Things are hopping again

There's one thing you have to say about beer: it will always, always be around. 

Over in Belgium, a brewery operated by the Grimbergen abbey was smashed and burned down by French troops, so the brewing stopped, but the monks have decided to get things going again.  They will use the same Latin motto as before: “Ardet nec consumitur” (“Burned but not destroyed”) and, one assumes, will put the same care into making beer as they used to before the unpleasantness with those troops.

After all, 1795 was a long time ago. 

But that's when the last beer was made at Grimbergen, and they're over it now.  They brewed from the 13th century until the late 18th, so if they still have the recipe and all, they should be good to go.

Grimbergen is just north of Brussels, if you're planning to grab a cold one. The first new ales will be canned or bottled or kegged late next year.

“For us, it’s important to look to the heritage, to the tradition of the fathers for brewing beer because it was always here,” Father Karel Stautemas told Reuters news last week, after the brewery plans received final approval from the local local government council.

“Brewing and religious life always came together,” said Karel, one of 11 Norbertine canons (members of the order) living in the abbey. He will be attending a beermaking course at the Scandinavian School of Brewing in Copenhagen in order to learn his new craft.

Why did no one tell me about this school when I was young?

Carlsberg Brewery will help finance the project, and the abbey has already planted hops in their fields and is building a visitors' center. Profits from the newly-restored venture will go toward abbey maintenance and charity.

There's a lot to like about this!