A visit to Fårö and Barlingbo Bryggeri

Gotland may not strike the common beer enthusiast as an interesting destination, but that may be about to change as the beer scene on the largest island in the Baltic Sea, just off the east coast of Sweden, is developing rapidly, with several new breweries opening up the last couple of years. One should also keep in mind that Gotland has a long beer tradition with its famous Gotlandsdrycka, brewed with smoked malt and juniper, which I hope will see a revival.

In August 2015 I found myself on Gotland for the Medeltidsveckan medieval festival which is held in Visby, the only real town on the island. Together with a friend I had a few days available for a short road trip, so we ended up driving around most of the island in search of good food and beer. I may write a post about some of the other breweries and places we checked out, but this post is about the Barlingbo Bryggeri and their collaboration with Fårögården Restaurang which resulted in the opening of a new brewery this summer.

Fårögården Restaurang, the home of Fårö Bryggeri

Fårö Bryggeri
Fårö is a large island just off the north-western tip of Gotland, connected by a ferry which runs around the clock and takes about 5 minutes to cross the Fårösund strait. Driving there takes about 90 minutes from Visby, so we're not talking long distances. The island is probably best known for its association with movie director Ingmar Bergman, it was his home for many years and now his final resting place. But the island also offers a very scenic coastline with impressive seastacks, known as rauks in the local dialect, standing up to ten meters tall, eerily resembling the tall Moai heads on Easter Island.

It makes sense to stay at least one night when you get to Fårö and for that Sudersands Semesterby offers the largest accommodation, you can either rent one of the myriad of cabins there or put up your own tent. I don't know about the winter season, but during summers Sudersand is teaming with guests, most coming for the great sandy beaches or for the annual Harley Davidson Rally which attracts hundreds if not thousands of bikers to Gotland and Fårö every August.

Most guests will be more than happy with the restaurants and fairly standard beach bars at Sudersand, but if you're willing to hike about 20 minutes west along Fårö Simunds you'll be treated to much better food and beer at Fårögården Restaurang. As the name implies ("gård" means "farm" in Swedish), Fårögården is also a farm, where they raise lambs among other animals. They also have a bed & breakfast service, so you can actually stay at Fårögården instead of Sudersand.

Leg of locally raised lamb at Fårögården Restaurang

Fårögården Restaurang aims at serving good local food, often using ingredients from the farm. One of the dishes they offered during my visit was a leg of lamb that turned out to be the best meal I had on Gotland. The lamb had been raised on the farm, so it was really short traveled food; the leg was cooked with low heat for many hours, so the meat was really tender and juicy, and served with a chevre & honey cream, pesto and polenta cakes and tasty chorizo sausages.

Inside the restaurant a small microbrewery opened up in June 2015, named Fårö Bryggeri or Fåröbryggeriet. The small 50 liter brewery is the old test brewery from Barlingbo Bryggeri, so Fårö Bryggeri can be viewed as a sort of test brewery for Barlingbo. The idea is to test new recipes by brewing them on the small microbrewery and serve the beer at the restaurant to find out which are good enough to be scaled up for brewing at the much larger Barlingbo brewery. Naturally, Fårö Bryggeri will also brew some standard "house ales" for the restaurant, not only experimental beers.

All the beer brewed at Fårö Bryggeri is sold exclusively at Fårögården Restaurang, so this is where you have to go to try these beers. Because the batches are so small everything is bottled by hand, nothing is kegged, so you'll find a pretty good beer menu with perhaps a dozen different beers. The only problem is that the small batches will quickly sell out, so perhaps only 8-10 of the beers will be available at any time. Still, that's plenty enough for spending a nice evening at the restaurant.

