HUYGHE

Campus, Delirium Nocturnum, Delirium Tremens, Abbaye de Villers, Artevelde, Floris, La Guillotine, St Idesbald Records show that beer was brewed as long ago as 1654 at Melle in East Flanders (near Ghent). The Huyghe family's involvement in the village is more recent, dating back to 1902 when Léon Huyghe arrived in Melle to work at the then Appelhoek brewery. Four years later, in 1906, he bought the brewery and changed its name to the Brouwerij-Mouterij Den Appel (the Apple Brewery and Malthouse). In 1938, it became known simply as the Léon Huyghe brewery. At the start of the 1980s, 90% of production was pils and 10% was table beer. None of this was exported. A restructuring and large investment programme in 1985 changed all that. The brewery switched production from pils to top-fermentation beers and began looking at export markets for the first time. In the 1990s, it expanded by taking over three smaller breweries: Biertoren, Damy and Villers. All of which means that the Brouwerij Huyghe produces a wide range of beers. Its flagship beer is Delirium, a golden beer that comes in a distinctive bottle with the now famous logo of a pink elephant. This has been joined by the reddish-brown Delirium Nocturnum, the amber Delirium Christmas and the dark red Delirium Red.It also produces Floris beers, a range of beers with more or less exotic flavourings such as mango, coconut and "cactus" (to name but three).There are the two Artevelde beers, one amber and the other a grand cru, and the company has its own white beer, Blanche des Neiges. And production continues of the beers made by the breweries that Huyghe took over in the 1990s: Biertoren's Campus range (Pils Premium, Amber, Gold) and Damy's Saint-Idesbald (Blond, Dubbel, Tripel and Rousse).Currently about 75% of all production is exported to 45 countries. A third of all exports is accounted for by Delirium. Total production capacity will shortly increase to 300,000 hectolitres per year following the construction of a new energy-efficient brew room at the brewery in 2011.The Huyghe family has remained in charge throughout with Léon being succeeded by his son Albert, who was, in turn, succeeded by his son-in-law, Jean De Laet. The current owner is Jean's son, Alain. Finally, we should mention the brewery's involvement - especially that of Jean De Laet - in the Delirium Café which opened in the centre of Brussels in 2004. With its list of over 2000 beers, this café has secured a place in the Guinness Book of Records. It now has six bars all on the same site in an alley called Impasse de la Fidélité, close to the Grand-Place. There is a seventh bar, Little Delirium, even closer to the Grand-Place.