Crans Craft Beer

Brewery closed on December 31, 2019. CRANS CRAFT BEER is a nano contract brewery in Almere-Buiten, the Netherlands. The brewer is Jan Ronald Crans, who is also known as De Biermeerster (the Beer Master). At age sixteen Jan Ronald drank his first Trappisten beer, which was a Westmalle Dubbel. In those days (it was the year of our Lord 1975) it was served with a dash of grenadine syrup at the bottom of the glass. A short time after that he drank a Duvel at a sidewalk café in Antwerp. From then on he was sold on craft beer. It became his passion and his goal was to taste as many different kinds of beer from as many different countries. This love for artisan beer is not a coincidence. It is in his DNA, his genes and his surname. Not only does his ancestry count many brewers, but the surname Crans (its meaning is: wreath) is derived from a wine- or beer house. Taverns used to hang jugs as a sign on their facade. Often the jug would be decorated with a wreath made of green foliage. More often the jug was left out and only wreaths were hung out. During the 17th and 18th century, in the Low Countries, the wreath was commonly used as a sign for wine- or beer houses. The oldest known ancestor, Jan Crans, had a bewery and a number of his descendants were brewers too (as quoted in Dutch from the Crans Genealogy, A. Crans, Breda, 2004). Show Less