A bottle of Gasmora smoked ale at Fårögården

Among the beers offered at Fårögården Restaurang during my visit was both a wheat ale brewed with raspberries, a heavily smoked ale and a strange herbal concoction. The weirdest beer I tried was Barlingbo Ekeviken, a 6.3% abv wheat ale brewed with mint and pineapple! The mint totally dominated the flavor and reminded me of tooth paste. This may not be everyone's cup of tea, certainly not mine, but I heard other people expressing their delight. For me it was the Gasmora smoked beer, brewed at Fårö despite the Barlingbo name on the label, which impressed the most. It was heavy on the bonfire smoke, but was well balanced thanks to a rich, sweet malt body that brought my thoughts to the malty rauchbiers of Bamberg.

While at Fårögården we happened to meet Jonny Warg, one of the founders of Barlingbo Bryggeri, who was up there to check on the test brewery. We talked for a good while and at the end of the evening he invited us to visit the Barlingbo brewery when we returned to Visby a couple of days later.

Stafva Gård - the home of Barlingbo Bryggeri

Barlingbo Bryggeri
Stafva Gård in Barlingbo, about 10 km east of Visby, is known for its cheese production and now also for its brewery, after Barlingbo Bryggeri launched its first beer in June 2014. Of all the breweries I tried on Gotland, Barlingbo was the one that impressed me the most, offering a range of excellent beers in classical styles such as lager, pale ale, ipa and porter to more experimental types.

As we drove back to Visby, bearing the invitation from Jonny Warg in my mind, we made a stop at Roma Abbey, both to visit the old ruins and to let me make a phone call to Mr. Warg. As the CEO of Barlingbo Bryggeri, I knew he would be busy on a Friday but when I phoned him he was more than happy to receive extra visitors. "Can you be here in ten minutes?", he asked. "No problem", I replied, with a sigh of relief. Roma Klosterruin is just a few minutes drive from Stafva Gård, so we immediately got into our car, drove to Stafva Gård were we parked less than ten minutes later. Jonny Warg was already waiting outside the main entrance to the brewery and greeted us with a wide grin when we got out of our car.

After we had donned special protective foot gear, to avoid bringing any dirt or farm soil with us into the brewery, Warg took us on an excellent tour. He told us that most of the brewery equipment were either bought used or have been re-constructed from earlier use in dairy production. For instance, the 1500 liter brewing kettle was formerly used for making cream, while the bottling line was an old German make from 1967, which has been upgraded with modern electronics and soon will be able to run "double vacuum" when filling bottles with beer.

As mentioned, the brewing kettle can produce up to 1500 liter wort, but there are plans to replace it with one of 1800 liter which is much better suited to fill up their 5000 liter fermentation tanks, since two brews will then produce up to 3600 liter (you never fill up the tank 100% as you need to let the beer ferment and release CO2).

For hopping their beer, Barlingbo prefer to use whole hops, not pellets or extract, so they have constrcucted a special hop cage ("humlebur") of chicken wire, over a meter long, 20-30 cm wide and half a meter tall, that they fill with hop cones and submerge in the beer.

Jonny Warg showing us the labeling machine at Barlingbo

The maximum capacity of the bottling line is 7500 bottles per hour, though they usually run it at a slower speed of 3600-4200 per hour, to allow for better CO2 control. Currently the bottling operation requires much manual labor, such as lifting the empty bottles onto the belt and packing the filled ones into cases, so Jonny Warg considers constructing a robot for lifting the bottles onto the bottling line. Their labeling machine is also well used, in a former life it was used by Dugges Ale- og Porterbryggeri and before that by Oppigårds Bryggeri.

