Bourgogne des Flandres Brewery - Bruges

Bourgogne des Flandres has been around since 1911.

In the early 1990s, Bourgogne des Flandres came into the hands of the Timmermans brewery in Itterbeek, owned by the John Martin brewery.

It is partly brewed in Bruges and partly in Itterbeek . In 2012, Anthony Martin bought a building from the OCMW in the Kartuizerinnenstraat. In the summer of 2015, a brewing installation was installed that will produce the beer from the end of 2015.

Bourgogne des Flandres occupies a very special place in the Belgian beer landscape. It is a typical example of the Flemish brewery tradition in which old and young beer are judiciously mixed until a perfect balance is created. In concrete terms, Den Bruinen Os , which is brewed on site in the attic, is blended with lambic from Brouwerij Timmermans. This lambic has matured for more than twelve months in wooden barrels . The result is a surprisingly red-brown beer, low in alcohol content and complex in taste.

The brewery can be visited.

The bar has one of the most beautiful terraces in Bruges .

History

The Van Houtryve brewing dynasty leaves its mark on the Bruges brewing tradition with no fewer than three breweries . As early as 1765 there was already a notion of a nameless farm-brewery in Loppem under Pierre-Jacques Van Houtryve, but it was his son who received permission from the provincial executive of Flanders to start brewing within the Bruges city walls in 1825. Brewery Den Os is born.

It is in the glory period just before the First World War that the showpiece of Brouwerij Den Os was created.

With Bourgogne des Flandres, an authentic West Flemish red-brown is brewed that manages to cope in the long term with the enormous popularity of the pilsner beers after WWI and the destruction of WWII. Nevertheless, Brouwerij Den Os had to close its doors definitively in 1957.

Over the years, under the supervision of Michel van Houtryve, the family recipe was further brewed at various breweries.

In 1985 Michel van Houtryve brought Bourgogne des Flandres to Brouwerij Timmermans in Itterbeek near Brussels, where lambic plays a leading role in the brewing process.

In 1993 John Martin , the oldest distributor of Guinness and known for Martin's Pale Ale , takes care of the Timmermans Brewery. Bourgogne des Flandres thus ends up alongside other classics in the Martin's Finest Beer Selection.

In 2015, work will start on a new microbrewery in Bruges in Kartuizerinnenstraat, just 50 meters from the former La Marine brewery. Here again Bourgogne des Flandres is brewed.

Willem Vandenameele