Although craft beers (amatalus, kraftiņš, craft beer, tasty beer) have been around in Latvia for at least 5 years (not counting even longer in specialised shops and among homebrewers), the general public’s understanding of beer styles is still very limited.

As the trees shed their leaves and the air becomes cooler and more humid, light and sparkling styles lose their charm and it’s worth turning to maltier beers.

The use of wooden vessels at different stages of the brewing process is not a recent innovation.

A short excursion into the history and etymology of honey fermentation in the Latvian territory, with the aim of starting a discussion on consistent terminology in modern Latvian on issues related to the use of honey in brewing.

It used to be simple. You say “beer” and they pour you a beer – that’s it, no interrogation! But what about now?

There’s not much to write – we’ll tell it all and show it with moving pictures.

PAGAN BREWS best describes what we, as LABIETIS Brewery, represent on the beer world stage on the threshold of our tenth anniversary.

Continuing the theme of beer’s relationship with wooden vessels, the next point to highlight is the ability of a wooden cask to allow the beer it contains to breathe a little.

It is not known exactly where and when the first Berliner Weisse was brewed, but there are rumours…

Continuing on the topic of foreign words, let’s briefly and concretely distinguish between eil and lager.

Miķeļi is the celebration of the fertile part of the year. Cereals should be cut, but potatoes and other roots should be kept in the cellar.

It is time to go back to our roots. Celebrating Midsummer is not a static exercise of sitting and eating. It is movement.

Time to sacrifice to the fertility god Usi! Our ancestors sacrificed eggs, onion skins, feathers, bones, money pieces and red woolen yarn to open the gates of fertility.

What’s not here! There are no tips on how to dye eggs. No tips on what to do with boiled eggs after the feast. And there are no recipes composed in the temple cloister.

Spring is in the air. The days are getting longer. And the sun is rising higher again. It’s time to celebrate Metheni, go visiting and masquerade.