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Home / The Country

'Pisner': The pilsner beer made from human urine

NZ Herald
8 May, 2017 02:57 AM2 mins to read

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The Pisner. Photo / australscope.com

The Pisner. Photo / australscope.com

New Zealand has a pretty pumping craft beer scene but Denmark have just taken things to a whole new level.

"Pisner" (a take on the beer pilsner) is the name of a new type of beer from Danish brewery Nørrebro Bryghus.

What's so special about this beer is that one of the ingredients is - as the name suggests - urine taken from urinals set up at the world famous Roskilde Festival, the largest music event in Northern Europe.

"When the news that we had started brewing the Pisner came out, a lot of people thought we were filtering the urine to put it directly in the beer and we had a good laugh about that," said Henrik Vang, Chief Executive Norrebro Bryghus.

The "lucky" taste testers appear to enjoy the brew. Photo / australscope.com
The "lucky" taste testers appear to enjoy the brew. Photo / australscope.com
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The Danish Agriculture and Food Council came up with the idea to gather the urine from the festival in 2015 to use as a fertilizer on malt barley fields in the Danish town of Køge.

And it's this barley that has now been made into beer. 54,000 litres of urine, released from the bladders of festival goers, has found its way into 60,000 bottles of beer.

Although the creators have no more plans to brew Pisner, we would not be surprised if this beercycling concept takes off.

Sustainable, organic and apparently no "pi**y" taste, is this the ultimate in exclusive hipster brews?

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The Pisner will be available in selected supermarkets and cafes in Denmark in June. Unfortunately - or perhaps, fortunately - with such limited supply New Zelanders are unlikely to get a taste.

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