Dutch beer

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The former Heineken brewery in Amsterdam, now a museum

The Netherlands are famous for their lager beers, especially Amstel and Heineken, which are well known all over the world. Amstel is the leading import light beer in the U.S.. Heineken is the world's fourth-largest brewer of beer, after InBev, Anheuser-Busch and SABMiller. Interesting is that Heineken is marketed as a premium beer for exporting, while it is regarded as the lowest denominator in the Netherlands itself.^{[citation needed]}

While pils makes up the majority of beer production and consumption (95% according to the Centraal Brouwerij Kantoor), most Dutch brewers also brew specials. Commonest is Bok, brewed in Autumn and Spring, a tradition closely related to German Bock beer.

The Netherlands exports the largest proportion of beer of any country in the world - approximately 50% of production, according to The Brewers of Europe. In 2004 almost 13 million hectolitres were exported out of a total production of 23 million.

[edit] Beer culture

The beer culture in Netherlands is a bit different from, for example, Belgium and Germany. Beer is regarded as either a delicacy or just a way to get drunk, the latter being predominant among youngsters who are allowed to consume alcohol from age 16. Pils is the most consumed type of beer in the Netherlands. Other popular beers are mostly imported from Belgium. There are many places for the hard-core beerlovers like beershops (Berts Bierhuis in Utrecht, Bieren en Pintelieren in Eindhoven, De Bierkoning in Amsterdam) and pubs with large stocks of different beers (Cafe België, Utrecht; Café De Wildeman, Amsterdam; Café Samson, Nijmegen; 't Arendsnest, Amsterdam). Good beer in the Netherlands is often regarded to be higher in rank than most wines, opposed to countries such as France or the UK where beer is often still seen as a workers' drink.

[edit] Breweries

There are four main brewery companies in the Netherlands: Heineken (which also brews Amstel), Grolsch, Bavaria and Inbev. According to the Centraal Brouwerij Kantoor, Heineken has around 50% of the market and the other three 15% each. Between them, the large companies operate eight breweries. In addition to the multinationals, there are five independent lager breweries and around forty five small, new microbreweries and brewpubs. A dozen other companies own no brewing plant themselves and have their beers brewed by third parties, either in the Netherlands or Belgium. The new breweries mostly brew top-fermenting beers roughly similar to those from Belgium, though there are also examples of British-style ales and traditional lagers.