I promise I won’t give another history lesson today, but I just needed to tell you  bit or their history… That Duvel wasn’t discovered or made over one night, but took almost 40years of research to finalize  the actual recipe as we know  it today.

Back to my tour 🙂 I must say that they give this tour in a very professional  way. I actually joined a group that also booked  a tour at the same time. This brings to yesterday’s picture

Before we started our tour, we all got a headset and a fluorescent vest. The vest was just for our safety as we were visiting a production area. At some point I fell like one of those guys who has to lead planes at the airport. The tour starts with to me the most important, with naming the 4 main ingredients of  Duvel/beer: Water, yeast, barley and  hop

What might surprise most of you, is that beer consists mostly out of water… so next time the police pulls you over, you just say you drank water :-).  In the case of Duvel, it is water that they get from 60 meters under the factory.

Did you know that the more hop there is in beer, the more bitter it tastes  And if I’m not mistaking, this also makes you pee more 🙂 :-). For me yeast is yeast, I didn’t know there were actually different kinds… In Duvel beer, they actually use a combination of 12 kinds of yeast 🙂 Scottish yeast that is (for more about history why they use Scottish yeast, check this website).

Every time I visit a production site I’m always amazed how incredible it all is and how high technological… Technique really stands for nothing these days. It is also nice to see that companies like Duvel Moortgat invest in their company, in new technology and research to be able to create the best possible product.

But the most impressive and amazing machine for me was the bottling machine

This machine will remove non Duvel bottles, remove the labels, check the bottle , fill the bottle and capsule, check the filled  bottles and put in boxes… and this machine can handle between 40 000 and 50 000 bottles per hour!!!! When at full capacity, I’m really amazed, as I know what this machine has to do, you also know, but how this machine is able to actually do it, always amazes me.

Just amazing. 1 thing during this tour actually got stuck in my mind. As I told, this machine is able to handle around 50 000 bottles, but this is not the case… as they prefer producing less and better… than producing a lot and a less quality product… Did you know that it takes about 90 days for a Duvel to be ready for selling?

After seeing all those bottles, we got to the best part of the evening/ tour

Yes, the tasting 🙂 I think the next picture speaks for itself.  For all of you who are wondering how long you can keep a Duvel beer… Normally you should drink it within 3 years, as than it is on its best. After the 3 years it would still be drinkable ofcourse, but it won’t be the same. Our guide had already drunk a Duvel from 21 years old. For him this wasn’t the best beer in the world, but that is a matter of taste, because for others, this might b heaven on earth.

And on top of that I got the company of the always super friendly Saskia :-)…What more does one need? Beer, good company and some cheese?

I have to admit that I really enjoyed this Duvel beer as it is not like any other beer! On top of that I learned a lot… but I think I’ll have to visit a few more breweries, just to get the real hang of bier loving …

But this was without any doubt a moment to remember! For anybody who would be interested to visit the brewery, you can look on the duvel website for the dates of guided tours.

As some of you might have read, last Friday I visited the Duvel Moorgat brewery.  I’m sure that even my foreign friends know Duvel beer, as this is probably one of the most well-known Belgian beers. For those who aren’t sure, see the picture below to refresh your memory

I’m going be honest with you guys,  I’m not much off a beer drinker … Don’t get me wrong, I’ll drink it when people serve it…but I don’t like it that much.  So that is actually the first reason why I wanted to visit the brewery, to actually get to know more about how beers are made, what the best way is to serve it, etc… Because as a Belgian you cannot not be a beer lover… And this brings me to my second reason, just to learn how to enjoy some good beer.

So which beer better to start with than with the pride of Belgium, Duvel!?  And on top of that it is an Antwerp beer 🙂 , as the brewery is located just a few kilometers outside of the city of Antwerp, next to the old highway towards Brussels

Everybody might know Duvel, but how good do you know it? Our tour actually started with a little hisotry lesson about the Duvel brewery or Moorgat brewery as it is actually called was already founded in 1871 by Jan-Léonard Moortgat. What actually surprised most, was that it was not until vetween1918-1923 that the Duvel beer found its life and got produced as Victory Ale….Which actually a pretty long time?

You might be wondering how and why they gave it the name Duvel (which means devil in dutch)? Well the story behind it is actually quite funny 🙂 The name ‘Duvel’ came after a beer tasting 🙂 with notable people, and at that time people were not used to drink strong beers, they were used to drink regular quite light beer… So you probably see where I’m going…. they all got drunk and one of the guests  Mr. Van de Wouwer ( a shoemaker) started shouting that this beer was a real devil…. And from that day on this beer goes under the name Devil or Duvel. OK, enough history 🙂

Just to get all the confusion out of this world. Duvel is a specialty or fermented beer and not a regular beer. First off all because Duvel has an alcohol percentage of 8,5% and a regular beer is only max 5%. Another difference is that it is not pasteurized.

Ok, this is all that I’m telling you today… please stay tuned if you want know more about  my visit to the brewery and the picture below 🙂 ok and if they got me to love beer…

To be continued…