Budweiser Budvar

Budweiser Budvar is the Czech state's own lager — brewed in České Budějovice, the town Germans call Budweis, and known worldwide as "the other Budweiser" thanks to a trademark battle with Anheuser-Busch that has run for more than a century. In the United States it sells under the name Czechvar. The beer itself is a slow-matured pale lager that many Czechs regard as a national treasure.

The brewery was founded in 1895 as a Czech joint-stock brewery, brewing its first batch on 7 October that year, though the town's brewing tradition reaches back to royal brewing rights granted in 1265. The name dispute with Anheuser-Busch began in the early twentieth century, as both companies claimed the Budweiser name — one by geography, one by trademark — and it has shaped the brand's export map ever since.

Unusually among major breweries, Budvar remains a national corporation owned by the Czech state, never privatized after 1989. That independence has become part of the brand: no global parent, long lagering, and Saaz hops from Bohemian fields. For beer travelers, the brewery in České Budějovice is one of the classic Czech pilgrimages alongside Plzeň.

Soft, honeyed malt with a rounded body and a gentle Saaz hop spice; the long maturation shows in its smoothness. It finishes clean with a faint, pleasing sweetness rather than a hard bitter edge.