Brewery Ommegang, Liefmans & Ducato Collaborate On Passport Royale
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MyBeer Buzz
This morning I have a new collaboration can coming from Brewery Ommegang in Cooperstown, NY.
This is Passport Royale and it will be a collaboration with Liefmans and Birrifico Del Ducato. The beer will be a blended sour ale that hits 7.5%-AbV and it will be packaged in 16oz cans. Stay tuned for release details. zzubreebym
Label Text:
“This unique collaboration is a celebration of the art of brewing and blending. With contributions from three iconic breweries across three nations, this blend brings together Liefmans’ mastery of sour ale, Ducato’s award winning hop innovation, and Ommegang’s Belgian heritage. Perfect for honoring Belgian National Day and Month, this limited release is sure to captivate beer lovers worldwide.”
About Liefmans:
The rich history of Liefmans Brewery dates back to 1679. Around 1750 brewer Jacobus Liefmans selected these fertile soils of Oudenaarde, where the banks of the river Scheldt provide natural nourishment for unique Liefmans beers. Liefmans flourished thanks to the talents of master brewer Rosa Merckx. As the first – and for many years also the only – female master brewer, she added finesse and gusto to the Belgian beer culture for 46 years. We can still enjoy the taste of that passion today.
About Birifico Del Ducato:
Beginning in 2007, Del Ducato is one of Italy’s most awarded breweries. It is located in Roncole Verdi, a small village in Parma County, birth place of world’s renowned composer Giuseppe Verdi and also home land of prestigious food such as Parma ham (Prosciutto) and fizzy wines such as Lambrusco and Malvasia. A land portraying a history of daily sacrifices and great passion.
Holding a BA in Food Science and Technology and a past as home brewer, Giovanni Campari is the radical and visionary Brewmaster. Manuel Piccoli is the brewery’s executive entrepreneurial mind with a precise vision for growth and development.
Striving for constant quality improvement and the continuous research to select the best raw ingredients are the foundation of our production process. Everyone says it: we do it and you can feel it. It is not difficult for us: we could not imagine ourselves differently from we are.
We select the best raw materials, getting to know our suppliers personally whenever possible. The malts that we use have different provenances: we import some from France and Britain, while also purchasing other specials malts from Germany and Belgium. We get our hops from: Germany (some of which we select personally at the time of harvest), England, USA, New Zealand. Particular hop varieties and their terroir are very important because they confer characteristic aromas to our beers. We use select yeast strains that we propagate in-house for brewing both top and bottom fermented beers, as well mixed fermentations (with the addition of wild yeasts and lactic bacteria).
Our beers are not pasteurized, because we believe that heat treatment irreversibly compromises the freshness and the organoleptic quality of such a fragile and complex product.
Some of our beers are saturated with carbon dioxide naturally as they finish fermentation in sealed steel tanks and they are subsequently bottled isobarically; others are refermented by adding sugar or beer wort before bottling, then stored for a given time at a certain temperature (depending on what beer is being made), hence resulting in a secondary fermentation in bottle and a natural carbonation.
In some instances, we operate mixed fermentations by inoculating wild yeasts such as Brettanomyces and lactic bacteria to create greater flavor complexity. Beers produced by this method (most of which are aged in barrels) require years of slow maturation and the results are truly exciting and surprising.
Some of our beers undergo maturation in wooden barrels for some months, mostly French and American oak barriques. We select barrels on the basis of what they used to contain:
some housed red wines, others white wines, others calvados, bourbon or whisky. During maturation in wood, beers acquire tertiary aromas of wood, they micro-oxygenate and also absorb part of what the barrel used to contain previously.
About Brewery Ommegang:
A Tradition Born in 1549
Holy Roman Emperor King Charles V visited medieval Brussels in 1549 with hundreds from his Royal Court. To welcome the King, merchants, vendors, cooks, brewers, musicians, theater troupes, dancers and more lined up around the city walls and joined in a celebration as his entourage passed by. That parade became known as the “Ommegang,” a word that variously means “coming together” and “walking about.” The Brussels Ommegang Festival continues to this day.
The First Farmhouse Brewery in America in 100+ Years
Belgian breweries Duvel Moortgat, Affligem, and Scaldis join with importers/entrepreneurs Don Feinberg and Wendy Littlefield to build an authentic Belgian-style farmstead brewery in Cooperstown, NY. They locate this cultural transplant on an old 140-acre hop farm in the Susquehanna River valley, in a part of upstate New York once known as Nova Belgium.
Our First Beers
We open in winter with Ommegang Abbey Dubbel, an 8.5% ABV traditional Trappist-style dark ale. Brewed with a complex array of spices and packaged in 750ml bottles, Abbey breaks the mold of the emerging American craft beer scene.
Our Portfolio (and Reputation) Grow
We expand our offerings with Hennepin Farmhouse Saison, Rare Vos Amber, and 12oz bottles. High-end culinary magazines and restaurants across the US take notice.
Ponder the Profound
Responding to a fan’s fantasy of “the perfect beer,” we introduce Three Philosophers, a Belgian-style quadrupel ale. A touch of Belgian kriek – a cherry beer – makes it distinctive, and offers a delicate note of dark fruit.
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