After the interesting tour of the brewery we were taken to the lab, where we were introduced to Barlingbo head brewer Niklas Gustafsson, a big smiling man with a huge beard. There I got the chance to try some of their new beers. I was first given a taste of their first ever lager, which was bottles unfiltered and had a strength of 5.6% abv and bitterness of 26 IBU, Named Holmudden, the lager was actually brewed at Fårö Bryggeri, so only 150 liter was made, but it had been lagered (matured on cold tanks) at Barlingbo, where it was also bottled. The lager turned out to be a very tasty Munchener style helles, with a good malt flavor and elegant hops provided by Perle and Tettnanger, it was fairly dry overall and very drinkable. After this tasty and refreshing lager I was given a taste of a real beast, their 13% abv imperial stout. About a year ago they brewed 900 liter of this beer which has been aging on tank ever since. It smelled of coffee and chocolate and had a rich but soft, creamy mouthfeel. It was very balanced, with a tasty black chocolate bitterness lingering in the aftertaste. In my view this beer is ready for release, as soon as they can find a good name for it :)

I'm very grateful for the wonderful treatment we received at Barlingbo Bryggeri and for the generous amount of time that Jonny Warg and Niklas Gustafsson spent on us. Thank you very much guys!

Currently, the beers from Barlingbo Bryggeri are mainly available on Systembolaget and at better beer bars in Stockholm and on Gotland. In addition to the already mentioned Fårögården Restaurang, there are usually some Barlingbo beers available at the Black Sheep Arms pub in old town Visby. I can also personally vouch for the excellent selection of beers at Karlsörestaurangen on Stora Karlsö in the south of Gotland, which is only open during the summer months.

Niklas Gustafsson and Jonny Warg of Barlingbo Bryggeri

More photos from Fårö and Barlingbo Bryggeri can be found at Flickr.

An evening at Færder Mikrobryggeri

Late in April 2015 the founders of Færder Mikrobryggeri invited around forty of their first Facebook supporters to a house warming party at their brewery in Tønsberg. They did this both to show gratitude for the early support and encouragement they had received but also as a way to spread their story and words about their new beers. The latter is rather difficult in a country where you can't advertise for beer, not even show pictures of them on your own website!

Guests waiting to enter Færder Mikrobryggeri on 14 May 2015

A little before 7 pm on May 14th a varied lot, young and old, men and women, showed up at the former Hurtigrenseren cleanery shop in Tordenskjolds gate 5, between Farmandstredet shopping mall and the railway line through central Tønsberg. From the outside we could see they were busy setting up kegs of beer and placing snifter glasses on the tables. We were in for a treat.

Tønsberg likes to pride itself on being the oldest town in Norway (though modern historians may be less certain about this claim), dating its foundation to 871 CE - smack in the middle of the Viking era. The town is a rather sleepy one during the winter season but increases dramatically in population and activity during the summer months, when people from Oslo move in at their summer cabins at Tjøme and expensive pleasure boats line the waterfront, Tønsberg brygge, where a number of expensive restaurants and pubs can be found. All drinking establishments in Tønsberg offer the same, bland industrial lager, so the town is not a destination for beer lovers. At least until now, after the opening of Færder Mikrobryggeri.

Færder Mikrobryggeri is a family owned and run microbrewery founded by mother and son, Tone and Mathias Krüger in September 2013. With financial advice and backing from husband and father, Steinar Krüger, the brewery launched its first beers a year later, in September 2014, becoming the first operative brewery in Tønsberg, since Tønsberg Bryggeri was closed by Nora Industrier back in the early 1970s.

The guests were let in at 7 pm sharp, greeted by Tone in the door, while Steinar and Mathias walked around talking with the guests as we sat down. As a welcome drink, we were served a really fresh and tasty Færder Skjærgård from tap. Some people mistake it for a pilsner, because of the mild floral character, golden color and excellent drinkability but it's really an ale with the floral character coming from the infusion of elderflower in the brew. I've never had it this good, so Færder Skjærgård is really an excellent draft beer.

After seating all their guests and serving them beer, the founders started telling us about the humble beginnings of Færder Mikrobryggeri. It all started in the fall of 2013 when Mathias, who studied medicine, took 6 months off from his studies to travel and spend some time with his family at Tjøme. His mother, Tone, decided they needed a hobby to keep Mathias occupied, so she bought a 25 liter homebrewing system and started brewing beer! The first couple of batches were purely about learning the technical terms but then Mathias got involved and they started getting more consistent results out of their efforts.

