Helping People is Wonderful

I first met Marc Struyf 3 years ago. I was developing Ginger Tipple and I found out that he was one of Belgium’s leading hop expert. He travels each autumn to America’s main hop growing area, Yakima Valley to try out their latest varieties, and gets there before the big Belgian breweries.

He also grows some hops nearby and there is a big event each September when they are harvested.

He invited me to visit him on a Friday afternoon in late May. The weather was perfect and the garden of his brewery is idyllic. His microbrewery, Den Triest, is located in a small rural town near Brussels called Kapelle-op-den-bos,

We sat in the garden and after I explained to him what I was trying to achieve, a ginger beer with hops which had to be Kosher for Passover, and possibly organic, he suggested which hops to use, and even gave me some samples.

The Beers

And then we started tasting his beers. They are among the best you can ever taste. As a hop expert, his IPA is supreme. There are a number of skills to brewing an excellent IPA. Most importantly, the underlying ale has to have body and flavour. Too many IPAs are dishwater with lots of hops. If you taste his regular beers, the blondes, bruins, doubles etc, you will taste the excellence in his brewing.

Then there is the dry hopping, when the hops are added towards the end of the fermentation or after it. Besides the selection and proportions of the hops used, there is the timing. Again, a lot of IPAs have a nasty kick from leaving the hops in for too long.

Kriek

Another of his wonderful beers is his Kriek. Most of the cheaper krieks are sweet. The high-end lambic krieks are very sour. Marc achieves that perfect balance of a pleasant sourness with only an undertone of sweetness. Of course, the colour is wonderfully natural.

Marc taught me how to take our Ginger Kriek to a higher level, using a technique not found in textbooks.

The Bar

Marc brews mainly in 200 litre tanks and sells his brews in 75cl bottles, mainly for export. His bar is open on the first Sunday of each month. So if you want to taste his beers you have to catch one of the 12 days a year it is open.

The healthiest way is to go there by bike as there are a lot of few bike routes in the area.

Ginger Tipple

I get particular pride when I hear from other brewers who work with Marc that they tasted Ginger Tipple when they visited him. Yesterday, one of his regulars approached me and said that he had heard a lot about my ginger beer from Marc and wants to sell it in his bar in Mechelen – he stocks over 300 beers.

When I went to pay, I looked in the kitchen and saw on his shelf of favourites a bottle of Ginger Kriek, I beamed with pride.

What I like most…

When I thanked Marc for his help and told him that his advice was perfect he replied “I am happy for you .
Also for my self , helping people is wonderful.”