Cretan Brewery S.A. — Restaurant in Municipality of Platanias

This is a place of two halves - it is a tourist attraction on the land train routes and a micro brewery.

The tourist attraction is nice, with the café/bar area having good views over the valley. The tour is interesting, if a little sterile as you have to stay behind a glass partition to keep the brewery clean.

They present a tasting flight of their current brews for a reasonable price.

The brewery is mostly interesting due to the high level of technology needed to just brew a live unfiltered beer in such a hot climate.

The house lager is really good, with body and depth. This alone requires a 5 star review. The house dark ale is also quite good.

The other beers are imitations of UK/German beers with the IPA especially lacking the complexity to please a UK ale drinker.

The main disappointment of the brewery is that it follows the German beer purity rules and is content to copy established beers. A brewery that calls itself Cretan should have the confidence to break free of this and experiment with the abundance of aromatic flavours available...

Having developed quite a taste for the delicious Charma lager on holiday, we decided to track it down to its source - and were not disappointed. We went for the full works - tasting of 5 different beers (with generous sample sizes) and then a final pint (or near enough) of our favourite, accompanied by a rather delicious lunch for just 18 euro each. Family opinions differed (but the dark beer is the best) but all were agreed: this is a great place to visit and a great experience - the tasting notes and information from our guide for the day really helped us to understand more about the beers - and why they taste so good. It’s little wonder that, having started as a hobby in 2007, Cretan Beer now employs 40 people and is expanding further. Sadly this meant that we were not able to go on the tour of the brewery as that part of the building is out of bounds for a while as the company builds additional...

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ We had a fantastic visit to the Cretan Brewery! The drive there through the mountains was an experience in itself — absolutely stunning. We took the long was round going from Gerani, up to the Botanical Gardens, then lost before geting there)

Once we arrived, the atmosphere was welcoming and relaxed. We only ordered their fries, but honestly, they were the best fries we’ve had during our two-week holiday in Crete.

The real highlight, though, was the beer. Their blond draft is one of the best beers I’ve ever tasted — smooth, refreshing, and full of flavor. They also have a small shop where you can take some home; we loved that they’ll fill up a bottle with whichever beer you choose.

We didn’t do the tour this time (kids got bored, carsick and then restless 🙄), but it’s definitely on our list for the next visit. Can’t wait to come back and experience...