One good thing about when your out-of-town friends visit is that as you show them around you kind of go on a little adventure yourself. And when our friends from Finland (Mari and Jussi, looking at you, kids) come and visit, we always end up going on a beer related adventure.
We’re all beer lovers but have a very different tastes. Tom and I swear by hoppy IPAs and insane imperials, whereas our guests are more inclined to enjoy pilsners and lagers. So finding a place that caters for all our palates is super important.
Of course Amsterdam isn’t in short supply of such places, but when you’re on day three of beer related shenanigans the chances are you’ve exhausted your still fairly limited knowledge on craft beer bars in your new home city. But as luck would have it, after some pretty late breakfast (read: lunch) we were aimlessly wandering around trying to figure out what to do when Jussi spotted it: cellar like doors, with a sign promising some 25 different draft beers and over 100 different bottled beers. It was the best kind of serendipity possible.
Truth be told, I hadn’t come across Biertuin in my frantic Google searches on craft beer in Amsterdam. I have no idea why. Often I google “craft beer near me” or scroll through endless lists of recommended watering holes but this one had somehow managed to elude me. But no more! Thanks to Jussi’s eagle eye (beer goggles? I don’t know) I quickly found myself at the bar of this fine establishment.
First things first: it looks the business. I’m a bit of a sucker for exposed tile décor, and if a place has a flooring I can only describe as cobbled street I’m pretty surely sold. I mean can I foresee the cobbled street effect going against me after one or two too many beers? Absolutely. Does it matter? Absolutely not. It looks dead cool though.
Secondly, the beer is banging. They have a really wide and well thought out selection, from Belgian classics to Amsterdam microbreweries to UK craft beers to brews from all over the world. So for us hop heads there was loads to choose from, and lager lovers didn’t need to settle for a Heineken, but were able to try something a lot craftier than that. Our guests were super impressed with Biri, a local beer from Brouwerij ‘t IJ and I was so happy I finally got to try My Pineapple Brings All the Milkshake IPA’s To the Bar from Brouwerij Frontaal. I can confirm it’s blooming banging.
The Biertuin does food as well (they have a pretty decent looking menu actually) but we were too busy drinking beer to have any grub so I can’t comment on that. From what I saw being delivered to other tables it looked really tasty though.
And that’s what it’s all about, eh? Finding new places to share your favourite things with your favourite people and have the best of times. I’m totally gonna visit again – either at the Prinsengracht venue which we came across by chance, or their sister venue on Linnaeusstraat.
Amsterdam Beer Blog 
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