If there’s one thing the Bulgarians do really well, it’s beer. Just as well, really, because it’s everywhere and very good it is, too. Despite the price rises since Bulgaria’s accession to the EU, beer still remains reassuringly, almost embarrassingly cheap, but this is no reflection on the quality of the product, which is to say that Bulgarian beer is some of the nicest I’ve ever tasted. I’ve done extensive research into this, so that is no mere sweeping statement.
In Veliko Turnovo the local beer is Boliarka, and if you’ve driven through the town you’ll be familiar with the big yellow brewery. They’ve been brewing there since 1892, and unlike some other brands which have been bought over by multinational companies such as Heineken (in the case of Zagorka), Boliarka is still owned and run by Bulgarians. The name is a reference to the women who surrounded the king, known in Bulgarian as the Boliarka.
Some years ago, some bright spark had the idea of painting the huge silos of the brewery like beer cans, which is just about the best advertising strategy I’ve ever seen. The enormous cans surround the building and can be seen for miles, and they depict each type of beer brewed within, including Kaltenberg, a German beer now brewed in the Boliarka Brewery under licence.
The tour of the brewery starts underneath these great monoliths, and takes you through the various stages of brewing. The entire factory is automated, so there are only a few people milling around, making sure the machines are working, I suppose. I saw one lady who had the job of straightening all the plastic bottles before they went through the labelling machine, which seemed like a necessary but altogether thankless task.
It turns out that the giant cans on the outside are misleading. Sale of canned beer makes up only a tiny proportion of the market, less than draft and glass bottles. Way out in front, with a massive 60 per cent share, is the plastic bottles. In the UK, anything in a plastic bottle is considered somewhat cheap and second rate, but in Bulgaria plastic is by far the norm. This perhaps goes some way to account for the lower price of beer, although the disadvantages perhaps outweigh the advantages. Once opened, a plastic bottle won’t keep its fizz overnight, although not everyone will find the necessity to drink two litres of beer in one sitting a problem. The real issue is surely the environmental cost, as all these plastic bottles clog up the landfills the length and breadth of the country.
That said, by far the most impressive part of the tour was the “blowing machine”. It does exactly what it says on the tin. The plastic bottles are delivered as “preforms” and look like little test tubes. One by one they pass through a machine where a single jet of air is blasted into them transforming them, as if by magic, into fully-fledged bottles. You can see the bottles enter the machine at one end, hear the jet of air, then see them emerge from their chrysalis a moment later; that you can’t see the moment when they are blasted with air seems to add to the sense of illusion. Another mechanical highlight of the trip is the bottling machine, but sadly this was malfunctioning the day of our visit.
But perhaps the real highlight of the tour isn’t mechanical at all, but the very thing which attracts people to visit the brewery in the first place: the beer. The tasting room is on the top of the main building, where there is also a little museum of historical objects used in the manufacture of beer. I must confess I skipped over these pretty quickly, as within sight of them was a table laid out with plates of cold meat, cheese and hunks of bread, as well as an invitingly abundant array of glasses.
You get to try four different beers. My personal favourite was the Boliarka Weiss, a white beer made with the German market in mind. I’ve not seen it on sale in any bars yet, but the tour guide assured me that you can buy it in Metro.
Overall, it’s pretty hard to get excited about the workings of the brewery, especially when you know there’s a beer waiting for you at the end of it. Even so, the tour is informative and enjoyable, and the tour guide was friendly and eager to answer questions. The tasting at the end is relaxed and unhurried, like beer drinking always should be.
The tour can be organised through Heart of Bulgaria for 10 leva per person, plus an additional group administration fee of 10 leva.
