St. Louis Gueuze

Brewed by Brouwerij Van Honsebrouck
Style: Lambic - Gueuze
Ingelmunster, Belgium

Serve in Flute, Tumbler

UPDATED: OCT 8, 2008 Blonde gueuze with a white head. Aroma of rubber and lactic acid. Sweet and chemical, with cigarette, like a vanilla nicorette! A drainpour. 2-2-1-2-3

Dark gold in colour with a lacing white head. Faint gueuzy aroma of lactic acid, not all unpleasant. In mouth, rather mild fruity taste, with little acidicic points, but thin and plain. Much better than the 250 mL bottles rated before. (375 mL corked bottle, LCBO Spring 2005). 6-3-6-2-10

Relatively fresh bottle from LCBO summer 2008, BB April 2009. Golden gueuze with thick darker off white head. Aroma is pleasant horseblanket and ground cherry, but in mouth, artificial sweetener overwhelms the palate. 7-3-4-3-8

Bottle. Deep golden colour with a white head. Aroma is acidic, fruit. flavour is sweet, yeast, sourness, fruit, metallic. Could be more.

Huge, very dense dirty-yellow head over copper-coloured beer, very well-carbonated visibly. Caramel(syrup), wood, Brett (horseblanket even), fruity esters (peach). Neutral, rather than sweet (or sour, God forbid); woody, plywood, slightly solvent, old hops (slightly cheesy). Brett gone to the ... - there’s some lemon flavour, unsure of itself. Syrupy maltiness, caramel underneath. Very spritzy, highly carbonated; sticky, syrupy presence, false body. An old acquaintance, still as unconvincing as ever.

UPDATED: AUG 8, 2007 33cl bottle, purchased at some bar in Brussels
While walking around the center touristy part of Brussels, we decided to get a drink at an unknown bar, which was dressed in common touristy decorations and served the common touristy beers like Jupiler, Maes and Duvel. We really just needed a place to pee, so decided to get a beer as well. I finally decided to try a commercial gueze. It was not very good at all. It had a perfectly clear dark amber appearance. The nose had some moldy yeast scents, very lightly prickly sour on the nostrils. Flavor was sickly sweet spoiled apples and tinny metal flavors. This truly is terrible stuff.

St. Louis Gueuze (25cl Belgian bottle with a best before date of 10-2012). Pours with a completely clear golden body with a large, off-white head that slowly fades. Aromas of funk, slightly rancid, orange, spice, summer day urinal, wheat, and sugar. Light spicy notes and some esters. Flavors of are spicy, raw wheat, vanilla, marrow (umami/fat), a hint of brett, plastic, styrofoam, chlorophenols, medium to low tartness, artificial sugar, creme brulee. Messy. Phenolic. Lively bubbles. Not very good. Fond Tradition is far superior.

Bottle. Golden brown with a small head. Aromas are sugar and light fruit with good acidicy. Flavours are initially sweet with brown sugar and some fruit. Some caramel with citrus. OK.

250ml bottle
Horse-blanket aroma. Quite watery. Gentle taste, very musty and sweaty. Not acidic enough.

Amber bodied topped by a royal white head, leaving some great lacing around the glass edges thanks to a powerful carbonation. Honest aroma plays between the sweet cookieish malt hinting at honey, peaches and pumpkin and lightly moldy, moreso hay-like yeast. It’s definitely no disaster up to now and the palate is actually quite soft with the carbonation being just enough, smooth and medium bodied if finishing watery. It is too sweet though, that’s its only weakness, but it transcends everything else and kills any interest. A fair number of IPAs and even stouts show more acidity (though mostly citric) than St Louis Gueuze. Needless to say that the complexity is fairly limited as well, it’s just basically not very tasty at all, the malt is faint and the fermentation elements are not assertive at all, a mere shadow of the aroma.