Brussels and Cantillon Brewery

Today was our first official day in Brussels!  Last night we walked around a bit and visited Delirium Café, which has 1,000 beers available.  It was great to see the beer culture here in Belgium; it is clearly different from the beer culture in Germany.  This morning we toured the city of Brussels and saw lots of historical buildings.  Belgium has had a very tumultuous past, and the guide did a fabulous job explaining all of this to us throughout the tour.  She helped us understand the significance of all of the different types of architecture.  The most impressive buildings were all of the guild houses as well as the churches.  The landscape here is much different than in Germany because there was very little Nazi influence; rather the Belgium people are defined by all of the invasion and war that they have experienced throughout their history.  My favorite part of the tour was going to the top of the music museum and having a coffee.  The view of the city was quite impressive and makes me want to explore the Brussels even more.

This afternoon we toured Cantillon Brewery, which is one of the most fascinating breweries I have seen on this trip and quite possible the most interesting brewery in the world.  Cantillon brews lambic style beers.  This style beer is characterized by the spontaneous fermentation.  This is when yeast from the air inoculates the wort after it has been cooled.  The inoculated wort is then stored in barrels and begins the fermentation process.  The beer is fermented for several years and then can be blended to form Gueze or it can be macerated with fruit to produce different flavors.  True lambic style beers are very dry and not sweet at all.  After the tour, we were able to taste the lambic beers that Cantillon produces.  This was not your typical tasting experience; the young lambic beer was not carbonated, was sour, and was very dry.  The Gueze and the blended versions were more carbonated but had the same sour, dry taste.  This brewery tour was awesome, and completely different than any of the other tours we have been on.