You could call us and our beers a little strange. So it’s not an unexpected choice that we joined forces with Butcher’s Tears. A mysterious, small brewery in Amsterdam’s Oud-Zuid district. Run by two Swedish old squatters and a German idealist, they’ve been making historic, English-style beers for a few years now. We are big fans and have wanted to make a historic beer together for years. So said and now, finally, so done. It became a blonde beer, with the secret, wild culture of Butcher’s Tears, to which we added home-picked gale, an herb that used to be used to brew beer, when hops could not be found in Europe. For the grains, we also chose a historic variety: Chevalier. This grain was very common in the 18th century for beers: it tastes very good, however, there were other grains that yielded slightly more in cultivation and so the Chevalier disappeared from the scene. Fortunately, we found someone who still grows these grains. It was a very long day of brewing, where we philosophized together in the dark, in silence, while enjoying a tea ceremony led by our own Mattias. A beer to drink by a fireside or during a punk concert. Do with it what you want. As long as you enjoy it.

One of our friends from the very beginning are Julian Zarate and Todd Mauvais from brewery Poesiat & Kater. Perhaps a bit unexpected in this collab series, given that their repertoire employs a slightly different, more popular, style than ours. Still, Nevel’s love for Julian and Todd never dies and we, with them, don’t care what comes rolling off their brewery. In fact, these two gentlemen and the rest of team Poesiat are such a fun bunch, that we are too happy to work with them. You could say that this collab is of a very personal nature. For years we at Nevel have been joking that we would love to make a lager. Lager! Yes, a wild lager! You can just do that, can’t you? Well, actually no. Our wild culture can’t handle the cold and is top-fermented, which doesn’t really belong in a pils. But there was Poesiat and Kater: Yes, man, these low temperatures are fine, let’s go! Take your yeast culture to Amsterdam! Julian put his money where his mouth was and allowed us to make our very own Nevel lager at the Poesiat&Kater set-up at low temperature. We thought it unlikely that it would work and were afraid of infecting his entire brewery with our hungry wild yeasts, but with all of Julian’s enthusiasm (and actually our big lager dream) we set to work. Together we are releasing one of our greatest experiments ever: Nevel lager! And while we’re at it, let’s do it in cans as well. Extra shout out to the pioneer of wild lager: Julian. Thank you for this beautiful collaboration, with a wonderful result. Krisp is a wild Czech-style pilsner brewed with 10 g/L saaz hops and bottom fermented with Nevel wild house culture.

Note: Krisp is fermented at low temperature (bottom fermenting). Normally, we at Nevel ferment at high temperature (top-fermenting). This normally results in less residual sugars in the beer and therefore less CO2. However, in Krisp’s case there are quite a lot of residual sugars in the beer that can still be converted into CO2. The advice is therefore to drink Krisp fresh, not too long and to keep it cool. Drink the beer within 3 months, and you will be fine!

For us, an experimental Dutch tour naturally begins with friends from the very beginning: Brouwerij De Kromme Haring. We both started our breweries at about the same time and are, in our own way, self-willed dreamers who have proudly remained independent of the big players. Walking into De Kromme Haring feels like coming home and so it was not difficult for us to come up with a recipe together: we are simply going to do everything! We are brewing a beer that has everything: a mix of modern and historic. Think of mixing wild yeasts, fruits and spices, traditional turbid mashing, and then adding Galaxy hops before, during and after the boil, because we can. This beer has it all, yet has become deliciously drinkable, because that’s how we prefer to drink them ourselves, together.