Guests walking through the Færder brewhouse

After only a month of brewing, Tone and Mathias had gotten to the point where they started thinking about their activity as craft brewing and they realized that Færder Mikrobryggeri would be a great name for a brewery at Tjøme. To beat any competitors they quickly founded a company by that name, on September 1st, and immediately sent in a registration to Brønnøysund Register Centre (the national public register). Færder Mikrobrygger was officially registered as a shareholding company on September 16, 2013.

After serious discussions within the family, father Steinar decided to pitch in with his knowledge of finances and business (he is the daily manager of Micasa AS) and work started on the plans for a microbrewery to be located at Tjøme.

In order to learn the trade, Tone and Mathias contacted Nøgne Ø, one of the oldest and best known craft breweries in Norway, asking if they could visit them for a day to learn about brewing and the brewery business. Nøgne Ø graciously opened their doors for the Krügers, allowing them to follow the actual brewing as well as see how they conduct their business. When Tone and Mathias told the Nøgne Ø staff about their idea of starting up with a 5 hectoliter (hl) brewhouse, they were warned they would regret it - brewing only 500 liter per batch would mean much more work than on a larger system. Instead the Nøgne Ø guys recommended that they went for a larger brewing system, 15 or 20 hl.

Before the visit to Nøgne Ø they had considered various locations at Tjøme, mostly barns, where a 5 hl brewery would be able to fit in. But with a 20 hl system, which they settled on, they needed a much larger location. None could be found at Tjøme. Then they were informed that the old Hutrigrenseren building in Tordenskjoldsgate 5 in Tønsberg was available. They immediately checked it out and decided it was perfect. With a floor space of 600 square meter it could fit both a 20 hl brewery system, with fermentation and clearing tanks, as well as a bottling line and some storage space.

With the financial backing and practical know-how of his parents, Mathias started working on the plans for a large 20 hl production brewery. He got in touch with A. N. Technologies in Israel, that has also constructed breweries for 7 Fjell in Bergen and Lindesnes Brygghus, and together with their engineers Mathias designed a tailor made brewhouse that would fit inside the brewery building. The brewery equipment was then built to specifications in China.

While telling us their story, we were provided with more tasters of their beers. After the decent Pale Ale we got to try one of the new ones, Færder Belgisk Gyllen, which is an 8.5% abv Belgian strong ale brewed with Duvel yeast. It smelled heavenly, of ripe green apples and mild spices, the taste followed up with more fruit and spices, overall dry with a long aftertaste. Belgisk Gyllen was released at Vinmonopolet in May 2015 and is my favorite Færder beer to date.

Brewmaster Mathias Krüger at Færder

Originally, the plan had been to open the brewery on 5 July 2014, but the equipment wasn't shipped from China until mid June, so they had to revise their plans. Instead they promised shops and distributors that they could start selling Færder beers after September 24, which meant they had to start brewing by mid August. So, the summer of 2014 was spent in frantic activity, erecting the large steel tanks with a number of pulleys, getting the plumbing done and hiring a team of electricians working around the clock for three weeks to get all the electrical systems in order.

The initial brewery that went into operation in mid August 2014 consisted of a 20 hl mashing tun, whirpool and brewing kettle, and four large 40 hl and two smaller 20 hl fermentation and clearing tanks. A bottling line from Karith Solutions Ltd in the UK was also set up, near the south end of the brewery, allowing them to bottle and label their beers more easily (though it took them an entire day to get it running the first time).

During the tour of the brewery, Mathias told us about the Færder beers and how they brew them. In a typical 4.7% abv ale, they use about 400 kg malt (in a batch of 20 hl), but for the stronger IPA about 550 kg. They use the same yeast strain for all of their pale ales (IPA, Pale Ale and Skjærgårdsøl) which allow them to re-pitch the yeast in the next brew. This particular yeast strain ferments out in just five and a half days. Færder Pale Ale spends a total of three weeks in the fermentation / clearing tanks before it's ready for bottling, while Færder Skjærgård takes 6 weeks and Færder Jul two and a half months.

