Brewer Stefan Stretz

Numerous young and old people sit together. They play cards, eat, drink beer. They enjoy the relaxed atmosphere in a cosy circle – life has returned to Nuremberg’s Gostenhof district. Once frowned upon as a “shattered glass quarter”, many gastronomes and merchants are helping it to a new splendour – as is Stefan Stretz, head of the Schanzenbräu and the associated pub.

Step by step to the hotspot

“We are a local pub; somewhere where people should just feel at home”, says Stretz describing his gastro philosophy, which he has developed together with his two colleagues Sebastian Köhler and Jürgen Rehm. It also means no music on the loudspeakers. “People’s conversations should be the music.“

Anyone wanting to find out how a simple worker’s district can turn into a spectacular hip part of town just needs to look at Nuremberg. Gostenhof is the name of the district that is less than two kilometres from the historical Old Town.

The former deprived district of the Franconian city is the home district of one of the first people who lived out their creative ideas here: Stefan Stretz,  manager of the Schanzenbräu and the associated bar at number 27, Adam-Klein-Strasse.

Gostenhof – Origin of Schanzenbräu

“Show me what you can do”, he challenged his friends back in 2003. The trained brewer, with an engineering degree in brewery technology, had just returned to his home town after ten years in Berlin.

"So we basically built a small brewery out of scrap metal"

There, Stretz moved his grandmother’s old laundry cauldron into the cellar of a workshop, and began to brew beer. Success was inevitable: his Schanzenbräu grew to become the second-largest beer producer in the city.

Stretz‘s recipe for success: To stay grounded, and that means washing up in the bar from time to time. And he is not alone in GoHo (anymore): Bike shops and spray-painting shops, goldsmiths who still work by hand, bizarre fashion and fairytale interior design can be found here, alongside health food shops, a coffeemaker and a bookshop.

And lots more besides. A new creative milieu has been created in Nuremberg, with thanks to his pioneering work

A bar without fuss

In 2008, he opened his own bar and secluded beer garden – a significant step for Gostenhof on its way to becoming the fashionable district of GoHo; a nod to the New York district of SoHo. 

Since then, innovative beers like the Rotbier (red beer) or the “Blonde Baron” have been meeting classic Franconian and creative takes on home cooking in Stretz’s bar:  You can find legendary Nuremberg Bratwurst as well as lesser known regional specialities.

The specials’ board, which changes daily, always includes small traditional Brotzeit snacks and Käsespätzle (cheesy pasta dish); on Sundays you can find roast meat, and oven-fresh Schäufele (pork shoulder) on weekends.

But the bar stands for more than this: Comfort in a good, old-fashioned way – without any fuss. Card players are most welcome here – and despite the enormous success of the bar, which can hold 70 guests, you can only make reservations for up to 15 people. “To make sure we still have room for the neighbours – our regulars.” And that is how it is: straight forward, grounded, traditional and yet different.

More about Stefan's pub at schanzenbraeu.de (only in German)