Green gold: the hops of the Savinja Valley
The flower that flavours beer around the world grows a few minutes from where I grew up. Here's why my home valley is covered in it.
Drive through the Savinja Valley in summer and you'll pass walls of green: hop plants climbing ropes strung high between tall poles, row after row, as far as you can see. Locals have a name for it: zeleno zlato, green gold.
A small flower, a big deal
Hops are the little cone-shaped flowers that give beer its bitterness and aroma. Slovenia grows around 3% of the world's hops, right behind giants like the US, Germany, China and Czechia, and most of them come from this one valley around Žalec. Brewers abroad know them as Styrian hops, and Styrian Golding is the classic.
How it started
Hops arrived here fairly late. The first attempts in the mid-1800s failed, until a local landowner, Janez Hausenbichler, planted seedlings brought from Germany. Others followed, and the valley never looked back.
Harvest time
The plants climb all spring and summer. In late summer the cones are picked and dried in hop kilns, the tall drying houses you still see all over the valley. Pickers used to come from far and wide to earn a little money in the fields, and some still travel all the way from Romania. One old kiln in Žalec is now the Eco-Museum of Hop Growing and Brewing.
In late summer the whole valley smells of hops. Once you've smelled it, you never forget it.
The fountain that pours beer
In the town park in Žalec stands the Green Gold fountain (Fontana piv Zeleno zlato). Instead of water, its six taps pour six different beers from Slovenian craft brewers. Buy a glass mug with a chip in town, and it lets you taste a small 1 dl pour from each tap. It's open from April to October, and the mug is yours to keep.
Where I'll take you
This is my home turf, and it's where the Green Gold Trail goes: a walk through the hop fields, a look inside an old drying kiln, a stop at the beer fountain, and a slow lunch with a hop farmer. No beer expertise needed. Just curiosity and someone else driving.