The head brewmaster for Weihenstephan, the world’s oldest brewery, harbors a surprising secret: he has a fondness for alcohol-free beer. Though he readily admits his preference for traditional beer, Tobias Zollo finds himself reaching for alcohol-free options during work or lunch breaks, appreciating the similar taste but reduced calorie content. This is all thanks to the brewery’s unique process of evaporating the alcohol.
“You can’t drink beer every day — unfortunately,” Zollo quipped last week at the Bavarian state brewery located in Freising, roughly 20 miles north of Munich.
Zollo isn’t an outlier in his preference. Alcohol-free beer has been on the rise in recent years, coinciding with a general decline in beer consumption. At Weihenstephan, which was founded as a brewery in 1040 by Benedictine monks, non-alcoholic wheat beer and lager now constitute 10% of their production volume. This shift, noticeable since the brewery began offering alcohol-free options in the 1990s, echoes broader trends in Germany’s beer industry.
“The people are unfortunately — I have to say that as a brewer — unfortunately drinking less beer,” Zollo remarked on Friday, just a day before the official kickoff of Oktoberfest. “If there’s an alternative to have the crisp and fresh taste of a typical Weihenstephan beer, but in a non-alcoholic version, we want to provide that.”
Remarkably, even Oktoberfest — arguably the world’s most renowned celebration of alcohol — now features alcohol-free beer. Throughout the festival’s 16 days, 16 out of the 18 large tents offer this sober alternative. While the price remains the same as its alcoholic counterpart — between 13.60 and 15.30 euros ($15.12 and $17.01) for a 1-liter mug — it offers the benefit of avoiding a hangover.
“For people who don’t like to drink alcohol and want to enjoy Oktoberfest as well, I think it’s a good option,” said Mikael Caselitz, 24, of Munich, inside one of the festival’s tents on Saturday. “Sometimes people feel like they have more fun with alcohol, which is not a good thing because you can also have fun without alcohol.” He added, “If you want to come and drink alcohol-free beer, nobody will judge you.”
This year also saw the debut of Munich’s first alcohol-free beer garden. Named “Die Null,” which translates to “the zero” in German, it offered non-alcoholic beer, mocktails, and other alcohol-free drinks near the city’s main train station this summer, though it was scheduled to close just before Oktoberfest began.
Walter König, managing director of the Society of Hop Research north of Munich, noted that researchers have had to develop special hop varieties for alcohol-free beer. Using typical hops in the brewing process for alcohol-free beer often results in a loss of the distinct aroma when the alcohol is removed.
But König believes customers are mostly concerned with taste. “They only want to know that what they are tasting is as good as traditional beers with alcohol,” he stated as he prepared for Oktoberfest.
