A Pub Where You Serve Your Own Beer (365 Ways With Words)

It would be fair to say that beer drinking everywhere is a popular activity, for Czechs drinking beer is a favourite national pastime. Czechs top the international league of beer drinkers. On average they drink 148.6 per capita per year (and that includes babies, prisoners and the tea-total!) and it's not hard to believe when one sees how they put it away.

It would be unfair to say that Czechs are alcoholics. Admittedly some do have poor alcohol management, but most appreciate that beer and alcohol in general is merely the oil in the engine of social intercourse, and that meeting and talking is really what it's all about.

In general, Czechs do not drink to get drunk, but they accept that it is at times inevitable; in much the same way that drivers do not drive in order to buy new tyres, but know that to own a car means to also account for new tyres. Czechs drink in the understanding that they'll sometimes (or regularly) have one- (or two-) too-many.

The pivnice (pron. 'piv-nees'), or pub, has become central to Czech culture over the years as more than a place to drink, but also to think and even say anything: before 1989 a good pub was a friendly social venue free from the shackles of communist state control.

The best pubs are the pivovars, essentially brewhouses where the beer is made and accompanied by food (or is it the other way around?). Czechs recognise quality beer when they taste it, and eagerly seek it out at these microbreweries.

But Czechs also drink tea. A čajovna is a tea room, but with a difference. Unlike it's rather stuffy British counterpart with bone china cups and doilies on the cake stand, a čajovna is more of a speakeasy, a place decked out in cushions under low-level lighting, where shoes are removed and the appley smoke of a hookah is shared. Czechs will while away whole afternoons in intimate conversation at such places, but essentially they hold the same purpose—to facilitate relaxed social exchange.

The writer is currently researching Czech beer drinking for an upcoming book on wider Czech culture, and as such has had to visit many-a pub and sample many a-brew. This onerous task has had its upside and many pleasant surprises have been met along the way. Colourful characters abound, their words and behaviour augmented by degree through consumption of their tipple. Of course, truly great beers have been sampled, at amazing locations, and wonderful evenings have been had. But some of the best surprises have been the pubs themselves. Such was the Mamut café in Brno.

Basically a cellar bar, the Mamut café is a large pub with a difference: the patrons pour the Pilsner Urquell themselves. This gimmick revolves around the taps being placed at the tables, and the drinkers deciding how many pints they want to pour. What adds a certain Czech panache to the occasion, is that the TV screens dotted around the cellar displayed the total volume of beer poured per table, making this activity an inter-table challenge! As may be expected, this popular pivnice is frequented by party groups, such as the bachelor/bachelorette party there last night.

This concept works well in principle, but there were a few problems, unclean taps being the most obvious. If a beer tap is not daily cleaned then it attracts the growth of bacteria making the beer sour and potentially poisonous. Such was the explosively emitted first pint. Essentially undrinkable, much of this first pour was drained into the tabletop drain under the tap. The second, the taps having the benefit of a flush, fared better.

It worked well as a gimmick, and the Mamut café is a must-visit on a beer tourist's itinerary, but for socially-minded Czechs it might be just too much. For one thing, it's not cheap at 78 Kč/€2.79 per litre (yes, that may be quite acceptable by international standards, but not in deepest darkest Moravia). Czechs also like to be served, particularly at table, and apart from delivering the glasses and taking a food order and payment, the waiter did little waiting.