Recently, I was invited by Christopher Quinn and Mike Schallau of the Chicago-based Beer Temple podcast to join them to talk about saison history and on Belgian and Dutch beer history in general. In fact, I had been doing additional research on saison this year, so I had some new stuff to tell as well.
Why don’t you give it a listen, it goes on for one hour and a half or so, after which Chris and Mike continue without me talking on American saison (which is something I don’t know very much about). (more…)

It will happen someday: my book on the history of Belgian beers. Already I’m working on a timeline, not unlike the one featured in my book on lost Dutch beers, published in 2017: an overview of which beer types existed from when, and in many cases, when they disappeared. Therefore, I keep on looking for the earliest (and latest) mentions of certain beers. Since when have we known white beer, grisette, Flemish old brown and saison? That’s why I was happy as a pig in muck last week, when I found a new starting date for one of my favourite beer types: lambic. And it has everything to do with a magic lantern.

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Time to look another long lost Belgian beer, this time from Lier, a nice old little town on the Nete river. It has quaint little streets in the beguinage, a beautiful old town hall, and a Medieval tower with an astronomical clock. Currently, it does not have its own brewery. It does however have a story to tell about historical beers.[1]

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Studying Belgian beer history can be overwhelming. Even I have a huge pile of books and articles that are still waiting for me to read them. But what if you’d just like a manageable introduction by going through some of the most relevant literature available? It’s the summer holidays, so brush up your knowledge reading on the beach, at the campsite, under a tree or in your tent. And brush up your Dutch and French, because sorry, English speakers: the world doesn’t revolve around you this time. (more…)

In June 1847 several newspapers featured a remarkable story. For instance, the Leydse Courant (from Leiden in Holland) told its readers: ‘Gent, 22 June. A new or rather old type of beer is brewed here now, which is called crabbeleire and which was highly regarded by the citizens of Gent in the 15th century… Mr. Van der Haagen has retrieved the recipe and is now supplying tasty, foaming crabbeleire to several innkeepers.’[1] Nice, a lost beer brought back to life, that’s how we like it. But what was the story behind it?

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September 1901. In the East-Flanders town of Sint-Niklaas demolition workers were busy tearing down the old post office. Suddenly, one of them saw something glittering beneath a wooden floor. A two franc coin. A stroke of luck that doesn’t happen every day! It was quickly decided to go and spend the coin in the adjacent pub. As you do when it’s Friday. ‘After the first round there was a second, and they liked the drijdraad so very much that soon they were all slightly “in the wind”.’ And then, they started arguing about the level of their wages…[1]

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If there’s one thing I’ve learnt from writing about Dutch and Belgian beer during the past few years, it’s that you really need to check anything and that you should never take anything at face value. Of course not everything is easy to verify, but eventually you develop a gut feeling that makes certain claims linger in the back of your head. Claims that make you think: yeah, I need to check those at some point. Which is why today I’ll discuss the 1852 Belgian beer law.

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On May 30, 1884 a man was buried at the Cimétière de Passy in Paris, in a grave on section 1, row 8 south, number 3 east.[1] This graveyard, today located within a short walking distance from the Eiffel tower, looks just like you’d imagine a cemetary in Paris: lots of robust small tombs the size of telephone boxes, statues of mourning angels, and shiploads of expensive looking marble. This is where he found his last resting place: Georges Lacambre, the man who taught Belgium how to brew.

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‘The double beer of Oudenaarde,’ wrote journalist and author Karel van de Woestijne in 1906, may not be as famous as its gothic city hall, but those who know it ‘compare it to the best wines of Burgundy. To them, Oudenaarde’s beer compares to ordinary beer as Musigny does to the most common of table wines.’ Those who were familiar with Oudenaarde’s beer, turned their nose up at gueuze-lambic and other beer types, when ‘lying in its basket, a bottle of Oudenaarde’ was served. In Gent, where it was particularly popular, there were people who fell out with each other over the question which of the two main Oudenaarde brands were the best: Felix or Liefmans.[1]

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On November 23 in the year 1877 there a very tragic accident took place in a brewery in the town of Geraardsbergen in the province of East-Flanders. One of the workers was cleaning a large vat that had been used or making old beer. Suddenly, he was overwhelmed by the vapours emanating from the yeast on the bottom of the vat, and he about to suffocate. Brewer Emile Vande Maele quickly jumped into the vat to save his unfortunate employee. The other workers tried to stop him, but it was too late. Vande Maele too couldn’t get air and choked. From everywhere people rushed forward to help, but there was so much carbon dioxide in the air that even the lamps held above the vat extinguished several times. In the end, the vat had to be chopped into pieces to get the bodies out.[1]

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