Tidigare i höstas släpptes bland annat Tilquin Oude Quetsche på Systembolaget och trots att jag påpekade det undrade många varför ölen var flat eller hade näst intill obefintlig kolsyra. Nu har Pierre Tilquin postat sin syn på detta, en möjlig lösning samt en ursäkt till alla som blivit besvikna.

  
Dear Tilquin enthusiasts,As you probably experienced, many bottles of the batches 16/17 of Quetsche and Mûre are pouring flat, or nearly, except the Quetsche with Prunes de Namur. We are sorry for that. To be honest, we have no explanation. These beers were bottled as usual at the end of December and in January, and normally, carbonation comes progressively, so that the fastest ones are carbonated in May, and the slowest around July. 

This year, the things didn’t happen like that, and we are in November with a lot of flat bottles. As we don’t add any sugar, bottle conditioning is a little tricky to get. The fruits are fermented in tanks at the rate of 1 kilo per liter for four months. Then the highly fruited lambic is pumped and blended with 1, 2 and 3 years old lambic to dilute and bring new sugars and yeasts to get carbonation. We started to sell these beers at last Toer de Geuze, in May. We sold these beers first of all because we were expecting that, as it happened before, carbonation would come progressively, and secondly because we consider that even flat, these beers are tasting good and are enjoyable. 

We are sorry if you didn’t enjoy them like that. If you bought bottles, we suggest that, if you are patient, to shake the bottles vigourously once or twice, and let them rest horizontaly at around 20 degrees Celsius, or at room temperature, for a few months. Hopefully, carbonation will come progressively, but to be honest, we don’t know. As we do spontaneous beers with spontaneous refermentation in the bottles, without addition of sugar, we cannot control everything.

We will do our best to get a better result this coming season. 

Cheers/Pierre

Tack för uppmärksamheten/

Jens Skrubbe