Taste Awards Jury Visits Carlsberg Brewery in Čelarevo
As last year’s Taste Awards 2023 laureates, on the 23rd of October, the Carlsberg Brewery in Čelarevo was the host for the Taste Awards jury and other esteemed guests who had the opportunity to see a tour of the famous Carlsberg Beer Museum and the facilities in which the Carlsberg beers are made.
After arrival and the welcome speeches held by the staff of the Carlsberg brewery, the esteemed guests of the brewery visited different parts of the facilities, witnessing how various brands of beer, including Carlsberg, Lav Premium, Twist, Merak, and Somersby, were made from the very start to finish.
This included almost all of the phases a beer goes through while being produced, like milling, boiling, fermenting, and packaging.
In addition to high standards regarding the quality of products and services, one of the priorities of the Carlsberg Group, and therefore of the Čelarevo brewery in Serbia, is constant work on improving business sustainability and controlling the environmental impact.
Work in this area is recognised primarily through preserving natural resources such as water, electricity, different types of raw materials, natural gas, etc.
After seeing how the beer was made, the Taste Awards jury learned about the history and origins of beer in Serbia, including the story of Lazar Dunđerski, the original founder of this brewery.
At the Carlsberg headquarters in Copenhagen, there is a museum dedicated to the company’s history. It houses numerous exhibits that witness how, in previous decades, a small beer workshop grew into the international brewing giant that Carlsberg is today.
The Čelarevo Brewery, in line with its parent company, has the task of telling a similar story. Therefore, 116 years after the brewery’s establishment, a small visitor centre and the museum were opened, dedicated to the very founder of the brewery, the famous landowner Lazar Dunđerski.
Lazar Dunđerski, at that time one of the most prominent Serbian landowners, founded a brewery in Čelarevo, then Čibu, in 1892, on his family’s agricultural property. Before her, Lazar already owned a brewery, which operated successfully. However, the new brewery was entirely his work. He paid particular attention to its construction. Everything he learned and saw in big European cities he wanted to try in his new brewery.
Visitors had the opportunity to hear about the brewery’s history through old pictures and letters of the founder, Lazar Dunđerski, as well as how the workers cheered up during the celebrations. Very rare antiquities, which were not even managed to be collected by nearby museums, were searched for in locations around Čelarevo so visitors could also see catering inventory that was used over 100 years ago.
At the end of the event, guests could learn how to pour their drink from experts from the Carlsberg Brewery, who showed the jury how to pour themselves a perfect glass of cold beer.
