Since most of us either don’t have the time or the money to pop over to Belgium to sip some Trappist history along a canal in Bruges, a short train ride to one of the Belgian Beer Week fests that have become an annual fixture in Japan since 2010 will have to suffice. You’ll be missing out on hundreds of years of beautiful architecture and a slew of UNESCO world heritage sites, but a few Belgian brews will surely help to ease the pain.
As a pioneer of lambics and other styles of sour beers, Belgium has been making good “bad” beers before Americans even knew sours weren’t just spoiled brews. When Cantillon arrived in the US in the 1970s, many Americans even returned the bottles claiming the beer had gone bad. Seems the Belgians were ahead of the curve. Barrel aging programs? They’ve been doing that for centuries. Session beers? Yes, saison would be more proper–doing them for years, too.
The list could go on and on. Belgian beer consumers and makers are probably chuckling to themselves a bit when they hear about the “craft” movement in other countries. They might tell you, “Hey, that’s what we’ve been doing all along. Glad you could join us.”
At 30,528sq km, you could fit two Belgiums in the area of Hokkaido and still have space to squeeze Shikoku in there. There are about 180 breweries in the country, the majority of which could reasonably argue that they are producing craft beer. Compare that to the roughly 250 craft breweries in Japan. For the area they occupy, the Belgians have a whole lot more craft breweries per square kilometer. But fear not, Japan! You are quickly climbing the global ladder in that area. Maybe you can convince Belgium to host a Japanese Beer Week in the near future?
Fans of Belgian beer will be delighted to hear that the Belgian Beer Week festival is once again upping their total stops to eight cities this year. In addition to the usual visits to Nagoya, Fukuoka, Yokohama, Osaka, Sendai and Tokyo, new-comers Sapporo and Kanazawa will play host for the first time.
As seems to have become tradition, Nagoya will lead off the festivities on April 27th, and Tokyo will close them in September. Odori Park, well-known as the site for the annual Sapporo Snow Festival, was an easy choice for the Hokkaido leg. Kanazawa, which has become a popular destination over the past year with the completion of the Hokuriku Shinkansen, is now easily accessible from Tokyo. The event venue there, Ishikawa Shiko Memorial Park, located next to sprawling Kanazawa Castle and the nationally famous gardens of Kenroku-en, will certainly make the trip very attractive.
Based on last year’s attendance, this year the festivals could see well over 200,000 total visitors. If by chance you are fortunate enough to have the time and cash to actually head to Belgium in the coming months, by all means, get on that plane (and bring us back some souvenirs). If you are like the majority of us that will not be making that trip, hope to see you at Belgian Beer Week 2016.
Santé!
by Brian Kowalczyk
This article was published in Japan Beer Times # () and is among the limited content available online. Order your copy through our online shop or download the digital version from the iTunes store to access the full contents of this issue.
