The Stange is a plain, straight-sided cylinder with no taper, no stem and no flare, and it is inseparable from one beer: Kölsch. Its defining feature is how little it holds. A true Stange is 0.2 litres, and the small volume is the entire design brief.Kölsch is a delicate, pale, top-fermented beer served cold and young, and it falls apart as it warms. Rather than fight that, Cologne built a service ritual around it. A Köbes circulates the room with a Kranz, a circular tray carrying a dozen or more Stangen, and swaps your empty for a full one without being asked, marking each on your coaster. Nothing sits long enough to go flat or warm. The glass is small so the beer is always fresh, and the tally on the beermat is how you find out what you owe at the end.Kölsch is also protected. Under the Kölsch Konvention it may only be brewed by breweries in and around Cologne, which is why the glassware comes branded by the city’s houses rather than by glassmakers.Düsseldorf, forty kilometres up the Rhine and Cologne’s traditional rival, does the same thing with Altbier in a slightly squatter Becher. Do not mix them up in either city.Suits: Kölsch, Altbier, and any pale beer you want to drink cold and fast.