Den Helder greets KeyKeg International Beer Festival’s circular economy
Den Helder’s KeyKeg International Beer Festival seduces locals and beer enthusiasts each autumn. The innovative KeyKeg and UniKeg sustainable kegs on display fascinate visitors and represent OneCircle’s circular economy commitment. The event showcases the trailblazing producer’s vitality, energy and environmental motivation.
The hardworking team representing KeyKeg and UniKeg at international beer festivals and drinks events deserves to unwind too. The KeyKeg International Beer Festival welcomes their family and friends. The team exhibits professional interaction with participants and visitors throughout, despite relaxing at its home event.
Why Den Helder?
A proud Den Helder family business produced KeyKeg and UniKeg. And the city’s honours the business’s growth and socio-environmental conscience. KeyKeg and UniKeg’s global reach sends Den Helder’s name to bars, cafés and restaurants across the world. The KeyKeg International Beer Festival represents a homecoming, a moment’s reflection on local business excellence.
The KeyKeg International Beer Festival offers locals and out-of-towners a sustainability masterclass.
Den Helder embodies the Netherlands’ rich maritime history and remains a naval port. The KeyKeg International Beer Festival drops anchor at Willemsoord’s Theater de Kampanje, the former dockyard’s flagship building.
KeyKeg International Beer Festival’s Highlights
Visitors marvel at Theater de Kampanje’s modern industrial chicness, waterside location and historic surroundings. Its bright, airy and spacious interior enhances the KeyKeg International Beer Festival’s easy-going approach. The floorplan inspires brewers and visitors to discuss beer while enjoying something refreshing.
Music maintains momentum during the afternoon and triggers the evening’s graceful party mood.
Friday and Saturday afternoon’s Beer Style Workshops excite visitors. International Beer Sommelier Bart van Kleef coaches in modern brewing techniques, beers, packaging and tasting. Tickets are limited.
Non-beer drinkers savour cocktails or imported cider’s great taste. The KeyKeg International Beer Festival delivers many options. 2019 introduces Japan’s Ibaraki Sake. The adjacent KeyKegcafé and Koninklijke Marine Stadshal provide wines and soft drinks.
Participants
The KeyKeg International Beer Festival is unique. Among established and familiar international breweries, it attracts rare and exclusive guests to the Netherlands. The tradition continues at its third edition with almost 30 beer and sake brewers, cider importers and cocktail caterers.
Belgium
- Dok Brewing Company
Denmark
- Alefarm Brewing
Finland
- Maku Brewing
France
- La Débauche
Germany
- Buddelship Brauerei
Greece
- Septem Microbrewery
Italy
- Birrificio Bruno Ribadi
- Birrificio RentOn
- Domus Vini
- Rock Brewery
The key ingredient driving Rock Brewery‘s 100 percent Sicilian beer is a taste of the island. Brolo’s sights, sounds and stories inspire distinctive beer recipes. And the area’s terroir influences beer flavour and aroma.
Italy’s character radiates from honour and respect for regional specialities, culture and tradition. Artisanal breweries applying the attitude brew excellent craft beer.
Rock Brewery follows the same philosophy. Classic styles and distinctive, innovative beer produced with quality local ingredients. Emphasising each beer’s “rock soul”.
Rock Brewery’s Quality Control program is unique among Italian craft beer breweries. Acknowledging bars handling and serving the brewery’s fresh beer in a proper manner. Respecting beer and valuing consumer quality earns a Rock Brewery Quality Standard symbol.
Maintaining visibility over beer’s path from brewery to glass builds relationships. Rock Brewery’s periodic retailer premises inspection ensures quality beer handling. And the brewery provides complimentary on-site training, improving pouring techniques and increasing knowledge. Maximising drinker experience at the root of every action.
Rock Brewery’s continuous taste development produces many excellent beers. Its core range already a success. La Saracena Kölsch, La Carretta Alt and La Ciavola Wiess are dependable classics. The Rock American IPA, Testa di Moro Hoppy Tripel and Bikini Beach Mango IPA dare to be innovative.
The brewery’s attention to freshness and proper handling aligns with KeyKeg. And participation at the KeyKeg International Beer Festival combines quality thinking. Drinkers can enjoy exceptional fresh beer too.
Japan
Netherlands
- Brouwerij Breugem
Collaboration is important in Zaandijk, a few miles northwest of Amsterdam. The town’s enterprises working together for success. Especially food and drink initiatives. And the Zaandijk taste quality is thus renowned.
