Changes

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s the brewery sourced raspberries from within the Pajottenland from a farm near the small village of Liederkerke. Harvested in July, the farmer would hire a group of students to come to the farm and pick the berries to fill buckets full of 20 kilograms at a time. Jean-Pierre notes that the farmer would “weigh them to nearest gram”<ref name=GrummelslinkseJune> Van Roy, Jean-Pierre. (2016a). Grummelinkse – June 2016. Musée Bruxellois de la Gueuze. Brussels, BE.</ref> and that due to Belgium’s rainy summer climate, the buckets would also be filled with quite a bit of water.

As tends to be the case with raspberries and beer, it can become quite sour and it was relatively weather dependent as to whether the harvest was acidic or sweet. Jean-Pierre recalls that “customers would be very critical when the raspberries used were of lower quality”.<ref name=GrummelslinkseJune> Van Roy, Jean-Pierre. (2016a). Grummelinkse – June 2016. Musée Bruxellois de la Gueuze. Brussels, BE.</ref> That is not to say, however, that the beer was unpopular. Van Roy recalls a time when over 600 bottles of raspberry lambic were opened over three days at the Francs-Bourgeois festival.<ref name=GrummelslinkseJune> Van Roy, Jean-Pierre. (2016a). Grummelinkse – June 2016. Musée Bruxellois de la Gueuze. Brussels, BE.</ref>