Tone Krüger told us a funny story from when they released the first beer. Because two rival chains of stores, Rema 1000 and Meny, had offered to sell Færder's beers, Tone wanted to make sure that they would get equal honors by starting selling the beer on the same date. She phoned them and even marked each case that the beer should not be sold before September 24. However, one of the stores had missed this message and put up the bottles on their shelves as soon as they received the cases. When Tone heard that people had already been able to buy the Færder beers before the given date she immediately called the store in question only to be told by a happy store manager that they had already sold out all the bottles and wanted Færder to send more!

Færder Belgisk Gyllen is delicious!

Initially Færder Mikrobryggeri used labels with a lighthouse motive, since Færder lighthouse was the inspiration for the brewery name. But after getting in touch with visual design company Panorama Design it was decided to go for a series of maritime signal flags as label motives. Despite some internal disagreement about this choice (Tone found the design too minimalistic) it proved to be a good one, as it won them and Panorama the award "Merket for god design 2015" in April 2015 and also a European design award!

In the future, Mathias plans to brew a 4.7% abv oatmeal stout, Færder Havrestout, for the grocery store market, while a Smoked Amber is more uncertain, despite being one of his personal favorites. Mathis is also very fond of the style India Red Ale, but Vinmonopolet seems reluctant to take in more beers in this category so it may not materialize.

What will materialize though is a special festival beer they've brewed for Færder Seilasen, an annual regatta in the Oslo fjord that goes from Oslo harbor out to the Færder lighthouse and then back again. It's only fitting that Færder Mikrobryggeri should provide the official beer for this regatta.

In September 2015 another beer will be launched at Vinmonopolet, Færder Supreme Stout, which we got to taste during the visit. This is a fairly complex 6% abv stout brewed with barley malt, wheat malt, flaked oats, rye malt, toasted barley, molasses and coffee. The coffee, some 10 kg in all, was made by Supreme Roastworks in Oslo, hence the name of the beer. The beer was bottled just 5 days prior to the visit, so it was really fresh. It poured pitch black and sported a lovely fresh coffee aroma with notes of black chocolate. It had a creamy mouthfeel, with a good balance between the coffee, chocolate and a nice rye bread flavor. It's a tasty beer and the perfect way to end a good evening, along with some chocolate cake.

All in all I was very impressed by the level of quality of the five beers we got to taste during the visit. I was also happy to learn that Færder Mikrobryggeri has signed contracts to have their beer distributed more widely in Norway, so things are looking very good for this young brewery in the oldest town in Norway.

A line-up of existing and possible future Færder beers

For more photos from my visit to Færder Mikrobryggeri see this Flickr set.

Ægir Bryggeri - beer for gods

Beautifully located between steep mountains at the innermost part of the Aurlandsfjord, a southern arm of the famous Sognefjord on the west coast of Norway, the small community of Flåm has attracted tourists for centuries and still is a popular stop for cruise ships going up the Sognefjord. Flåm is also the end station of the 20 km long Flåmsbana railway line, known as the most beautiful train ride in Norway, going between Flåm at sea level and the Myrdal Station on the Bergen Line at 866 m above sea level.

Flåmsbrygga where large cruise ships arrive in summer.

Besides its breathtaking natural attractions, Flåm also offers a world class brewery - Ægir Bryggeri - which this post will be about.

The small start

Back in 2004, American design consultant Evan Lewis and his Norwegian wife, Aud Melås, decided to move from California back to her native Flåm in Norway. It was part of a dream for both, she wanted to run a hotel and restaurant business while Evan, who had been a homebrewer since the age of 17, dreamed of turning his hobby into a profession.

Ægir brewery and pub in Flåm.

After a couple of years of constructions, the Flåmsbrygga hotel and restaurant opened up, followed in the summer 2007 by the brewpub, housed in a beautiful, Norse dragon-style, wooden building next to the hotel.

