Privatbrauerei Klute

I won a minor victory today as we headed off to a nearby brewery for lunch. Klute's feels like it's in the middle of nowhere, being set in a little grouping of buildings off a main road near Havixbeck, west of Münster. I'd tried their beer before, but to be honest, I couldn't remember the flavours when I got there, so I was looking forward to checking them all out.

Walking in, the view to the right is dominated by the large coppers, and an open bar area right in front of you. On Sunday, at least, you can either pop upstairs for an open buffet meal or stay on the ground floor for table service, which is what we did, mainly so I could ogle the maturation vessels and the archaic-looking bottling device in a room beside the coppers.

It has a relatively large room, and is open, simple but cosy. The food choices were pretty standard fare for around here, although a couple of their items were complete meat-fests that I was almost tempted by. As it was, I stayed simple and ordered Schweinefilet with fried mushrooms and a bearnaise sauce and potato gratin (all very tasty), while my wife had a humongous shrimp salad. On the beer menu it listed Klute's own Landbier, Hell, Dunkel and Sommerweizen.

I opened up with the Klute's Hell, a hazy, golden straw coloured beer with a dense fluffy head. It's quite tart and refreshing, It has a soft malty base, but a citric hop element really dominates, making it almost lemony. A slight resiny, herbal edge comes in towards the back, with a relatively dry finish, but the lasting impression is lemons. One could say it was slightly thin, but the sharpness and dry finish make this quite a refresher. Checking my previous post now, I'm glad it seems to have had the same impression from bottle or tap.

The Klute's Landbier -- or Dunkel, see below -- came next, posessing soft caramel and light chocolate flavours, but like the Hell, it has a citric edge. It also has a slightly fruity undertone, suggestive of mango or strawberry sorbet. Highly carbonated, it's spritzy on the tongue, all adding to the light, refreshing character, and a head that never dissipates.

I enjoyed both of these beers, but the Landbier gives a little more complexity.

Although I wasn't expecting to be able to buy the Sommerweizen, I was surprised when I was told that the Landbier and Dunkel were the same thing, even though they were listed separately on the menu. I also tried buying bottles of the three on the menu, but was told the same thing, so I ended up coming away with a litre bottle of each of the Hell and Landbier (AKA, Dunkel on the in-house menu). Oh well.

Being a Sunday there didn't seem to be anyone to drill about the brewery operations, but I did learn that they brew every 10 days or so, and no, the public can't come in. I should have pulled my journalists ID *cough*.

Klute's has a small distillary on site, but unfortunately that was closed, but there is a photo of the still on their website. Opening times are limited at the moment, but I expect that in summer it'll be more open, and from what I heard, they do some seasonal beers. A return is expected.

My son had the Malzbier and said it was delicious. From the way he practically climbed into the glass to get the last drops I think we have a malt-head on our hands.