Beer and Sausage, and Beer…and Sausage…and Sausage, and Beer

IDsteve, 19 February 2013 AT 02:02 AM

If you’re hungry or thirsty in Germany, well, you don’t have much of a choice. You drink beer. You eat sausage. And that’s just how it is.

Sure, German cuisine has started to become adventurous with the influx of immigrants—particularly evident in the prevalence of currywurst and doner kebab shops—but this is a national diet that has and always will be built firmly on the staples: beer and sausage.

The average German gulps down 116 liters (or 31 gallons) of beer every year, and consumes more than 60 pounds (27 kilos) of sausage. While there are 1500 varieties of sausage produced in Germany (who would have guessed there were so many different ways to put meat in a thin casing?), the heavy hitters here include wurstchen, or tiny cocktail-like sausages often used as snacks or appetizers, and bratwurst, a heartier meal staple. Salami cold cuts are also huge here, often as a part of breakfast.

On the beverage side of things, Germans are masters of the craft of brewing. The home of a huge variety of beers—alt, bock, dunkel, kölsch, lager, malzbier, pils and weizenbier—it is no surprise that beer is often cheaper than water here. It’s perfectly normal to see some brands of beer sold in supermarkets for just a few cents a bottle.

So eat well and drink heartily while you’re here—just make sure you learn to like sausage and beer.