Named after the brewer of the gods in Norse mythology, Ægir Bryggeri was a small 10 hl brewpub with a capacity of 1,400 hl beer per year. A simple bottling facility was installed too, to allow Ægir to distribute their beer outside Flåm. In those days craft beer was still in its infancy in Norway, even the best beer bars only sold craft beer on bottle, not on draft, so a bottling line was essential for wider distribution.

The impressive growth

Thanks to some very good, high quality base beers, such as the crisp Bøyla Blonde Ale, the tasty Sumbel Porter and the American style India Pale Ale, and the great atmosphere of the brewpub, Ægir experienced a phenomenal growth and almost instant recognition in Norwegian beer circles - it has been voted the Best Brewpub in Norway every year since 2008 by the 100 thousand members of Norøl and Norbrygg!

Because of the rapid growth, Evan hired brewer Dave Gardonio from Toronto, Canada, to help out with the daily operations at Ægir. By the end of 2009, Ægir sold 60% of their beer outside Flåm and there was no way they could keep up with the growing demand at their essentially brewpub-sized brewery. They would either have to refuse more orders or come up with a plan for how to meet the growing demand.

In Early 2010, Evan decided to "outsource" his most popular bottled beers, to have them brewed on contract at another brewery, to save the Ægir brewing capacity for making draft beers and for experimenting with new beers. He chose to have his bottled beers brewed at De Proefbrouwerij, a world famous contract brewery in Lochristi, Belgium, that already had craft brewing legends such as Mikkeller and BrewDog as clients.

View of the central fireplace at the Ægir pub in Flåm.

On my previous visit to Ægir, in May 2010, they had just received the first bottles of India Pale Ale from De Proef and Evan admitted it was difficult to exactly reproduce the aroma and flavor of the Flåm brewed original. But after some tweeking and feedback to De Proef, green light was given and bottled Ægir beers started to arrive from Belgium.

And the exceptional growth continued, both the bottled beers and now also kegged beers took off like never before in Norway. New beer bars, selling craft beer on draft, appeared in all the bigger cities. A few restaurants even did the unheard thing of pairing dishes with beer on their food menus! In the span of 2010, Ægir beer sales grew by a staggering 115%!

Ægir Natt Imperial Porter - a personal favorite.

Thanks to contracting out the brewing of Rallar Amber Ale, Sumbel Porter, India Pale Ale and other Ægir fixtures, Ægir had time to play around with new recipes too, introducing new beers from their brewpub - such as the Roggenbier (draft only) and the tasty Natt Imperial Porter - a personal favorite. They also barrel aged the latter, creating the very popular Lynchburg Natt.

A new brewery takes shap

With their continued growth, it became obvious to Evan that they not only should but could, thanks to the financial strength of a popular brand, bring their bottled beer production back to Flåm. Plan for a 510 m² warehouse in Flåm was redrawn and expanded to a 1,200 m² building, to house both the planned warehouse, a brand new brewery, a small distillery and a new bottling line.

The new 1,200 m² Ægir Bryggeri complex in Flåm.

A plot of land on the banks of the Flåmselvi river, on the south side of the E16 highway through Flåm, was selected for the new brewery complex and construction work started in 2011. By the time of my recent visit, in April 2012, the large building was finished and the warehouse and a 180-litre distillery was already in use.

The new brewery will consist of a 35 hl four-vessel brewhouse from Newlands Systems Inc in Canada, with six 70 hl fermenters and two similar sized conditioning tanks, giving Ægir an initial brewing capacity of 8,000 hl per year - about six times higher than the brewpub. And they have enough space to expand the brewing capacity up to 35,000 hl/yr!

Outlooks for 2012

Most of the tanks and the bottling line have arrived in Flåm, but still awaits final assembly at the new brewery. Right now it looks like the brewery installation will take place in May 2012, so we may see the first Ægir beers roll out of the new brewery in time for their 5 year anniversary. Taking the production of their bottled beers back to Flåm, after two years of contract brewing in Belgium, would be a great way to celebrate five years in the brewing business.

