Traveling to Croatia? Try These Killer Beers to Enhance Your Trip

It’s hard to resist the undeniable beauty that is Croatia. If it’s your first time visiting, you can expect to see beautiful beaches, well-preserved architecture (Diocletian’s Palace), and NBA basketball players on every corner. Seriously though, everyone there is 6’ 5” with an NBA player's wingspan. I’m 5’ 6” and I got bruises on my forehead from getting elbowed by people they consider “average” height. That’s another story though. With Croatia’s cuisine not being their strong suit. I leaned more towards finding out what beer brands are the “go-to” beers of the Croatian people. Ožujsko, Karlovačko, and Pan are the Croatian “big three” brands that you can find in every convenience store and supermarket. But Osjecko holds the longest tenure in Croatia dating back to 1664, it truly shows the value that beer has to the Croatian people and the loyalty they have built with their big-brand beers.

Connecting Beer to the Culture

The Vučedol people are traced back to between 4500 to 5000 years ago and were among the first people in the Slavonia region to make beer. Slavonia is considered the Eastern part of Croatia consisting of five counties: Brod-Posavina, Osijek-Baranja, Požega-Slavonia, Virovitica-Podravina, and Vukovar-Syrmia. Skilled in pottery the Vučedol people actually made their own beer vases and mugs to fulfill their drinking needs and made their beer out of wheat, rye, and barley. Beer became a mainstay in the region and in the 17th century with the German movement to Slavonia, Ojisek became home to one of the first breweries. Click here for the whole story of the history of beer in Slavonia.

Osjecko beer dates back to 1664

The growth of commercial breweries grew in the 1800s with Zagrebačka Pivovara (1892), Pivovara Daruvar (1840), Osječka Pivovara (1856), Heineken Hrvatska (1854) leading the way and maintaining their relevance in modern-day Croatia. The microbrewery scene currently plays a bigger part of Croatian beer-drinking culture with more and more popping up in Croatia’s higher-populated cities like Zagreb, Split, and Zadar. The growth of the craft beer culture has been happening at a rapid pace the past five years making it a prime place to go on a beercation.

While on my journey through Croatia, stopping through Zagreb, Split, Hvar, and Dubrovnik, it was only in Dubrovnik, while bar-hopping with my wife, that I started to get recommendations on the types of beers that tourists miss out on.

Grička Vještica

Produced by Pivovara Medvedgrad (est. 1994), Grička Vještica began being mass-produced

in 2013. Given a 79/100 by BeerAdvocate, this Dunkelbock (dark beer with a smooth malty flavor) has everything you need in a beer. I feel like the ratings it has been given do not match what this beer really has to offer. It is smooth with a hint of toffee and a sweet aroma that brings all of your senses to life making you unable to stop at just one. When comparing the bottled and the draft version of the beer, the draft version did the beer more justice and stamped its place as one of the best beers to have in Croatia. Understanding that dark beer is not everyone’s forte, I invite you to spread your wings a bit and give this one a try. It’s doesn’t taste as dark as it is.

San Servolo (Dark Lager)

Located in Buje in the Northwestern corner of Croatia, lives Bujska Pivevara; a brewery, beer spa, and steakhouse and home to San Servolo beer. The San Servolo brand itself is named after an Italian island, which was home to an insane asylum for 250 years but now is home to museums and a university. San Servolo has six different flavors, but their dark lager takes the cake. It goes perfectly with Croatian cuisine, especially Dalmatian dry-cured ham and Pag cheese. It has a rich chocolate and coffee taste but plays a bit lighter and has a creamier texture. Not many dark lagers leave a delicious after-taste quite like this one. If you are not a fan of dark lagers, I recommend taking a look at their American Pale Ale. It is a great alternative to those who don’t enjoy heavy beer. If you get a chance to check out the San Servolo beer spa, where you can sit in a tub of their beer and drink their beer until your heart is content.