Brewing experience and talent forms another essential ingredient. Patrick Breugem’s notable brewing background in several renowned breweries explains Brouwerij Breugem‘s quality. Add a dedicated support team, and the diverse, seasonal beer portfolio can be distributed and enjoyed outside the town.
Brouwerij Breugem brews at Zaandijk’s Brouwerij HOOP, an energy neutral brewery thanks to over 300 solar panels. It presents its draught ‘Saense Beers’ to visitors at its on-site tasting room (and shop). And rare, limited edition beers are also available in the area’s culinary and drinks outlets, such as Lab-44.
Brouwerij Breugem’s contemporary beers are classic styles with an interesting twist. The brewery’s clever approach is focusing on core, traditional beers rather than chasing the latest trends. Visitors at the KeyKeg International Beer Festival can enjoy superior beer produced as a result.
- Brouwerij Kees
- Brouwerij Noordt
Bringing prolific brewing talent examples to Den Helder is a Rotterdam locals’ favourite, Brouwerij Noordt. Superior Dutch craft beer delighting visitors at the KeyKeg International Beer Festival.
Brewing commenced four years ago at its concealed brewery, taproom, bottle-shop and former fire station tucked away behind residential properties. But Brouwerij Noordt’s journey to today’s inner-city brewery has taken 10-years. The story began after witnessing US craft beer success and developing ideas to replicate the model in Rotterdam. The North Rotterdam brewery’s central role within the city now enriches the local beer scene.
Brouwerij Noordt recognises craft beer’s future is dependent upon developing the industry’s next generation professionals. Proactive education and training pulsates through its core. An indicative approach fortifying the brewery’s social conscience, precision and passion for quality.
Brouwerij Noordt and the KeyKeg International Beer Festival is a formidable combination.
- Brouwerij TX
- Ciderwinkel
- Crooked Spider
Founded by the talented Niels Beekhuizen, Wassenaar’s (Den Haag) Crooked Spider is an award-winning brewery producing classic and innovative beer. (Read the full article here.)
- Molotov Events
- Sancti Adalberti
- SpierBier Brouwerij
- Stadsbrouwerij Helderse Jongens
- Stadsbrouwhuis Broer & Zus
Beverwijk, North Holland’s city brewery, Stadsbrouwhuis Broer & Zus, brews artisanal beer beside its tasting room. Its flavoursome, award-winning output produced in-house since 2016. The brewery believes quality outshines quantity and delivers superior standard, characteristic small batch production. It even produces other people’s beer.
The Beverwijk tasting room’s jewel is its brewhouse. Nine core Broer & Zus beers are always on tap, alongside 15 draught guest beers and countless bottles. The brewery’s beer range journeys from American IPAs and Porters to Russian Imperial Stouts, from Belgian ales to English barley wines. All relished in the tasting room’s warm, hospitable ambiance.
Broer & Zus distributes throughout the province and beyond. It’s even international. Den Helder visitors to the KeyKeg International Beer Festival can experience the excitement. Broer & Zus may be a small brewery, but it has huge impact.
- Uiltje Brewing Company
Norway
- Amundsen Bryggeri
Familiar vibrant, multicoloured cans distinguish its beers from others on the shelf. Its curious logo — a raptor wearing an American indigenous peoples’ war bonnet — confirms it’s Oslo’s largest brewery. Amundsen Brewery, ranked among Norway’s fastest growing independent breweries, produces innovative craft beer since 2011. Consistent quality, growth and increased international distribution ensures its canned and draught beers are now found across Europe and beyond.
Despite its international presence, Amundsen Brewery’s “Created by Craftsmen” motto represents its continued artisanal approach. The finest ingredients and matching passion producing hand-crafted premium quality beer. Its beer portfolio covers seasonal, barrel-aged and collaboration style diversity alongside its core lagers, ales and sours.
Amundsen Brewery claims to produce its high-quality craft beer for ‘non-conformists’. If drinking superior flavoursome beer over industrial homogeny is non-conformist, hundreds of thousands will join the revolution. Visitors experiencing Amundsen Brewery’s characteristic beer at the KeyKeg International Beer Festival will decide. Many have already chosen because the popular brewery is a likely event highlight.
Portugal
- Cerveja Musa
Cerveja Musa headlines the main stage. Support acts include Mick Lager, Red Zeppelin Ale, The Peach Boys and Baltic Sabbath. Punctuating the intermission are delights such as Born in the IPA, Twist and Stout and Low Me Tender.
