Oud Beersel Oude Geuze

Brewed by Brouwerij Oud Beersel
Style: Lambic - Gueuze
Beersel, Belgium

Just a prime example of all that’s good about a gueuze. Pours a hazy yellow color with a loose white head. Aroma is tart and sour citrus with a hint of wood. Flavor is mouth puckering and dry. Beautiful tartness and a great sour twang. This is a great Gueuze.

[Bottled] Hazy golden with amedium, white head. Sour with diesel and rubber along with some sweet maltiness and citrus. Not that sour after all...

A Geuze is as a Geuze does. Once one has wandered into the realm of the more wild Belgian beers, there is usually no return for at the point, your heart and soul has been captured by their lively, tart, and complex bodies. Such was my torrid love affair on that fateful evening a few weeks ago when, after much searching and growing desperation, I found myself face-to-bottle with the Oud Beersel Geuze from Oude Geuze Vieille, Oude Beersel. Our lips met and I became hers, heart and soul, something I am sure my girlfriend will have something to say about.
She poured a golden hay color into my glass with a slight haziness, disturbed only by the steady stream of bubbles which rise to join the scattered puffs of foam resting on top. She foams easily upon each swirl; bringing a bouquet of dirty laundry, soap, orange skin rinds, and a tart pickled vinegary snap. Intrigue and lust commands me to wait not, and so I raise my glass and taste her sumptuous body. Dry like an Arabian desert with an immediate sour pucker of funky lemons, pickles, and bretty delight. Lemon, grapefruit, and other citric skin esters mingle amidst delicate spice. Each quaff leaves my mouth arid and thirsting for more. My Oud Beersel Geuze is an oral and sensory delight. Tangy, crisp, and refreshingly funky as a Geuze should be. Lacking the further ten-fold punch of many traditional Lambics, my Gueuze instead woos me with a more subtle palate. Of course, they are two different beasts, but should one enjoy a Geuze, one will most definitely enjoy the other. None too soon, my glass is empty, and I am left wholly satisfied. My lips and mouth are dry with a lingering tartness and funk.
I could drink Geuze all day long, and I could drink the Oud Beersel Geuze all day long. I have fallen and fallen hard. If you have an open mind and open palate when it comes to beer and new gourmand experiences, then seek out your own Geuze and discover your own love affair for these wild and invigorating beers.

Bottle. Semi-hazy, yellow colour. Smells like sour candy banana. The flavor is kind of anonymous for being a geuze. It´s almost more sweet than sour.

Crystal clear golden coloured body with an orange glow and a very thin slightly off-white head. Nice look, albeit the head dies a bit too quickly. Aroma of lemons, sour grapes, hay, wheat, curacao, sugar and a bit of dry, tannic scent. Medium-bodied; Sharp bitter hay and farmhouse flavours up front with grass and a light tartness noticeable. Aftertaste shows oak and grass, along with some sugar and a decent amount of yeast - however, no strong sweet or tart flavours like most gueuze. Overall, a nice beer, although not as strong, sweet and tart as I’d expect. I ennjoyed this beer, but to be honest - I’d rather have most gueuze that you can find in a small grocery store in Bruxelles. I sampled this to celebrate my first marathon - yesterday on 26 October 2008. This beer was purchased as a ’split’ 37.5 cL bottle from Oliver’s Beverage in Albany, New York on 12-July-2008, sampled on 27-October-2008.

Bottle. Somewhat hazy orange color, no head. Sour aroma with fruits, vinegar and woody notes. Sour flavor, woody, vinegar, spicy, some apples. Dry citrus finish with spices and some grassy notes.

Thanks to Rustychiles. Pours darker than the usual Gueuze. Huge frothy white head. Aroma of tasty sourness bursts through the thick head with some lemons, orange, and vinegar, though the ’’aftertaste’’ of the aroma is of sewer drain, which wasn’t quite pleasant. Taste perfectly matches - beautiful lemony tartness, but a little thin. Quite funky tasting. Delicious at first, but the sewer drain aftertaste that becomes more prominent as it warms becomes distracting.

Pours a nice light gold with an active white head. Aroma of sour vinegar asprin and funk. Flavor is tart aspriny old garbage puckery goodness. Dry bitter sour aftertaste. Pretty good sour beer.