Over the past four years we have spent more than our fair share of time in Brussels, exploring the brewing and drinking culture of arguably the worlds most famous beer city. Although much of the beer offerings are steeped in tradition, there is a new wave of young, progressive brewers beginning to emerge, respectfully nudging the city’s beer scene into the modern day. No brewery exemplifies this more than Nanobrasserie L’Ermitage. Here’s a little bit of information about the brewery from co-founder, Nacim….
"The Ermitage nanobrewery is an independent and urban artisan brewery project based in downtown Brussels. Initiated by homebrewing and guided by the new wave of modern craft beers, we aspire to bring our own effort, however small, to the building of the renewal of the Brussels brewing heritage. We defend the revalorization of authentic beers and taste, without compromise on the quality and without creativity barrier.
We started homebrewing with a 30L homebuilt kit in 2013. Then we decided to start a commercial brewery in late 2015. We g0t our hands on a 150L Kit in January 2016 to continue to experiment homebrewing on a larger scale and try to setup some kind of core range. During 2016 we worked very hard on our business plan and finding a spot and funds for our brewery. In March 2016 we decided to contract brew during those days of research so we could release a beer on the market and have more trust from banks. We released our first beer : Lanterne at Barboteur beers day in 2016 with the beautiful people from A&H just next to us.
Finally in October 2016 we signed the contract for our actual location in Andelercht close from midi station and Cantillon brewery. The bank accepted the loan, then we finished to design and order our equipment and finally after 9 months of construction work, permits paperwork, brewkit delayed, and everything we started brewing officially in July 2017.
We started with a 8hl kit and four 15hl tanks that we fill with 2 brews. After a couple of months, due to high demand, we added 3 more tanks. So now we’re brewing about 30hl per week which means 4 brews in 2 days.
We hired our first guy this month and ordered 3 more tanks. So by the end of the year we’d like to do 2 more brews per week so we could reach 2000hl a year. We bottle and keg condition everything (30% bottles – 70% kegs). Though we’re looking for a canning line at the moment, and hoping to do everything in can by early 2019.
Our influences come obviously from the modern UK scene, and modern styles in general. We love hops and sessionable beers."
We’ll have 5 beers on tap, including Lanterne on cask for the very first time.
Get your tickets here.