Concocters Without Borders
WEDNESDAY, MAY 14, 2025
BRASSERIE AU BARON
The Au Baron café was once one of fifty in the tiny French village of Gussignies, near the Belgian border. By 1973, when it was bought by Alain Bailleux, it was the last survivor. In 1989 Alain and his father, a former brewer, installed a tiny brew house next to the kitchen, where they experimental with revivalist farmhouse ales. Today the brewery, only slightly expanded, is in the hands of Alain’s son Xavier, who specializes in French bières de garde that show a strong affinity with the refreshing saisons of the very near neighbors just across the border.
BRASSERIE de BLAUGIES
Wife-and-husband team Marie-Noelle Pourtois and Pierre-Alex Carlier were schoolteachers when they began garage-brewing in 1987. While much of their early product was drunk by themselves or used for home-cooking, the couple’s rugged and hearty farmhouse ales gradually developed a following, and their young sons eventually joined the family business, one as a brewer and one as a chef for the attached restaurant. Wider availability and international recognition later allowed Brasserie de Blaugies to build an impressive, state-of-the-art brew house on the farm’s grounds.
T.O.S. DISTILLERY
In the 18th and 19th centuries, genièvre was the strong drink of choice for the miners and textile workers in French Flanders.This juniper-flavored ancestor of modern gin had been popular for centuries, not only in northern France but also in neighboring Belgium and The Netherlands (where it’s known as “jenever”).
The Claeyssens Distillery in Wambrechies was founded in 1817 to brew genièvre, reaching peak production in the 1930s. But the gradual decline in popularity of genièvre meant that by the end of the 20th century there were only three remaining specialist distilleries in the region. Claeyssens eventually branched out to producing whiskey and other distilled liquors before itself succumbing to financial difficulties.
In 2017, Brasserie St-Germain decided to start a distillery within their brewery, in part to revive genièvre production in the north of France (their T.O.S. Distillery also produces whiskey and an eau de vie distilled from their beer). In 2019, they acquired the rights to distill at Claeyssens, now known as Wambrechies Distillery. As the historic building has been under renovation for the past several years, most T.O.S. distillation still takes place at Brasserie St-Germain, but following the installation of a new still all production will soon shift to Wambrechies.
mons
Mons is the capital of Belgium’s Hainaut province. It was an important walled city dating back to the 1100s, and much later became a center of industry. It was the site of major battles in WW I, and today is a key university town and commercial hub. The center of the old town is dominated by its main square Grand Place, which is paved in the historical manner of the region and whose many cafes and restaurants are the focus of local nightlife. The old city center is pedestrian-only, and Mons was the co-European Capital of Culture in 2015, along with Czech beer capital Plzen.
**Every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of information presented on this webpage. Inner Circle Beer Tours (ICBT) is not responsible for errors in or damages resulting from use of the information contained herein. Information contained on this webpage is subject to change without notice.**