Rock and pop’s cultural references are Cerveja Musa‘s recurrent motif. The Portuguese independent microbrewery’s refreshing words and design presenting a clever, witty approach.
“It’s fun to drink at the Y.M.C.Ale.”
The theme continues within the ‘Factory’ (brewery), recalling Andy Warhol’s revolutionary NYC studio. Like its New York namesake, Lisbon’s ‘Factory’ and adjoining taproom are cultural hubs. The line-up includes a bar, brewing workshop, occasional concert venue and dining experience.
“Psycho Pilsner, qu’est-ce que c’est?”
Founded in 2016, the brewery re-energised bygone recipes and produces contemporary, revolutionary beer. And cultural references state revolutionary beer bottles wear berets instead of a cap. The artisanal brewers exploiting innovative techniques and brewing inspirational beer.
“Lager Virgin, supped for the very first time.”
Cerveja Musa makes its debut appearance at the KeyKeg International Beer Festival. The brewery’s beers charming visitors and its puns keeping them enthralled.
Slovenia
- Pivovarna Pelicon
Ajdovščina’s trailblazing Pivovarna Pelicon pioneered at the forefront of Slovenian craft beer. Award-winning former Young Entrepreneur of the Year, it started brewing in 2013. An unsurprising reputation for a brewery whose home is Slovenia’s fertile Vipava Valley. Fruit trees flourish and the terroir produces renowned first-class white wine.
The brewery’s “quality first and sleep last” ethos rewards drinkers. Besides offering brewery tastings, Pivovarna Pelicon’s draught beer delights customers at local bars. The Pelicon beer shop sells bottles and merchandise. And it distributes flavoursome unfiltered, unpasteurized beers across Slovenia and Europe.
Pivovarna Pelicon organises September’s Pivomanija craft beer festival.
Creativity pulsates at the brewery’s core, developing recipes and boosting an existing portfolio. Pivovarna Pelicon’s extensive quality beer range includes Pale Ales, IPAs and stouts. Winter warmers, hoppy reds, wheat beers, saisons and bitters. The brewery enjoys barrel-aging, limited editions, wet hopping and creating concept beer.
Slovenian beer will triumph with KeyKeg International Beer Festival’ visitors.
Spain
- Chula Craft Beer
A hot Spanish brewery with cool ideas and cooler beer. Chula Craft Beer: young, passionate and focused on quality. Its superior local ingredient choice emphasising natural, unpasteurised beer production. Its environmental respect reflects its sincere approach to waste and recycling.
It cares.
Chula Craft Beer’s principal brand is Chula. Its everyday core beer range, free from additives, stabilizers or preservatives. From Pilsner to Irish Red Ale, Dry Stout to IPA, the styles reflect the brewery’s enthusiasm. The beers are popular, whether it’s an organic, gluten free Blond or a Pale Ale, a wheat beer or a non-alcohol beer.
One-off, unique beers for enthusiasts and special events form the Ziva range. The brewery often produces these limited-edition beers only once, creating rare treats.
Chula Craft Beer distributes most in Madrid and other Spanish provinces. But it also has a significant global presence. The brewery’s participation at the KeyKeg International Beer Festival will delight visitors.
UK
- Box Social Brewing
Although still an unfamiliar name, Newcastle Upon Tyne’s Box Social Brewing will shine at the KeyKeg International Beer Festival. Steve and Ross Holland (father and son) founded the brewery in 2015 and its dazzling reputation for no-nonsense quality and definitive tastes continues flourishing. Its Den Helder appearance is a highpoint, earning the brewery new fans.
Box Social Brewing’s name stimulates drinkers to challenge perceptions, engage and build friendships over its beer. Victorian society networked at “Box Socials”, private home gatherings that combined business and pleasure.
Many people know Box Social Brewing through its music collaborations. It produces Union Black, an excellent stout, with Welsh reggae metallers Skindred, for example.
- BrewDog
Practicalities
A direct train travels between Amsterdam and Den Helder station, a few minutes’ walk from Theater de Kampanje. The KeyKeg International Beer Festival pours Friday, 27th (15:00–22:00) and Saturday, 28th September (13:00–20:00). Entrance costs €12.50 (€10.00 in advance) and includes a glass and two tokens. 5 extra tokens cost €10.00.
Please also see: Revolutionary KeyKeg International Beer Festival daring to be unique
Please also see: KeyKeg’s emergent beer festival memorably reinvents established models