Cantillon Brewery
One of Brussels’ most authentic traditional family breweries, the Cantillon Brewery, first opened its doors to customers as early as 1900. Originally founded by the Cantillon clan, it’s been run by the Van Roys after the last surviving member of the founding family passed the business on to his son-in-law, Jean-Pierre Van Roy. For the sake of tradition, the original name of the brewery has remained unchanged.
Today, the Cantillon Brewery is a charming place serving the famous local lambic beer specialities such as
kriek and
gueuze, brewed according to centuries-old recipes. The Cantillon Brewery is the last lambic brewery in the city. Taste-wise, the
gueuze and
kriek produced there are rather tart and dry if compared to their mass-produced, artificially sweetened counterparts. Recently, the Cantillon Brewery launched the production of their new speciality, Iris, which is a quite unique kind of beer. Spontaneously fermented, it’s made from fresh hops and doesn’t contain wheat; thus, technically, it’s not a lambic. The building of the Cantillon Brewery also holds the Gueuze Museum and offers guided tours around the brewery during which one can take a closer look at the intricacies of the brewing and bottling processes.
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