(Photo, above: Pierre Tilquin pouring a sample oflambic in the blendery.)
This Saturday and Sunday, May 28-29, Belgium's first new
The event will happen at both locations of Moeder Lambic in
Brussels, as well as Delirium Taphouse, starting at 4 pm (16.00)
local time. Delirium Cafe, the bar with 2,000 beers located below
the Taphouse, will have bottles on offer beginning at 10 am for
those who are too thirsty to wait till late afternoon, and Pierre
will be at on hand at the Taphouse at 10 PM (22.00) to present his
Oude Gueuze and answer questions.
I really wish I was in Belgium next weekend . And this one too.
If I was in Belgium, I know where I would be!
Also, this weekend is the Weekend of Spontaneous
Fermentation in Buggenhout, arguably Belgium's top
lambic beer fest. I attended in 2008 and 2010, and look
forward to getting back in the future.
De Opstalse Bierpallieters, asked Brouwerij Girardin
to produce a special Oude Gueuze for them, and indeed
they did.
It will debut and be available at the event.
See: Weekend
Belgium has a new gueuze blendery, and it’s in Wallonia.
(Photo, above: Pierre Tilquin in his blendery.)
Fortunately for the sour beer lovers of the world, there are young Belgian beer lovers dedicated to the survival and promotion of such brews. Pierre Tilquin is one of them. He and a small group of investors have started the first new gueuze blendery in “The Beer Country” since Geuzestekerij De Cam opened in 1997.
“We opened in March 2009,” Pierre told me during my visit to the blendery on May 29th. “We have 222 barrels, all in the 400 liter size, and all are full now,” he added. “So that’s 888 hectos of lambic on barrel.”
He continued: “As I live in Brussels, I did want to open a blendery there. But rents are very high, and it was impossible to find a suitable space at a reasonable price. Here in Bierghes-Rebecq, we are only about 15 minutes driving from Lembeek, where Brouwerij Boon is, and Flanders is about 200 meters away.”
Pierre also mentioned the government helps businesses such as his in Wallonia, whereas such subsidies are rarely seen in Flanders. Adding to that, he said “We have a great deal of time and money already invested here. All the barrels are from French wineries; 150 of them, with the silver bands, come from the St. Emilion and Medoc regions, and cost us 70 Euros each. The other 72, with the black bands, come from the Hermitage region, and we paid 60 Euros each for them.” Pierre added that he cleaned the barrels with hot water until no color remained in them.
“I have backing and help from Gregory Verhelst of Brasserie La Rulles, and other investors. We have a complete business plan. I will work at the blendery full time, and we may have another person working part time as well in the future,” Pierre commented.
“Of course you know all lambic producers have their own symbol, which you can see painted on their barrels. I’m still working on mine, as well as a website,” Pierre remarked.
“My plan is to sell 500 hl of blended lambics and Oude Gueuze per year. For that you need about 900 hl of barrel capacity, which we have. We buy wort from Boon, Cantillon, Girardin, and Lindemans, and put them in our barrels here. But I won’t sell any straight, unblended lambic; there’s no reason to when you could buy that right from the breweries. I’ll sell only some blended lambics on draft at special places like Moeder Lambic and Delirium Cafe in Brussels, and of course 37.5 cl and 75 cl corked bottles of Oude Gueuze. I even have some ideas for fruit beers for the future, but it won’t be Kriek or Framboise, as these are already common. I want to do something different.”
Pierre continued: “As to Cantillon lambic, I will only use it in my blends as a three year-old. In fact, I’m the first and only gueuze blender that Cantillon will sell their wort to. I’ll probably use Boon as a one year-old, and Girardin and Lindemans as one, two, or three year old lambics.”
Ah, and the taste, you ask. We first sampled an interesting “March” beer from Boon which was just a few months old. It was an interesting brew; a lightly sour beer of 8 degrees plato and about 3% abv that Pierre told me he would used to lower the alcohol in his Oude Gueuze. “My goal is a gueuze of about 5 to 6% abv. I don’t want it to be higher than that. This March beer is what the farm workers would have drunk in the fields years ago. Refreshing, but not too alcoholic,” Pierre said.
Pierre told me that the temperature inside the blendery is controlled so that it won’t go higher than 19 C (66 F) in summer. He added, “What you see here is only the beginning. I still have to build a warm room for conditioning the beers, and also a room for the bottling machine.”
(Photo, above: Pierre Tilquin and Brian Ewing,
at Moeder Lambic Fontainas in March.
Brian Ewing and 12 Percent Imports will import Oude
