[Trappist]

Hi,
Some excellent top-quality natural Belgian beers, brewed by brewmaster Bart Degrande at Torhout based brewery De Houtlandse Brouwers were tasted yesterday afternoon.
This was part of a great initiative from Bruges' beer historic organisation 't Hamerken (www.thamerken.be)
We were with about 25 enthusiastic people, and enjoyed every second of this sunny afternoon from 13.30 till 17.30.
The guidance from Jan Dedeyne was phenomenal !!! 



Much more things were done yesterday, incl. some visits to defunct local breweries in the centre of Torhout.
Those pictures will be published later on...


The actual entrance to De Houtlandse Brouwers.
We see former brewmaster Bruges' brewery De Gouden Boom Paul Vanneste (big name!) entering the brewery.




The brew kettles (made in Slovenia)




The yeast vessels in full action.




The nice bottling line.

Time for a taste....










All beers (4) we've tasted were from outstanding quality!!
All natural beers, without using any artificial ingredients or artificial techniques.
Those are pure nature products, and that can ofcourse be tasted.
I personally preferred their tripel. What an amazing beer this is.
Fresh, herby/spicy, sweetish but not too much, flowery hoppy, nicely malty and a great body too.
This beer drinks so smooth too.
The other beers we had were also outstanding.
The Quadrupel at 10 vol% was nicely roasty and not at all that sweet.
Dangerous drinkable for sure.
This beer is a real winter beer warming and soothing beauty of brewing.

Visits to the brewery are possible, tasting room is available, buying their great beers too !!
It is so easy to combine with a visit to my hometown of Bruges.
The trainstation is only steps away from the brewery.

For more details: https://houtlandsebrouwers.be/

We sure will definitely come back as they open on Saturdays every two weeks.
HIGHLY recommended by yours truly 

Cheers,
Filip

[Trappist]

Hi folks,
The "complete" report can now be found at the www.thamerken.be website.
Direct link to the pictures: https://www.flickr.com/photos/trappist/albums/72177720334231934/
It also shows the brewery tour we did, before heading towards De Houtlandse Brouwers.
You'll see that Torhout had a rich brewery history, and some breweries ares still there !!! which frankly surprised me ALOT !!!
Cheers,
Filip