Schwarzbier, or "black beer," is a German dark lager beer with an opaque, black color and a full, chocolatey flavor.

Schwarzbiers are bottom-fermented beers, though originally top-fermenting yeast was used in brewing them. The alcohol content usually ranges from 4.8%–5%. They get their dark color from the use of particularly dark malts in brewing. The malt in turn gets its color during the roasting procedure. Dark beers are some of the original types of beers brewed, with lighter colors only becoming possible with lighter, short-roasted malts approximately one hundred years later. In its strictest sense, fermentation (formerly called zymnosis) is the energy-yielding anaerobic metabolic breakdown of a nutrient molecule, such as glucose, without net oxidation. ... The Brewer, designed and engraved, in the Sixteenth. ... In general usage, alcohol (from Arabic al-khwl الكحول, or al-ghawl الغول) refers almost always to ethanol, also known as grain alcohol, and often to any beverage that contains ethanol (see alcoholic beverage). ... Malted barley Malting is a process applied to cereal grains, in which the grains are made to germinate and then quickly dried before the plant develops. ... Roasting is cooking with dry heat, whether an open flame, oven, or other heat source. ...

The roots of the Schwarzbier lie in Thuringia and Saxony; the oldest known Schwarzbier is the Braunschweiger Mumme ("Brunswick Mum") brewed since the Middle Ages (the first documented mention is from 1390) in Braunschweig. The earliest documented mention in Thuringia is of Köstritzer from 1543, a popular Schwarzbier still produced today. The Free State of Thuringia (German Freistaat Thüringen) lies in central Germany and is among the smaller of the countrys sixteen Bundesländer (federal states), with an area of 16,200 sq. ... With an area of 18,413 km² and a population of 4. ... The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times, beginning with the Renaissance. ... Events Births December 27 - Anne Mortimer John Dunstable, English composer (d. ... Map of Germany showing Braunschweig Braunschweig [ˈbraunʃvaik] (English & French: Brunswick) is a city of 245,500 people (as of December 31, 2004), located in Lower Saxony, Germany. ... The Köstritzer brewery has been owned by the Bitburger Brauerei since 1991. ... // Events February 21 - Battle of Wayna Daga - A combined army of Ethiopian and Portuguese troops defeat the armies of Adal led by Ahmed Gragn. ...

A famous black beer drinker (among other things) was Goethe. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe   Johann Wolfgang von Goethe? (pronounced [gø tÉ™, sometimes incorrectly pronunced Goth, Gurter and Gotha]) (August 28, 1749 – March 22, 1832) was a German novelist, dramatist, humanist, scientist, philosopher, and he conducted his civic services as a cabinet minister of Weimar. ...

The American brewery Samuel Adams distributes a Schwarzbier under the name "Samuel Adams Black Lager". Samuel Adams is the brand name of American beers produced by the Boston Beer Company and named after brewer and patriot Samuel Adams. ...

Other popular dark beer types are Altbiers (Düsseldorf), porters, stouts, and dark Hefeweizen (wheat beers) from Bavaria. Altbier (often abbreviated to Alt) is a dark, top-fermented type of beer from Düsseldorf and the Niederrhein region in Germany. ... Düsseldorf is the capital city of the German federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia. ... Porter is a type of ale which has a malting aroma and hop bitterness. ... A pint of stout Stout is a dark beer made using roasted malts or roast barley. ... Wheat beer is a beer that is brewed with both malted barley and malted wheat, rather than only barley. ... The Free State of Bavaria (German: Bayern or Freistaat Bayern), with an area of 70,553 km² (27,241 square miles) and 12. ...