Chapeau Xmas Gueuze

Brewed by Brouwerij De Troch
Style: Lambic - Gueuze
Ternat-Wambeek, Belgium

375ml bottle bought at Bier Paleis in Brugge. Pours dark and muddy brown with a tan head. Smells like dill pickles and burnt almonds and manure, and not the good kind of manure you find in some gueuze. Chemicals, biowaste, and PICKLES, damn. What’s with the dill herb smell? And why am I picking up notes of baloney? Or is it pickle loaf? Sadly, it doesn’t just smell like this, it tastes like it too. Of sure, there’s the littlest bit of apple cider vinegar and a light acidity, but that doesn’t redeem this beer in any way. Pungent baloney meat and dill seasoning wrapped up in a terrible apple vinegar body. Breughel La Gueuze de Kamouraska may be the lowest rated gueuze in the world, but I think one is actually worse.

12.7oz bottle, generous provided by acrdz, who is evidently mad at me for something. Sorry, Mike! This was not a good gueuze, or really a good anything. Pours a clear, bright honey-brown color with a greenish tinge; off-white head with patchy lacing. Smells like pickle juice poured into an ashtray. Tastes like pickle juice and spices and burnt bark. Pours down the drain quite easily. I hate pickle juice, establishing this as basically the worst beer I’ve ever had. In not so many words: a crime against nature.

Courtesy of acrdz. Muddy amber body with a small off-white head. Stinky feet and dill pickle were almost all I could get out of the nose. Well, they don’t mess around when they sweeten a beer. Lots of sugar, light vinegar, strawberry in there perhaps or maybe it’s the sugar talking. Medium/light body is thin with low carbonation. This shit sucks.

Pours a brick-red brownish color with an off-white head. Minimal spotting noted. The nose is somehow both exceedingly sweet and excessively pungent. Notes of rotten dark fruits bathed in vinegar and corn syrup come to mind. With all the courage I could muster, I regrettably took a few sips. Ugh.....what a mistake. Long-spoiled strawberries and figs steeped in dirty sugar water and acidic salad dressing make for an offensively poor taste. Medium-bodied and abundantly syrupy, not even the mouthfeel is agreeable. This is an absolutely vile concoction. Drain pour.

Wow this shit sucked. Pours an almost clear copper amber color, with a small white head. Smells of absurdly tart soured fruits that had been sitting in the sun for 2 weeks, along with some battery acid. The flavor is way overdone with the sweetness and the tartness is way too funked out and soured. The fruits just get blasted by the tartness of it, and really have no chance to make an impact on the flavor. I got a weird ketchup taste to it as well, that made me instantly pour the rest out. Putrid.

Bottle. Aroma of raspberry syrup blended with black dirt. Cobwebs and rotting tree bark. Ugh... Pours dark reddish/pink/brown with a thin white/pink head. Flavor is damn near unpalatable. Quite sweet. Very tart. And lots and lots of dirt and wet wood. Very acidic, but far from in a good way. Stewed vegetables (broccoli?). This is one wretched gueuze.

Purchased at Foremost Sunset Corners. 12 oz capped and corked bottle. Pours like and oxidized WhiteZinfandel. Aroma of fruit. Cranberrries? Hey, it’s a Cranberry Lambic! Raspberry syrup. Flavor is of wood and sun dried fruit. This one actually tastes how it smells. Why HATE?? Santa is holding up his glass!

Name: Winter Gueuze
Date: 03/15/2008
Mode: bottle
Source: Tasting, Cellar Party

Appearance: hazy dark red, fine beige head, drippy lace,
Aroma: dark carame aroma with a good balance between the sweetness and the tartness,
Flavor: sweet caramel malt flavor, nice fruity tartness, additional fruity sweetness comes back in to balance the tartness, touch of veggies,

Aroma: 5/10; Appearance: 7/10; Flavor: 5/10; Palate: 7/10; Overall: 9/20
Rating: 2.7/5.0
Drinkability: 6/10
Score: *4