In the meantime, the old brewpub is brewing at full steam to fill up orders from Vinmonopolet and other beer thirsty clients. Vinmonopolet, the Norwegian government owned chain of liquor stores, wanted a Norwegian brewed Abbey Dubbel style of beer and Ægir rose to the task, taking inspiration from their very popular Ægir Julebrygg (green label), and created Ægir Skumring Dubbel - a 7% sweet, spicy and fruity dubbel. Ægir will also get their Scotch Ale listed at Vinmonopolet later this year, so that's even more great news.

Ægir Skumring Dubbel - a tasty new beer.

In addition to brewing beer, Ægir is also experimenting with their own distillery. Expect more types of akvavit to be bottled and ready for Christmas (an important akvavit season in Norway) this year.

As mentioned above, this summer Ægir Bryggeri will celebrate their 5 year anniversary. Expect news of a big party to be published soon. If you're in Norway at the end of June you may wish to consider a trip to Flåm :)

Getting there

Visiting Ægir and Flåm may seem like a daunting task, it does look fairly remote when you look at a map of Norway. But it's truly worth it, the trip to Flåm will take you through some of the most scenic parts of Norway, with long fjords, waterfalls and steep mountain sides hiding deep valleys. 

View from the train on Flåmsbana.

As briefly mentioned, at the start of this post, there are several modes of transport that can get you to Flåm. Many visitors will come by the sea, on big cruise ships, and in that case you're all set. If you're in Bergen during the summer season you could also take the Fjord1 ferries, they connect many communities on the west coast and also stops at Flåmsbrygga.

If the sea is not your thing you still have two choices - either to come by rail or by road.

There are daily trains going between Oslo and Bergen, following the Bergen Line across the mountains and stopping at the Myrland Station. There you will have to get off and take the Flåmsbana train which departs hourly in the summer season and takes you down to Flåm in less than an hour.

If you decide on driving, it's a two and a half hour or 166 km long trip along the E16 highway from Bergen. From Oslo it's between 330 and 350 km, depending on the specific route you take, the longer (E16) is actually the shortest in time - taking about four and a half hours to drive.

The best time to visit is in May-June, before the onset of tourist season and the large cruise ships, or in the early fall when the tourists have left. Then Flåm returns to a tranquil place and the brewpub becomes less crowded.

Photo sets from Ægir and Flåm can be found at Flickr: May 2010 and April 2012.

Visit to Cantillon

World famous lambic brewery Cantillon in Brussels, Belgium, is also famous for being a keeper of traditions. The brewery acts as a living museum, with equipment from the early 20th century still in daily use, allowing visitors to experience the history of lambic brewing and gueuze blending.

The iconic Cantillon sign outside the brewery. 

Early history - the founding

Located in Rue Gheude 56 in the Anderlecht district of southwest Brussels, just a couple of blocks from the Gare du Midi train station, Cantillon was founded at its present address in 1900 by one Paul Cantillon.

Paul was the son of a Lembeek brewer and had purchased an old warehouse, dating back to 1874, to start blending gueuze which was all the rage in Brussels in those days - most cafés would blend their own gueuze from lambics bought from lambic breweries in Pajottenland - just outside the city.

Initially, there were no plans of brewing lambic at Cantillon. It was Paul's sons, Marcel and Robert, who took this next step. They set about purchasing some second hand equipment and manufacturing a copper mash tun, and in November 1937 the first lambic wort flowed into the coolship at Cantillon - a new lambic brewery was born, and inside the city of Brussels.

In 1962, the twenty year old teacher Jean-Pierre Van Roy met a lovely young girl, Claude Cantillon, without realizing she was the daughter of Marcel Cantillon, then owner and head brewer of Cantillon. Claude and Jean-Pierre fell in love and eventually married, in 1967. The same year they received a son and a future brewer, Jean. Two years later, his father-in-law told him "either you take over or I close the brewery". Jean-Pierre duly did, learrning the art of brewing lambic from his father-in-law.

