Our first brewery visit was a very special one: the last working lambic brewery in the centre of Brussels . Brouwerij – Brasserie Cantillon is the name and the owners, the family Van Roy are very friendly people, devoted to their job, their passion: making lambic in a true traditional way. The brewery was founded in 1900 and has always been in the hands of the same family Cantillon-Van Roy. The lambic is pure and their beers are sour and unsweetened. Lambic is a beer of spontaneous fermentation, this means that the wort, made out of 2/3 barley and 1/3 of wheat, is infected by wild yeasts that float around in the air. Therefore, the ceilings are never cleaned or brushed, and spiders have a free playground there. Lambic is aging in oak barrels for up to three years. Gueuze is a blend of lambic of different ages, the blend is the secret of the brewer: every barrel of lambic is different! So , after tasting a sample of each one of them, he decides how he is going to blend them to obtain a consistent taste.

They only brew from November till March-April and when we were there, outside temperature was still about 25° Celsius, so they were busy cleaning up, as a shipment of fresh grapes arrived from Italy : their Vigneronne , a lambic with white grapes, is a first class product! Other beers, apart from gueuze and vigneronne, are Kriek (small cherries , originally grown in the area but now they come from the east of the country) , Rosé de Gambrinus (raspberry flavour ) , Sint Lamvinus (red grapes from the Bordeaux area) and Foufoune (apricots!!)

After the tour of the brewery, we sat down for a great lunch:

Menu Breugelian buffet with cold meat, poultry, vegetables, cheese.... We could taste all of their beers, Gueuze, Kriek, Raspberry and even a pitcher of Faro was put on the table ( = sour gueuze with candy sugar ) .

We left because more breweries were to be seen, but some of us really had preferred to stay just a little bit longer…

As we arrived at Hanssens Artisanaal, the gates were shut…
A few phone calls later, the brewer, John, arrived (a misunderstanding about the exact time but quickly forgotten..) and let us in. Hanssens is situated in Dworp, a small rural village in the Zenne valley, some twenty kilometres outside Brussels

The brewer , who is married to Cindy Hanssens, has taken over the job of his father in law. John explained us the difference between a lambic brewer and a lambic blender (the first brews his own lambic, the second buys the lambic at a lambic brewery and blends it himself before bottling) Hanssens buys their lambic at Girardin and Lindemans and makes gueuze, cherry lambic and raspberry lambic of it. Their labels mention the name “Oude geuze”, or “Oude Kriek”, this means that they are made in the old fashioned way, without addition of other high fermentation beers, using only real fruit for the fruit beers. We even managed to get hold of some rare bottles of “Mead the Gueuze” (a gueuze with mead sold only on the US Market). It stinks like the attic, but tastes wonderful. John waved us goodbye as we drove away towards what was to become our third brewery visit that same day

We even managed to get hold of some rare bottles of “Mead the Gueuze” (a gueuze with mead sold only on the US Market). It stinks like the attic, but tastes wonderful. John waved us goodbye as we drove away towards what was to become our third brewery visit that same day

Silly, a small village on the south of Brussels, has its own brewery and the owner, Didier Van der Haeghen, proudly showed us around the recently renovated brewery.

His Scotch tastes exquisitely, the Double Enghien is a very refreshing spiced ale and Titje is a very special wheat beer, with a wonderful deep fruity nose. Of course we had to try all their other beers as well and meanwhile it had become dark and the bus driver was starting to get afraid that we weren’t going to come out again. We had to, because dinner was waiting for us at the local restaurant “Aux Neuf Tilleuls” .

Menu Roast Beef with Scotch de Silly Sauce, Scotch de Silly peares and French fries, with plenty of the Brasserie de Silly beers

There had been a “kermesse” (fancy fair) that weekend in the village, and the local brass band was playing their last tunes in a fully equipped garage!!! not bigger than a small living room. As we walked by, we noticed the brewer Didier dancing on the podium, enjoying a Silly Pilsner!! What a funny sight, once again we had to leave with pain in our hearts…

Day III