Girardin Gueuze Black Label

Brewed by Brouwerij Girardin
Style: Lambic - Gueuze
Sint Ulriks-Kapelle, Belgium

Ever been curious as to what a gueuze should taste like? This is it. Very representative of the style. Beautiful use of wild yeast cultures and allowing the local environment to impact the flavour and add to the unique characteristics of this interesting brew. Sour and fruity flavour that leads to citrus and oak. The fun part is the horse hair, smoky and spicy flavours that are present from the brett character. Don’t be afraid! Give it a try.

Bottle. Hazy golden orange color with a huge frothy head. Sour, fruity aroma. As expected the taste, after a fleeting sweetness, is lemony and grapefruity and ends with some dryness. Very easy to drink and enjoy.

Bottle at Eulogy, shared with Phillymonksbeer and Whaleman. Very nice sour, fruity, and floral aroma. Pours hazy golden orange with a nice white head. Flavor is tart, with notes of apple, hay, citrus, and oak. Some bitterness and dryness on the finish. Nice beer. I wish I could have rated this in a more serene environment, so I could have taken notes and remembered more of the complexities. Maybe next time.

Bottle. Near perfect! Aroma of peach, rose petals and cucumber. Looks pale, hazy red. Taste of piqante yeast, cranberries and blackberries. Long and dry finish.

Pours copper/amber with a tall foamy and crackling white head, sticky lacing, lasting head. Aroma is earthy yeast (grass), sour fruit (green apple, pear), malt (hay, straw) and dough. Tart and bitter sour fruit and earthy yeast, malt flavor, medium acidity, flowers-fresh, mint and spices with notes of wood. Medium bodied and foamy, fizzy palate.

So I have been waiting a while to try this and just on chance I walked into New beer in NYC and this was laying around. Don’t think a shipment came in to NY, probably just a misplaced case. Also, lots of crude in the neck makes me think its been sitting around for a while. So I split this into two glasses a Lindeman’s flute and a small tulip glass. Cork pops with lots of power, barely had to force it off. Pours with a vicious head in the flute and a small but strong head in the tulip. Color is a very nice light amber orange, murky, cannot see through it yet full of bouncing light. Visible carbonation but not too much. Aroma is strong, a strong but aged tartiness, I’ll compare it to the tartiness I get in a lot of Cantillon’s but much more subdued. I figure age has done this. There is what I feel is a burnt rubber aroma akin to a 3 Fonteinen Gueze, which I am not a fan of but here it is a background character enhancing the aroma. Also imagine smelling fruit, more particularly strawberries but without any of the sweetness. I know its weird but its what I get. Some hay and funk all around. Taste is incredibly mellow and funky with a sharp tartiness kicking in just as you swallow and passing fast. Leaving a leathery aftertaste that quickly subsides into dryness. I really am impressed by the mellowness of this lambic. A spiky carbonation to offset the tartiness. But all of it passes and nothing is left but a dry feeling in your mouth begging for more.

Another 375mL bottle, also marked 1106 on cork and much less crude in the neck. So I really have no idea what the age on either of the bottles are. Just wanted to return to this because it’s just such a great beer. Aroma is orange marmalade infused vinegar. And it jut smells so fresh, nothing about it could give away the age. Taste is very sour and sweet-less fruits and ends with a long long good herbalness and sourness. I no longer get any of the "rubber" I got in a bottle a year ago. Just the best.

Bottle from Holiday Wine Cellar: Pale hazy peach color with a generous off white head. Aroma is fruity (citrus) and acidic. Flavor starts extremely tart with sharp lemon, vinegar, wood and green apple. Finish is sour, hoppy and quite dry. Medium bodied with champange like carbonation.

Hazy golden orange with a frothy head. Sour, fruity aroma. As expected the taste, after a fleeting sweetness, is lemony and grapefruity and ends with some dryness. Immensely easy to drink and enjoy.