Gueuze and Lambics

Here’s a thread dedicated to stinky, sour, sweet, fruity, yummy gueuze and lambic beer!

This is the place where Brettanomyces and wild yeast are revered!

Panil Reserve “Barriquée”, Italy, $25-$30

This is Italy’s best attempt at a Flander’s Red Ale. They add NO sweeteners of any kind, so this is fairly aggressive with intense sour cherry flavor at the outset. The color matches the flavor, but runs towards the darker (brownish) side of a cherry skin.
Once the initial impact of this beer passes, more complexity is revealed in the body. Balsamic vinegar, earth, and a hint of vanilla (from the barrels?) come through the cherry compote and lead to a long, persistent finish.
This is remarkably better than many Belgian “original” versions!

“Really Old” Cantillon Classic, Belgium, prices vary by size for modern bottlings

Opened during a visit by the Cantillon boys to our store, this VERY old bottle (early 80s, so not quite 20yrs) was both cap and cork finished.
Poured a hazy dark yellow, not quite to the browned color of an apple left out half-eaten. The aromas were very horsey and barnyard at first, but some of the residual grapefruit skin characteristics did float their way out of the thin head. Still sour after all these years, this dry gueuze had some pretty strange (in a good way) flavors: dried peach, horse sweat, dried citrus zest, and FUNK.
Started coming to pieces after 30 minutes, but still interesting.

thanks for posting this, Peter. It never occurred to me, until reading your note, but I think you hit the nail on the head with the balsamic vinegar descriptor. Spot on, my friend. [thumbs-up.gif] (and, I only speak from my experience with their “regular”, of course).

very cool!! what an experience!

NOSE: nose gives away the fact this will be sour; damp sweatsocks; light oxidized apple scent; smells faintly Saison-esque; hint of orange oil.

BODY: red-tinged golden color; hint of carbonation still present; clear; med.-light bodied.

TASTE: somewhat flat compared to Cantillon’s standard gueuze, but still very nice; refreshing; good sourness, but not as mouth-puckering as some other gueuzes; zippy and juicy on the front palate, becoming increasingly dry and muted towards the back; slightly wheaty and spicy; a very fine example of gueuze, but not worth the $30 tariff considering that one can find gueuze of equal quality for about 2/3 the price. Cantillon used old Bdx barrels for the aging of this lambic blend, but I honestly cannot discern any relative “winey” character here. If you’re really into gueuze, it’s worth picking one of these up just to try it - it’s certainly inherently worth $30 ---- just don’t be expecting anything drastically different than a “standard” version of the same.

B: 50, 5, 13, 18, 8 = (94 pts.)

Posted from CellarTracker

  • N.V. Drie Fonteinen Oude Gueuze Feb. 2007 bottling - Belgium, Flanders, Brussels (11/15/2009)
    Acidic/funky nose – kind of cider-like. Wonderful mouthwatering sourness on the medium-light bodied palate. This has classic gueze character, and is impeccably balanced between the sourness and spice. Medium-long finish of moderate intensity. Although I’ve had better bottles of this brew, this continues to be the best beer I’ve ever tasted – when this is hitting on all cylinders it’s a 99-100 pt. beer. This is the real “champagne of beers!”

B: 50, 5, 15, 18, 9 = 97 (97 pts.)

Posted from CellarTracker

NOSE: moderately expressive bouquet: tart-smelling: tart apple skin, yeast, old wood furniture, and a hint of blood orange. Very nice bouquet.

BODY: butterscotch color; very flat - no head; a small amount of yeast is present; light to medium-light bodied.

TASTE: very light – lacks the “pop” of many other gueuzes I’ve had, but this is not surprsing because this gueuze is only a 3 yr. lambic – most gueuzes are blends of 1, 2 and 3yr.-old lambics. As lambics age, the piquant sourness of their youth gives way to a gentler, warmer spice/fruit profile – that characteristic is certainly evident here. Light belgian spices intermingle with a delicate sourness on the palate. Light finish of great length. A bit hollow on the mid-rear palate. This would be a good gueuze for those that find the average gueuze to be “a bit much.” Despite my preference for a more classically-styled gueuze, it’s obvious to me this is a beer of superiour quality.

