Hanssens Mead the Gueuze

Formerly brewed at Hanssens Artisanaal
Style: Mead
Dworp, Belgium

I was very suprised at how good this beer was. Pours a hazy dark yellow color with a nice sized head. The aroma was a very nice sour scent--not too over the top. The palate was full and carbonated perfectly. The taste is a great mix of sour flavors with just a slight hint of honey for balance--this is not a sweet beer! I really liked the flavor and balance of the tart tastes in this one. Can’t wait to have another.

Bottle - cork & wire: Pours a orangey color with no head. Swiss cheese and sweetish mead like aroma. The flavor is tart upfront with a lactic character, which abruptly turns to a sweet and syrupy finish. The gueuze and the mead did not mix well in my own opinion.

WOW.....I thought I would have rated this by now. Pours a cloudy, orange hue with a huge white head that dies fast. Aromas ofgueze funk, citrus, orange peel, and light spice. Mouthfeel is medium bodied with flavors of raisins/grapes, a light metal, nice effervescence ana a mellow honey note.

Bottle. When I undid the cage the cork immediately blasted out of the bottle. Luckily, I was unscathed. Pours a ginger ale color with an incredible, loosely foamy head. Nose is citric. Flavor starts off with that tart geueze puckering, lip smacking taste which I like only to finish in this somewhat bitter, very dry end. This started off being quite good but went downhill as it completely passed the taste buds.

Bottled corked and had a bunch of funk around the edges. Ah, honey is one of the most self-preserving foods known to man, the geueze can’t help grow much outside of its own nasty bacteria, and beer does well even if old, so I continued onward. Popping the cork: bamo, pop! Phew, positive pressure does wonders to keep infection away from the bottle contents. Again, onward, I won’t get sick, eh? Poured a hazy (not cloudy) golden straw yellow color with a very generous head. Lacing was about nil, squeeky clean glassware. The aroma was an odd geueuze / mead combo: light honey, funk, rubber/plastic meadness. The flavor was grapes, bitter honey, funky barnyard, plastic/rubber funk, green apples, almost no alcohol presence. Mouthfeel was HIGHLY carbonated. Not a bad concoction, although I don’t generally like meads and feel a straight geueze is much more worth my time.

A good sourness in the aroma.Pours a very murky gold with a medium white head.Get some sourness but also a honey sweetness in the flavors.Light to medium mouthfeel with a slightly sour finish.

Bottle. Opened like a bottle of champagne (luckily I was warned by SoLan and didn’t spiil a drop). Strong musty lambic aroma with noticeable honey and white pepper notes. Golden yellow with gigantic head. Sour musty cracker flavor with just a hint of the mead. HIgh carbonation. More traditional gueuze flavor - expected it to be sweeter but it’s very dry - a bit like Cantillon’s Faro with higher carbonation.

Bottled: hazy gold in color with sweet honey aromas and an undertone of sour. The body is surprisingly thin, i guess the honey way leaving me to expect a thicker body. Sweet honey and sour flavors with an oaky tartness that clings to the sides of my tongue.