of Bamberg is today one of the leading producers of German specialty malts. They also produce pilsner and other base malts, but are perhaps best known for a series of specialties designated by the prefix “Cara.” Carapils, a Weyermann trademark since 1908, is a pale dextrin malt and Carafa, a chocolaty roasted malt used in the production of dark beers. See carapils. In addition, they offer a line of organic malts, rye and wheat malts, as well as roasted unmalted grains, which because of the strictures of the German Purity Law (Reinheitsgebot) are intended for use in making beer beyond German borders. See reinheitsgebot. A Reinheitsgebot-approved liquid coloring agent called Sinamar is also manufactured.

In 1879 Johann Baptist Weyermann expanded his father’s grain store to include a malt-roasting facility that in its earliest days produced malt coffee. Soon a germination room was added for the production of brewing malt. Several expansions were undertaken over succeeding decades, and in 1902 a second facility, largely for the production of the malt-based Sinamar, was opened in Potsdam on the outskirts of Berlin. This plant was damaged in the closing days of World War II, subsequently placed under Russian control, and never reopened.

Perhaps more than any other German maltster, Weyermann has striven to make itself integral to the growth of the craft brewing movement, especially in America. Its specialty malts in particular are part of recipes devised by hundreds of breweries from Colorado to Japan. The company remains family-run. While the German brewing community can be insular, Sabine Weyermann and Thomas Kraus-Weyermann, invariably garbed in the distinctive red and yellow of their brand, are often seen at beer festivals and conferences, and have been tireless over the years in their attention to small brewers worldwide.