Latvia
Breweries on the map
Cēsu alus
The audit of Cēsis Castle mentions brewing as early as 1590: the birth certificate of Cēsu alus, considered the oldest brewery in the Baltic and Nordic countries. From the medieval castle to the historic buildings raised in 1878 by Count von Sievers, then to the modern plant opened in 2001 within Finland's Olvi group, the house kept growing until becoming, since 2014, Latvia's largest beer producer. Lagers, dark beers, ciders and kvass roll off its lines today, a few steps from the castle and old town of Cēsis, one of the loveliest stops in Vidzeme.
Malduguns
Malduguns — "the will-o'-the-wisp" — flickered to life in 2013 in Rauna's former bakery, when three companions from Latvia's homebrew scene, Andris Liepiņš, Krišjānis Zeļģis and Valdis Jansons, decided to pool their kettles. A pioneer of national craft, listed in its very first year among RateBeer's hundred best brewers in the world, the Vidzeme house cultivates small-scale craftsmanship and quiet experimentation: the American pale ale Cilpa turned classic, the Zaļā Bise single-hop series with its twenty-odd variations, the mighty roasted-malt Tumšā Puse, down to braggots with Smiltene honey and Brett mixed fermentations. The spark that lasts.
Piebalgas alus
Founded in 1989, on the eve of the Soviet collapse, in the county of Piebalga — reputedly Latvia's most ecologically pristine — the Jaunpiebalga brewery was built around the legendary brewmaster Gunārs Barviķis, creator of dozens of recipes including the famous dark Sātans of the 1990s. Faithful to the 1516 Reinheitsgebot and the brewers' code of honour, it remains one of the rare Latvian houses to practise open fermentation, with a unique house yeast preciously preserved at the Latvia University of Agriculture. Its rounded, living lagers, including the Lux, are earned like a well-kept secret of deepest Vidzeme.
No brewery for this initial.