Minipivovar Velichov / Hospoda U Mexického Zálivu

No Longer In Business

This place is definitely one of a kind. Opens 3pm most days, but I got there at about 2.45pm on a nice sunny day and a few folks were out the front having a beer. Old barrels as tables and wooden benches for seats just off the main street through town. A constant stream of locals stopping off for a beer or two after work and then heading off. The brewer/landlord sits out the front and chats with everyone. One particularly interesting fella had a few disgusting empty jars of something with him for some reason. Landlord is a lovely guy. He asked me if I was Dutch for some reason, but when I spoke to him in Dutch he didn’t understand. Very happy to show me the brewing setup, which is pretty rundown but surprisingly big. An order of magnitude bigger than Hastrmann. The beer itself is pretty different - shockingly so at first, but it really grew on me. 500mL glass bottles are available for takeaway, which is unusual for a Czech brewpub. He also had empty bottles for a tmavy, but none available. Seriously memorable. I hired a pushie in Karlovy Vary and rode to here and Velky Rybnik - definitely recommended, and a bit more efficient than trying to do both by PT in the same day.

I hadn’t checked the opening times, which is at 3 PM on a Monday, but a little girl running across the open space in front of the brewery in this very tiny and seemingly desolate village fetched first the brewer/owner (Novak) and then the keys. The brewer was so kind to open 2 hours before the official opening, that was the first part of the super service, later we got a tour of the small and very different brewery, and a chat in a mixture of German and Czech. We had the one quite nice beer twice fresh and bottled 1 month old. The place is somewhat run down with lots of patina - really traditional. The brewpub is beutifully located - and it was lovely to sit in the sun enjoying the beer. Nowak was amazed the his place was mentioned in the GBG to Czech Republic, so he got a copy for the beers and two "beutiful" mugs.

To get to this pub you need to locate the elusive Nowhere and find its middle, because that’s where the pub is. Ambiance 5/5. Sits about 35 on four tables and chairs probably picked-up in a dump. Curtains like those your old drunk red-neck grand-father has on the windows of his trailer. Painted for the last time in 1934. A few probably-jobless locals watching a hockey game. Some also-probably-jobless locals walking in to fill their 2L “growler” (old dirty soda-pop plastic bottle re-used for the 200th time). Dirty bathroom with a broken window that will probably never be fixed. It was march and we were freezing, I think the place is not heated, the few customers were wearing their winter coats and everything. Service 10/10. A single owner/brewer/waiter that is in a desperate need of a shower and even more in desperate needs of a new pair of sandals. Extra friendly, took us to the back where he brews, looks more like a storage/dumpster room than a brewing facility. Amazing that he can brew s

Check out my article for more info on this fascinating countryside brewpub: http://www.ratebeer.com/Beer-News/Article-716.htm