Munich's Best Beerhall (Augustiner Braustuben)

Member Name: MykReeve

Product:	Augustiner Braustuben
Date:	24/02/02 (2071 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Superb, reasonably priced food, Good, well priced beer, Efficient service, Friendly patrons

Disadvantages: Location

This was my favourite of the beer halls I visited on my recent trip to Munich. It came highly recommended in the Lonely Planet guidebook, but despite their glowing praise, hadn't become as packed with tourists as many of the city's other halls, and managed to retain a strong atmosphere.

There are three Augustiner beer halls in central Munich; this one, which is located alongside the Augustiner brewery; the Augustiner Keller, on Arnulfstrasse, on the north side of the station; and the Augustiner Grossgaststatte, on the pedestrianised Neufingerstrasse of the Altsadt. Of these three, only the Augustiner Keller has a beer garden - and a particularly large one, at that, seating no less than 5,000!

I visited Munich in Winter, so the lack of beer garden at the Augustiner Bräustuben wasn't much of an issue. Of the three Augustiner beer halls, the Bräustuben was by far the smallest - you could probably pack about 500 people in there, but it would be a hell of a squeeze. Nonetheless, when we visited on a Friday night, although it was busy, it was easy enough to get a seat.

LOCATION

Getting to the Augustiner Bräustuben involves a fairly long walk from the city centre. Heading west along Landsbergerstrasse, the road immediately to the south of the Hauptbahnhof, the beer hall about ten minutes' walk away, on the south side of the road. It's not particularly eyecatching from the outside, but if you're walking along the road after dark, you'll easily identify it as the only place that's still open.

It has to be said that this doesn't feel like a particularly safe walk. More cautious visitors might want to take either tram 18 or 19 west, and get off at the Holzapfelstrasse stop, which is only a few yards east of the entrance to the Bräustuben.

The hall's about as far from a U-Bahn station as you can get in central Munich - about five minutes walk north from Theresienwiese station - or abou
t five minutes walk south from Hackerbrucke S-Bahn station.

LAYOUT

Upon entering, you pass through the usual thick walled curtain just inside the door, to keep the cold winter air out. There are two areas to the Augustiner Bräustuben, a more conventional bar area to the left, and the beer hall proper to the right, up a few stairs. I can't really comment on the bar area, as I only went into the beer hall.

The beer hall is a long hall, which immediately struck me as considerably smaller than the Hofbrauhaus, which was the only other beer hall I'd visited in the city at that time. On the right hand side of the hall, attached to the wall, were huge old barrel lids extending from floor to ceiling. In front of these were a series of long benches pointing out into the room.

On the left hand side was the kitchen area, and beyond it, the bar at which all the beer is dispensed. Between the two, set back a little from the hall, are the entrances to the toilets. Between the toilets is a large display window, through which visitors can peer in at the brewery's Percheron horses, and see the cart that they pull through the city in the Summer.

SERVICE, FOOD AND DRINK

When you enter, just sit wherever there's a space - they don't stand on ceremony here! Check to make sure that there's no sign above the seats saying "Stammtisch" - which means that those seats are reserved for regulars. I don't remembering seeing any Stammtisch spaces in the beer hall of the Bräustuben, but it's best to be aware of the general rule, so as not to upset anyone!

Shortly after sitting, your waitress will rush over with a menu, and a basketful of pretzels. The menu will be in German, so unless you can read German, or fancy a fun game of "food roulette", it might be worth asking for an English one. Evidence that the Augustiner Bräustuben doesn't receive that many non-German visitors was pro
vided by the fact that our waitress took a very un-German while to find the English language menus, and that the prices on it were still printed in Deutsche Marks rather than Euros.

The pretzels cost just 1DM each (about 35p), so it's important to keep track of how many you've had. When your waitress comes over with the bill, when you're ready to leave, she'll ask how many you've had and add them to your bill.

Beer comes in three sizes - "vom Fass" (a half litre stein), "Schnitt" (a half litre stein, but with more head on the beer than you could possibly ever want), and "Mass" (a full litre stein). Essentially, there are three types of Augustiner beer that are available in the beer hall - Edelstoff, the normal light-coloured beer, which you will get by default, if you don't specify which type you want; Hell; and Dunkles, a dark beer. After ordering the beer, the waitress will return with it faster than you would believe humanly possible.

One word of advice though, not many locals seemed to be ordering the Mass size of beer - most seemed happy with the smaller vom Fass steins. There is no financial benefit to choosing the larger size, and it's considerably more unwieldy than the smaller size. Nonetheless, I found that there was something very satisfying about the sheer size of the Mass stein... perhaps I was compensating for something...

I only drank the Edelstoff beer here, which was excellent - very light, with a slightly creamy flavour, which went down very smoothly. A Mass of Edelstoff cost 9DM (about £2.80) - certainly one of the cheapest prices for that quantity of beer in a Munich beer hall. [Hell is fractionally cheaper, and Dunkles is the same price].

The food menu at the Bräustuben was very diverse, and was supplemented by a series of specials up on a chalk board. The specials seemed popular with the locals - two of them got wiped off the board during the
course of the evening, as they sold out. If you're more adventurous than I, or faster with your phrase book, you'd probably do well to give them a try.

The largest chunk of the menu is taken up by "Bavarian specials" - primarily pork dishes, generally served with potato dumpling and a selection of other vegetables. I plumped, however, for the baked Schnitzel. If you've not had Schnitzel before, it essentially consists of a flattened, tenderised pork fillet, covered with breadcrumbs and fried. A Wienerschnitzel (which you will also see on menus), is veal, rather than pork.

The Schnitzel came with a mixed salad, and was priced at 15,50DM (about £4.80). I can honestly say that it was the best meal that I had in Munich. The pork was superbly tender and had a wonderful slightly spicy taste. The salad was crisp, nicely presented, and topped by a light dressing.

After a couple more beers, a dessert seemed like a good idea. The dessert menu isn't exactly massive - only seven options, but most appealing of these is unquestionably the fresh baked apple strudel, a snip at 7,80DM (about £2.40) for a big chunk, served with vanilla ice cream. The strudel was superb - clearly freshly baked with a lovely texture and flavour.

Essentially, everything I ate here made me want more of it - not because it wasn't filling, but because the flavour was so good! The service was also consistently swift and efficient.

ATMOSPHERE

The atmosphere in the Bräustuben was very good, and the locals seemed very friendly. Being seated at long benches inevitably forces you into close proximity with strangers, and the locals I met here were very pleasant company, and enthusiastic about their city.

CONCLUSIONS

The Augustiner Bräustuben offers good beer and superb food, with efficient service, for a very good price. Possibly the only down side is that the beer hall is quite a long way from the city centre,
and it's not a particularly pleasant walk to get there, after dark. Although the Bräustuben gets busy, it's generally fairly easy to get a seat here, even on a Friday evening.

The beer hall has also, unlike some of the city's more central ones, managed to retain something of a traditional atmosphere. Unlike some of the city's more central beer halls, there's no souvenir shop within the hall itself (though you can buy T-shirts or steins if you want to).

It is surprising that more tourists don't make the effort to come out to somewhere like this - particularly given its enthusiastic description in the Lonely Planet guide. I can only assume that it receives more tourists in the Summer - after all, most tourists visiting Munich in Winter are just stopping there on their way to the ski slopes. It's their loss!

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