A copper brewing kettle from 1937 still in use at Cantillon.

Recent history - sticking to traditions

When Jean-Pierre took over the brewery in 1969, he decided to stick with the Cantillon name. For several decades, Jean-Pierre battled an uphill struggle to keep the lambic tradition alive in Belgium, at a time when most other lambic brewers either closed or started producing sweet, fruit beers.

The classic Cantillon Gueuze 100% Lambic Bio.

Only in the last 10-15 years, after the US market discovered his amazing traditional gueuze, tart and sour, has he been repaid for his labor. Cantillon is now recognized, across the world, as a keeper of Belgian lambic traditions.

In September 2009, Jean-Pierre brewed his last batch of lambic, leaving the brewing and gueuze blending to the great-grandson of the brewery's founder: His own son, Jean Van Roy. Jean has learned the art of lambic brewing and gueuze blending by his father's side, over the last twenty years, even introducing some of his own ideas - such as the famed Zwanze series - before taking over as the new head brewer of Cantillon.

Jean Van Roy has shown a greater will to experiment than his father, creating a number of new sour ales and even introducing Roman-style ceramic amphoras for maturing lambic instead of the traditional oak. As of 2012, the Cantillon brewery seems to be in very good and capable hands with the fourth generation of the Cantillon-Van Roy family in charge.

Public Brewing Session

Twice a year, one Saturday in March and one Saturday in November, Cantillon hosts a Public Brewing Session, where visitors can come in and watch the entire process of brewing a traditional lambic. On November 12, 2011, I attended one such brewing session and here follows a few photos and a brief account of that experience.

Brewing a lambic is a time consuming enterprise, because of the unusually long boiling times of 3-6 hours, so the brewing day starts early. At cantillon at 7 am. So get up early if you want to witness it all. Here's a typical brewing schedule:

Hot water and ground malt going into the
mash tun at Cantillon. Notice the leakage!

07-09: Mash-in
Witness the ground malt getting mixed with hot water and poured into the mash tun to extract the fermentable wort. Pay attention to all the cranky mechanics used to close and open ancient valves, and look for sudden leaks that are handled by placing a bucket on the floor.

09-12: Transfer to brew kettle
Witness the filtration and hopping of the wort as it gets ready for transfer to the brew kettle.

12-15: Boil-in
The hopped wort is boiled in two large copper brew kettles for at least three hours, reducing the liquid from 10,000 litres to 7,500 in order to raise the gravity of the wort, break up starches and reduce the bitterness of the hops.

15:30 Coolship
After the long boiling, the wort is pumped to the coolship upstairs, just underneath the ceiling, where the wort is allowed to cool overnight and become germinated with the wild yeast - Brettanomyces bruxellensis - living in the walls of the old brewery. The next day, the cooled wort will be transferred into big oak barrels, formerly used for aging red wines in Bordeaux or Rioja, for primary fermentation, which may take a couple of months, and then aging for up to three years.

The coolship at Cantillon is located right under the ceiling.

The Cantillon Public Brewing Sessions are very popular events in Brussels so the small brewery will quickly feel swamped by people, so it's smart to be there when the brewery opens at 6:30 am and take the very first tour, before the line of people with cameras gets too long. If you do that, you can sit down at the brasserie section and enjoy some of their lambics and gueuze while watching new visitors line up for the later tours.

Cantillon is also open for visits outside the Public Brewing Sessions, both the brasserie and the brewery / museum (self-guided tours). On Mondays to Fridays they're open from 9 am to 5 pm and on Saturdays from 10 am to 5 pm.

A bottle of Cuvée Saint-Gilloise and gueuze cheese at Cantillon.

Photo sets from my visits to Cantillon can be found at Flickr: May and November 2011.