a chat with friends at the side of the road. The little yellow two-wheeled tankers that provided this service have since been pensioned off, as far as beer is concerned, but can still be seen today now dispensing another traditional Russian drink of the non-alcoholic variety known as Kvass.

The increase in on-licensed premises since I first came to Kaliningrad in 2000 is nothing short of phenomenal and, coronavirus willing, may it continue to be that way. To service this industry there is not just a greater variety of Russian-brewed beer but also many international imports, both mainstream brands and interesting lesser known products, offering plenty of scope for exploration.

The craft beer bar has also made its debut in Kaliningrad. I believe there are five such outlets, the most popular and well-known being the Yeltsin Bar. These fairly small, but magnificently well-stocked beer bars, are reminiscent of the UK’s micro- or pop-up pubs but offer a substantially greater quantity and variety of beers at any one time sourced from around the world and purveyed on a rotational basis.

Variety of Beer in Kaliningrad

The brewed-on-the premises concept is also well established, with brew bars producing their own house brands and proudly displaying their brewing equipment for all to see on the premises. A good, large and exciting example of this would be the Pivovar Restaurant Brewery just off Victory Square in the centre of Kaliningrad, where the rows upon rows of deep copper brewing kettles and those mounted monolithically behind the bar are nothing short of magnificent

British ales are obtainable in Kaliningrad, such as Fuller’s ESB and various IPA varieties, most conspicuously in the Sir Francis Drake English-style pub, the first of such bars in Kaliningrad, which was certainly functioning when I first came here in the year 2000. But, as might be expected, the British ales that are served here are the keg export equivalent of their real-ale counterparts. But hey! ~ you did not travel all this way to drink a pint of Charlie Wells, did you?

Bottled British-brewed craft ales are also no stranger to Kaliningrad. You can expect to find both mainstream and more exotic brands in Kaliningrad’s specialist beer shops, and some supermarkets, both small and large, often stock a surprisingly diverse range of British beers.

Imported beer is, not very strangely, more expensive to buy than home-grown varieties, whether bought for consumption in restaurants or bars or as an off-sale from specialist beer shops. The typical price of half a litre of British beer in the Sir Francis Drake, for example, would set you back 250 to 360 rubles, which is between £2.90 and £4.18, whereas a half litre of Russian beer in one of the Britannica bars (a chain of British-themed ale houses along the lines of Wetherspoons) will leave your pocket a lot less stressed at around 130 rubles (£1.51).

Naturally, beer purchased from supermarkets can be obtained at more economical prices. My favourite Kaliningrad bottle beer, Ostmark (strong), which weighs in at a not inconsiderable 6.7% alcohol by volume ~ rather too strong for my normal preference of 4.5% max, but with more taste than most lager beers ~ costs between 160 rubles and 136 rubles for a 1.35 litre bottle, the price differentiation can be explained by the presence of two small supermarkets close to where we live, one of which is cheaper. In the cheaper supermarket, special offers occur on a daily basis, and I have seen good quality beers in 1.35 litre bottles going for less than a quid. Incidentally, this same supermarket does a good discounted range of quality vodkas as well, from around £2.80 for a 75cl bottle.

Another must for the beer connoisseur and further testimony to the take-up of beer in Kaliningrad specifically and Russia overall are the well-patronised specialist beer-dispensing shops. These establishments offer a wide selection of Russian and imported speciality beers on tap, which once purchased are conveniently decanted into screw-topped 2-litre plastic bottles.

Surprisingly, given its relatively small size, one of our local supermarkets incorporates an outlet of this nature. It stocks around 10 different beers on tap as well as some bottled varieties. The beer is good, both in terms of variety and quality, and is also competitively priced, making this venue a particular favourite of my brothers when he visited us last summer.

Variety of Beer in Kaliningrad

In Russia, beers tend to be grouped into categories determined by their hue: light, red and dark. In restaurants or bars, you will also often be asked whether you want a particular beer to be filtered or unfiltered. Simply translated this means that you have a choice between cosmetic surgery or beer in its natural state.

As the articles which follow deal exclusively with beers that I have been buying at random from our local supermarkets in 1.35l bottles, the light, dark, filtered and unfiltered taxonomy is only relevant insofar as appearance is concerned, and you can only really determine this once the bottle is open and the contents have been poured.

These beers may not be the crème de la crème in the sense that they are supermarket bought, not purchased from craft-beer outlets, but they do have something very important going for them: they have helped to sustain me through the isolating process, and during social distancing have become a much appreciated part of my personal New Normal in the wake of closed bars whilst the dreaded spectre of Coro continues to stalk the land.

😏 Feature image: Mick & Olga Hart enjoying a beer on the terrace at the palatial Residence of the Kings, Kaliningrad, in the pre-coronavirus summer of 2019