Sour Beer -- Any Favorites?

Epicurean Exploits - Food and Recipes
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I have been looking for sour beer that can serve as an alternative to my current sour stand-by, Duchesse de Bourgogne (Flanders Reddish-Brown Ale). Anyone out there have favorite sour ale?

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Gold Standard:

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I love Rodenbach too, but it seems no place in Maryland outside of Montgomery County can get it. I haven’t figured out why. Good call!

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If you can find a geuze from a producer like Girardin or Cantillon, that’s my recommendation for a sour beer.

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yup … gueuze is the way to go!

I second the recs for Girardin and Cantillon. Even Lindemann’s makes an acceptable gueuze – it’s called “Cuvee Rene” and typically costs about $10 per 750 mL.

If you can find it, get some Drie Fontenein Gueuze – it is otherwordly! Hansen makes a decent gueuze, as does Boon.

Monk’s Flemish Sour Ale (brewed in Philly, I think) is another great sour beer.

New Belgium Brewing Company just came out with a pair of fine examples as well: Eric’s Ale, and La Folie.

Jolly Pumpkin Brewery, out of Dexter, MI, makes a fantastic artisinal belgian amber ale that has a nice sourness to it – “La Roja”

Happy hunting! [drinks.gif]

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Cascade Sang Royal

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Victenaar (sp?) - my current favorite. Cheaper than the Duchesse, but very good. That said, a 5 year Duchesse will kick just about any beer’s ass.

Monk’s Cafe is also darned good.

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Lots of interesting suggestions here for me to try. Monk’s Cafe has been mentioned several times, and I agree it is a pretty good, widely available (on the East coast, anyway) example of the style. I definitely mean to try Cantillon, which has eluded me until now for some reason.

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one of my local favorites, captain lawrence cuvee du castleton. [give_heart.gif]

released yearly, sells out quick. i have a few from last year left still and i believe july will be this years release. [wow.gif]

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What (if anything) is the correlation between a beer being a geuze and it being fermented with Brett?

And what is the definition of a sour beer, same as a geuze, are all geuzes sour beers? Vice versa?

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True sour beers use Lactobacillus and often are fermented and / or aged in wood.

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Also see here:

Gueuze - Wikipedia" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

HORAL - Wikipedia" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Rodenbach - Wikipedia" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Flanders red ale - Wikipedia" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;