Josef Groll (21 August 1813 – 22 November 1887) was a

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total l ...

brewer Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with yeast. It may be done in a brewery by a commercial brewer ...

, best known for being the first brewer of

Pilsner Pilsner (also pilsener or simply pils) is a type of pale lager. It takes its name from the Bohemian city of Plzeň (german: Pilsen), where the world's first pale lager (now known as Pilsner Urquell) was produced in 1842 by Pilsner Urquell Bre ...

beer. He is sometimes called "the Father of the Pilsner". The world's first-ever

pale lager Pale lager is a very pale-to- golden-colored lager beer with a well- attenuated body and a varying degree of noble hop bitterness. The brewing process for this beer developed in the mid-19th century, when Gabriel Sedlmayr took pale ale bre ...

Pilsner Urquell Pilsner Urquell (; cs, Plzeňský prazdroj ) is a lager beer brewed by the Pilsner Urquell Brewery in Plzeň (German name: Pilsen), Czech Republic. Pilsner Urquell was the world's first pale lager, and its popularity meant it was much copied ...

was highly successful, and served as the inspiration for more than two-thirds of the beer produced in the world today.Brewery tour of Pilsner Urquell
University of Economics Prague

Brewing the first pilsner

In the late 1830s the people of Pilsen,

Kingdom of Bohemia The Kingdom of Bohemia ( cs, České království),; la, link=no, Regnum Bohemiae sometimes in English literature referred to as the Czech Kingdom, was a medieval and early modern monarchy in Central Europe, the predecessor of the modern Czec ...

started to prefer less expensive imported

bottom-fermented Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and #Fermenting, fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with Yeast#Beer, yeast. It may be done in a brewery ...

beers to local

top-fermented Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with yeast. It may be done in a brewery by a commercial brewer ...

beers. As a result, many of top-fermented beers from Pilsen were not being sold fast enough, got spoiled and the casks had to be poured out. In 1839 the burghers with brewing rights decided to build a new brewery capable of producing a

bottom-fermented beer Brewing is the production of beer by steeping a starch source (commonly cereal grains, the most popular of which is barley) in water and fermenting the resulting sweet liquid with yeast. It may be done in a brewery by a commercial brew ...

with a longer storage life. At the time, this was termed a

n beer, since bottom-fermentation were popular mostly in Bavaria. For bottom-fermentation it is necessary to keep the fermentation tanks cool between 4 and 9 degrees Celsius. The climate in Bohemia is similar to that in Bavaria making it possible to store winter ice and sustain bottom-fermentation year-round. Joseph-Groll-Büste in Vilshofen an der Donau

Joseph-Groll-Büste in Vilshofen an der Donau

The burghers of Pilsen not only built a new brewery, but also hired Josef Groll, a Bavarian brewer with lager-brewing experience. Josef Groll's father owned a brewery in Vilshofen in

Lower Bavaria Lower Bavaria (german: Niederbayern, Bavarian: ''Niedabayern'') is one of the seven administrative regions of Bavaria, Germany, located in the east of the state. Geography Lower Bavaria is subdivided into two regions () – Landshut and Donau-W ...

and had long experimented with new recipes for

beer. On 5 October 1842, Groll brewed the first batch of '' Urquell'' beer. The use of soft Pilsen water, barley

malt Malt is germinated cereal grain that has been dried in a process known as " malting". The grain is made to germinate by soaking in water and is then halted from germinating further by drying with hot air. Malted grain is used to make beer, w ...

prepared in indirectly heated English-style kiln and

Saaz hops Saaz is a "noble" variety of hops. It was named after the Czech city of Žatec (german: Saaz). This hop is used extensively in Bohemia to flavor beer as the Czech pilsener. Saaz hops accounted for more than of total 2009 hop production in the Cze ...

, resulted in golden color and herbal, floral taste. The new beer was first served on 11 November 1842 and was very well received by the local populace. The demand for the Pilsner beer grew strongly. Soon the brewery expanded and started to export to many countries. Josef Groll's contract with the brewery ended on 30 April 1845. Groll returned to Vilshofen and later inherited his father's brewery.

Death

Josef Groll died on 22 November 1887, aged 74, of a heart attack in the house of his daughter Kathi Hutter in

Vilshofen Vilshofen an der Donau is a town in the German district of Passau. Demographics Religion The population of Vilshofen is predominantly Christian. In Vilshofen there is a Catholic Church, a Protestant Church and a new Apostolic Church. 78.36% ...

Brewery

The Groll brewery no longer exists. Parts of the brewery, however, were acquired by ''Wolferstetter'', another brewery located in Vilshofen. ''Wolferstetter'' still produces a ''Josef Groll Pils''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Groll, Josef 1813 births 1887 deaths People from Vilshofen an der Donau People from the Kingdom of Bavaria German brewers