Kloster Andechs: And Blessed Be Thy Beer

Kloster Andechs occupies a central place in the pantheon of German brewing. Founded by Benedictine monks in 1455, Kloster Andechs has been offering hospitality to weary pilgrims ever since. Now run by the Benedictine Abbey of St. Boniface in Munich, Kloster Andechs is the largest of the handful of bona fide monastery breweries remaining in Germany. It’s also one of the few regional German breweries with beers reliably available this side of the pond. (Even if you haven’t already tried the beers of Kloster Andechs, you’d probably recognize the label depicting a Baroque monastery surrounded by greenery.) Though Kloster Andechs still welcomes upwards of one hundred organized pilgrimage groups per year, the monastery plays host to scores more people who make the trek for a different reason: the world-class beer.

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We had arrived in Frieding, a quiet village southwest of Munich set amid rolling hills and lush farmland, after a walk up a narrow road through the woods leading out of Herrsching on the sparkling Ammersee. Thirsty from the walk, we ensconced ourselves in the beer garden at Gasthof zum Queri, an inn on the pilgrimage route to Kloster Andechs, and rested up for our journey the following day.

The morning dawned warm, sheaves of wheat waving in the breeze. We set out along a path trodden by so many before us, some in search of salvation, others in search of libation. We skirted farmers’ fields and an emerald-green meadow dotted with bright red poppies before passing through a stand of trees that opened out onto a vast clearing. There, looming up in front of us, a sight we immediately recognized: the Kloster Andechs monastery perched on a glacial moraine rising up from plain, framed by the Alps towering up like a mirage in the hazy distance.

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From Holy Land to Holy Mountain

If Count Rasso of Diessen hadn’t been an adventurous soul, there would have been no holy relics to attract pilgrims, no monastery, and no beer. It all started with Rasso’s own tenth-century journey to the Holy Land, where he came into possession of relics reputedly from Christ’s crucifixion, including a thorn from Christ’s crown of thorns, a piece of the veil Veronica used to wipe Christ’s face, and even a piece of the cross. After his death, the relics were installed in a fortress atop what residents of the region now call the Holy Mountain, home of today’s Kloster Andechs, for safekeeping from marauding enemy forces.

The fortress at Andechs eventually became the seat of Rasso’s descendants, emerging as a magnet for pilgrims in the twelfth century when Berthold II obliged his subjects to journey to Andechs once per year to venerate the relics. With pilgrims flocking to the site, a collegiate church was built to tend to the visitors’ spiritual needs. But it wasn’t until 1455, when the Benedictine monks of Tegernsee replaced the Augustine canons atop the Holy Mountain at the behest of Duke Albrecht III, that beer began to flow. Pilgrims soon became the beneficiaries of more than spiritual sustenance, for hospitality was a founding tenet of the Benedictine order.

A Brief History of Benedictine Hospitality

The Benedictine monks have been extending hospitality to travelers since the earliest days of the Middle Ages. Beer was a staple of that hospitality. Indeed, the currents of the Benedictine brewing tradition course deeply through European history. It was the Benedictines who ran the famous monastic brewery in St. Gallen during the ninth century, an impressive example of monastic beer culture that heralded modern brewing.

Benedictine monks were uniquely positioned to foster the development of brewing culture, enjoined as they were by the Rule of St. Benedict to live by the work of their hands. In practice, that meant that monks could dedicate themselves wholeheartedly to pursuits like the craft of brewing or cheesemaking. Unlike the peasants of the time who brewed beer sporadically in the village brewery, the brewing monks amassed experience by brewing on an almost daily basis. Monks were also among the few during the Middle Ages who could read and write. They recorded their brewing observations and experience, sharing their written and oral knowledge with other monasteries. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say that they were the first professionals of their trade, an enviable situation that allowed the brewing monks at Andechs and elsewhere to flourish right up to the rise of industrial capitalism.

And thrive the good monks of Andechs did. Thanks to both the popularity of the pilgrimage and the Benedictine’s skillful provisioning of the pilgrims, not even the upheavals of the Reformation or the Thirty Years’ War could knock the monks off their stride. The monastery and its brewery prospered, so much so that the monks were able to remodel their church in the Baroque style in 1712. The secularization of the Napoleonic era put an end to monastic activities across Bavaria, but the pilgrims and their beer were of too much regional economic importance to let lapse. Private owners continued to run the brewery and inn.

As it turned out, the monks’ hiatus behind the brew kettles proved temporary. King Ludwig I acquired the monastery in 1846, intending it to be the economic driver of an abbey he envisioned and eventually founded in Munich in 1850, the Abbey of St. Boniface. To this day, the monks of Andechs finance the charitable work of the abbey in Munich with their business enterprises in accordance with King Ludwig’s founding charter. The brewery is the largest of these enterprises, but the monks also distill schnapps, make cheese, and bake bread with the spent grains from brewing. There’s also a butcher shop on the grounds of the monastery.

