würze

Würze is a German noun with two principal meanings, one culinary and one technical from brewing. In everyday cooking, Würze denotes flavoring or seasoning—the ingredients that give food its taste. It can refer to spice blends, bouillon, or a sauce base, and it is used to describe the overall flavoring of a dish. The term also appears in idiomatic expressions such as die Würze des Lebens (the spice or zest of life).

In brewing, Würze is a technical term for the wort, the sugar-rich liquid produced when malt is mashed. This Würze serves as the starting material for beer production. It is typically boiled with hops to extract bitterness and aroma, after which it is cooled and fermented with yeast to become beer. The quality and composition of the Würze determine much of the final beverage’s sweetness, body, and fermentable content.

Etymology and usage notes: the culinary Würze derives from the verb würzen, meaning to season. The brewing Würze is a distinct technical sense and is not etymologically tied to seasoning, though the two senses share the same word. In English-language discussions, Würze is usually translated as “seasoning” in culinary contexts and as “wort” in brewing contexts.