The “New” Brazilian Beer Culture
What do you know about Brazilian beers?
Do you know something about Brazilian beer culture?
That´s why i´m here to explain what really happens here, but I must tell you about the big breweries first; you´ll find their beers everywhere you go in Brazil.
I live in São Paulo (Brazilian southeast), probably the richest city of Brazil. The big breweries dominate the beer market here, with the famous beers in Brazil being: Skol, Brahma, Kaiser, Nova Schin… (all lagers). We are in a hot country, and refreshing beer has a high level of demand and sales.
Last week, Google released a list of the most popular brands in Brazil, and beer was actually a leader in 2010 with the brands Skol Beer and Devassa Beer. Skol has been the number 1 selling beer over the last few years, but Devassa started as a craft beer from Rio de Janeiro and was later bought by Schincariol Brewery in 2007. Devassa beer later became famous in 2010 for their publicity featuring Paris Hilton (it´s true!).
The name of this post is the “new” beer culture in Brazil, because in the last five years there has been a huge growth of homebrewers, which has brought us a new mindset about the flavors and aromas of beer, especially for a public so accustomed to lagers. The growth of craft beer in Brazil is huge, and the daily battle with the big breweries is very much like that in the rest of the world.
We have a lot of places like pubs, bars, beer stores, and even supermarkets that sell craft beers – relatively few labels like Baden Baden (from Campos do Jordão city – my last post), Eisenbahn (from Blumenau city), and Devassa (Rio de Janeiro city).
We have other good microbreweries here like Colorado (Ribeirão Preto city), Bamberg (Votorantim city), Falke Bier (Belo Horizonte city), and much more, even if they aren’t as easy to find.
Last month, Stephen Beaumont (Canadian beer writer) came to Brazil and went to Festival Brasileiro de Cerveja (Brazilian Beer Festival) in Blumenau City, and he talked with a Brazilian beer TV program – Venenosa TV (by the way, they have a school brewery call Bode Brown, but I´ll talk about that in another post).
Check the interview with Stephen Beaumont talking about brazilian craft beers and the future of brazilian beers.
There is plenty to talk about with this new culture of beer in Brazil, and I will continue telling you all news as well as some of the background of this story.
Cheers!
Raphael Rodrigues
Beer Sommelier
Have questions? Write me:
allbeersbr@gmail.com
All Beers (my beer blog in portuguese!)
3 Comments to “The “New” Brazilian Beer Culture”
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I first heard of Eisenbahn on the podcast Craft Beer Radio. And I have een lucky enough to taste them at the Great British Beer Festival. Excellent beer.
[...] from Ratebeer members as of late: everything from awesome poetry (Dr. Seuss-style, no less), to dispatches from Brazil, to upcoming voices that might very well find a steady home at The Hop Press. I dig that, and I [...]