Latter-Day Beer Pilgrims to Kloster Andechs

Though Kloster Andechs is still a popular religious site, beer pilgrims are legion, especially on a sunny weekend. Laden with picnic baskets or backpacks, these latter day pilgrims flock to Herrsching from Munich on just about any sunny weekend. Do as they do and catch a taxi or bus up the Holy Mountain, or opt for a hike from the shores of the sparkling Ammersee. There are fewer better ways to work up a thirst.

Once atop the hill, you can stop in to admire the opulent Baroque church (where Carl Orff of Carmina Burana fame is interred), or just make a beeline to the two thousand places reserved for aficionados of Kloster Andechs’ liquid bread: the Andechser Bräustüberl with its long hall, its spacious Waapensaal, and a room with an impressive vaulted ceiling; the sun terrace with its spectacular view of the Alps; or the leafy beer garden in the shadow of the church.

The Beers of Kloster Andechs

The Andechser Bräustüberl doesn’t serve the entire line of Kloster Andechs beers, but it occasionally serves seasonal beers available on site only (like the unfiltered Dunkel they had tapped in December 2019) in addition to the three beers typically on draft.

Start off with the Andechser Spezial Helles, a rich and flavourful beer reminiscent of freshly cut bread balanced by a subtle herbal hop cone note. Elegant, with graham cracker malt sweetness balanced by spicy hops and a beguiling hint of slate-like minerality reminiscent of stone fruit and a whiff of sulfur. Two Tankards

Follow that up with the satisfying Andechser Weissbier Hell featuring intense clove and banana custard with cinnamon, brown sugar, crême brûlée, and floral perfume in the background. Its creamy effervescence makes it ideal for warm days in the beer garden spent gazing languidly at Kloster Andechs’ baroque church tower. Two Tankards

The dark copper Andechser Doppelbock Dunkel with its fiery ruby red highlights is one of the best there is — rich and luscious, like a loaf of black bread studded with figs and dried dark cherry, and spiked with dark chocolate. Elegant spice aromas mingling cinnamon, anise, and cardamom add complexity. Pleasantly effervescent, it’s robust yet velvety, strong and yet pleasantly malty. Three Tankards

All of these beers go wonderfully with the food on sale at the kiosk in the Andechser Bräustüberl, which continues the monastic tradition of provisioning travelers with hearty local specialties, including massive pork knuckles, crispy roast pork in its juices, sausages from the onsite butcher, and freshly baked pretzels. Pull up a seat in one of the rustic rooms, or let your gaze wander from the Zugspitze to the Kreuzspitze when the weather’s fine.

One final note before you head down the hill: As noted above, Kloster Andechs is run by the Benedictine Abbey of St. Boniface in Munich. The order funds its charitable endeavours from the proceeds of the latter-day pilgrims who climb the Holy Mountain to wash down Bavarian classics with Kloster Andechs’ beer. All the more reason to drink up!

Odds and Ends / Getting to Kloster Andechs

*The S8 S-Bahn train runs from central Munich to Herrsching every twenty minutes. The trip takes about an hour.

*Kloster Andechs offers tours of the brewery, but these tours are fairly standard affairs that don’t rise to the status of memorable. No photography permitted.

*You could do what most people do and walk from Herrsching straight to Kloster Andechs. But if you have some time on your hands, consider staying a night in the quiet village of Frieding with its excellent inn, Der Obere Wirt zum Queri. Bonus: they serve the entire line of Kloster Andechs beers. From there, it’s a flat 5-km walk through meadows and fields along the historical pilgrimage route to Kloster Andechs. Buses to Frieding don’t run on weekends and holidays. That leaves you a few choices: arrive on a weekday so you can catch the bus (just be sure to check departure times in advance), or take a taxi. You could also stay the night in Herrsching (a fine option) and do it all in reverse: hike from Herrsching to Frieding via Kloster Andechs, then get a bus or taxi back to the S-Bahn station in Herrsching.

Sources:

“Wallfahrtsort und Wirtschaftsbetrieb: Interview mit Pater Valentin Ziegler vom Kloster Andechs,” Monumente: Magazin für Denkmalkultur in Deutschland, 2015.

Astrid Becker, “Wallfahrt zu den brauenden Mönchen,” Süddeutsche Zeitung (ed.), Mir san Bier: Braukunst und Biergärten in und um München (Munich: 2013).

All images by Franz D. Hofer.

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Klosterbrauerei Weissenohe: Where Malty Beers Fit For Monks Meet Dry-Hopped Ales

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©2020 Franz D. Hofer and A Tempest in a Tankard. All rights reserved.

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