Cantillon
Brasserie Cantillon — The Soul of Brussels Lambic
Founded in 1900 and still run by the Van Roy family, Brasserie Cantillon is one of the last remaining traditional lambic breweries in the world. Tucked away on a cobblestone side street in Anderlecht, Brussels, Cantillon uses only spontaneous fermentation — wild airborne yeasts and bacteria drawn in through open windows do all the work, with no temperature control, no added yeast.
The brewery is a working museum and a time capsule: copper coolships where hot wort is spread overnight to catch the local microflora, cobweb-covered oak casks where the lambic ages for one to three years, and a blending philosophy that values complexity over predictability. Every bottle is a snapshot of a particular season, a particular year, a particular ecosystem.
Cantillon's production is small by necessity — a single coolship, a handful of cold winter nights, and the unpredictable Belgian climate set the limits. They are the benchmark against which all spontaneous-fermentation beers are measured worldwide.
Country: Belgium | Region: Brussels | Founded: 1900 | Specialty: Lambic, Gueuze, Kriek