B: 50, 5, 13, 17, 8 = (93 pts.)

Posted from CellarTracker

I have a co-worker who suggested I try Gueuze Boon so I went looking - it was not meant to be so I ended up with a Lindeman’s Gueuze Cuvee Rene.
Hazy dark yellow, citrus, floral, funky, sour. I really like how the acidity/sourness makes the full bodied beer seem so delicate and full of energy. A solid beer (which is all I was expecting from Lindemans) and now I’ll need to find some more. Guess I’m going to need to go see Peter for some more!

On an aside - what do you guys think of Jolly Pumpkin?

Daniel
We have free beer tastings every Saturday from 3 to 5. (Also, we have Alan from Dogfish Head here tonight from 5 to 7.)
This Saturday we’re opening a range of “high end” Belgians. You should come by!

Jolly Pumpkin = win!

I like Gueuze and Krieks just fine, though I can’t say I absolutely love fruit beers. But the Lindeman’s Pomme Lambic on tap - that’s the kind of delicious refreshment I could drink for a LONG time. Not nearly as good in bottle (of course).

I love Lambics and gueuze. Ironically, so does my wife, and she is a brett hater.

Daniel,

I think Lindeman’s Cuvee Rene is a very solid selection considering it’s only $10 for a 750mL. That said, it’s at the very bottom of the gueuze totem pole – the Boon is very good, and is better than the Cuvee Rene. Others to look for include: Cantillon, Drie Fontenein, Girardin, Font (or is it “Fond”?) Tradition, and something that starts with an “F” — sorry, name is currently escaping me – label is mostly light brown in color, though. Keep looking … it will be a rewarding search.

Jolly Pumpkin: they are hit-and-miss, for me. I loooove their Artisinal Amber, but don’t like some of the others (including their Belgian Stout). I haven’t tried their Farmhouse or Winter, but would certainly like to. Michigan has an incredible amount of good breweries – some of the best in the country, really. I think Jolly Pumpkin deserves to be in that conversation.

The Reserve tasted above was vintage dated 2008. For Christmas dinner, I pulled out a “regular” bottle of Panil Barriquee from 2007 which was significantly less sour and tasted more like a brown ale than a red. It was surprising to me how different the two were from one another while sharing several common characteristics. There was certainly a vanilla component, plus tart cherry, but lacking was the astringency of the Reserve’s substantial brett. I think I’ll spend the extra $5 and buy more Reserve and let sour-adverse drinkers pick up the regular.

That Lindeman’s geuze is certainly the least interesting that I’ve had. My favorites are Girardin geuze (black label), Hannsen’s oud geuze, Cantillon classic geuze and Lou Pepe geuze (I like both, but agree that for the price the classic geuze is a better buy). I haven’t been patient enough yet as they drink so well young, but I’m interested to see what a Cantiillon classic geuze is like with some bottle age on it. I’ve had a Hannsen’s that was bottled in '01 recently and liked it but didn’t love it. What interests me is that Hannsen’s doesn’t release their oud geuze until it’s been in the bottle at least 3 years. I think Cantillon might gain a little more depth from the funk coming out more with more bottle time.

Panil Reserve: I like this beer a lot, but it seems a bit unbalanced even to this lover of sour beers. I would be more into it if it carried a lower price tag, but I’m quite happy with a lot of stuff from Belgium at half the price.

I’ve enjoyed the couple of Jolly Pumpkins that I’ve had.

Hannsen’s!!! That’s the one I was trying to think of in a prior post (where I was going on and on about a brown label, and such). Thanks for jogging my memory, Doug!!

I once had a German hefeweisse that was cask conditioned and had picked up just a hint of sourness from being in the wood. It sounds weird, but the sour element was subtle enough that I felt it did not compromise the style. I was told that the beer from bottle did not have that element. Has anyone else experienced anything like this?

Petrus Oud Bruin did this for me. Good stuff!

A true Bavarian weisse should have a tart element to it. I always get it in the ones I make, although to varying degrees. I tell people that they don’t need a lemon because it already has that tartness built in. Sour beers are all the rage up here. Some are pretty good and others should probably be used as paint remover.

I love that beer. All of their beers that I’ve tried have been outstanding.