Oktoberfest at Barleyz

Oktoberfest is the world’s largest beer festival, it is annually held in Muich, Germany. It is a 16 days of celebration with beer which starts of in late September to the first weekend in October, a staggering 6 million people from around the world attend this fest every year. Now the Oktoberfest has been adopted across the cities of India. Did you know that The Guinness world record for beer chugging is held by Steven Petrosino of Pennsylvania, who chugged 1 lt of beer in 1.3 seconds, this record was made in 1977 and even after 37 years his record holds good. Did you know that beer is the world’s oldest prepared beverage i.e. 9500 BC. Do make sure that you have degree in zythology i.e. the study of beer and beer making, yes u read correct zythology is the scientific name given to study of beer and beer making. If you are among one of those people who is afraid of an empty glass then I sorry to be bearer of bad news but you have cenosillicaphobia, which is the fear of an empty glass. There are various number of beer facts that make you want beer more than ever.

Barleyz are among the few that have the pleasure to have their own brewery. Their brewery master Mr Mallieswaran gave us a walk through of their brewery system, he is in this field for the last 25 years. They have a two micro brewery which has a capacity of 500 lts, the first container is where the initial crushing take place and then it is transferred to the second contained for mixing and filtration happen. Once the second container has finished its job, then the batch is again transferred to the first container where it undergoes the heating process. This entire process takes about 8 hours to complete. These completed batches are then sent to the final 1000 lt containers for the end process. Two batches at the micro brewery will fill up one container. This is the process that makes sure that we get proper tasty beer. Here the final removal of yeast, fermentation, etc takes place and the average time for a batch of 1000 lts of beer takes about two weeks to be severed. Barleyz have 10 1000 lts beer containers, this tells you that Barleyz will never send you sober because they will always have beer for you. My experience in Barleyz was as good as Valhalla, Old Vikings heaven. The old Vikings believed that there is a giant goat whose udders provided unlimited supply of beer to them in Valhalla.

Mr Mallieswaran between the Crusher/Mixer unit (right) and Filtration Unit (left)

Crusher and Mixer unit

Filtration Unit

Storage unit

Cleansing process of a beer batch

Storage unit

5 of the 10 storage units

Inside the storage unit

Burrp had prepared a small contest on the Oktoberfest and due to which I learnt a few things more about the fest. My fellow blogger Prateek and Janvi won the contest. The best thing that I learnt during the contest is that, when a contest during Oktoberfest make sure you do anything to win.

(From left ) barleyz special, wheat and sprout

(From left) Sprout, legar, wheat and barleyz special

Barleyz have four different kinds of beers that is severed, those are wheat, barleyz special, sprout and lager.  The wheat and the lager was the mild beer and the barleyz special and sprout is on the strong. The wheat beer was not heavy but it has an abundant taste of wheat and it is the perfect beer for me to start off with. The lager is not my favourite beer but this beer had a distinct taste that enabled me to enjoy it to an extent of more than a taste. The sprout has a strong aroma to the beer but the after taste was an enjoyable dark roasted chocolate, which made me like this beer. The barleyz special was a joy to my mouth with its different and unique taste that made me have two mugs of it. I would rate the wheat beer 7, the lager beer 6, the sprout 8 and the barleyz special a perfect 10 on a scale of 10. The reason I am giving the barleyz special a perfect score is due to the unique taste, the taste is new and very good.

Chicken wings

Pork Ribs

Fish

Spring rolls

Now it time for the starters. The starters were on the sweeter side due to which I could have more. The dish that stood out as a starter for me was the pork, the pork was also sweet but after a bite or two the taste of a perfectly cooked pork makes a lot of difference to me and this exceptionally went well with the wheat beer. The second dish that I loved was the chilli chicken, this was my first time that I had a chilli chicken that was sweet in the beginning but that left an after taste of the chillies in my mouth and this went well with the Barleyz special. The dish that went well with the sprout was the paneer, the paneer was well cooked but not well blended with the dish but due to this the paneer enriched the after chocolate taste after each sip.

The nalli pepper soup was excellent , it reminded me of the home cooked soup with a slightly different taste. The taste made the difference in the soup, it helped me to sober a bit and make some room for the main course. I had the aloo mutter, fish tikka with some biryani, this was after a long time that I actually drank more but ate less. The spread for buffet was vast from soups and salads to main course and deserts, I saw a lot of things but I could eat much. I hope you come twice, once to fill your self with beer and the second time for the food.

Barleyz has a unique touch which enables one to enjoy the beer, music, the company and the food all at the same time. Do visit Barleyz during the Oktoberfest to enjoy Valhalla like a Viking. The roof top was closed due to the rain but it looked liked “the place” to enjoy the beers with a couple of friends and just enjoy the movement.

I thank Burrp who enable me to visit Valhalla in Bangalore.