We hadn’t had much geuze back in Florida. Our local shop had three kinds (Lindeman’s, Oud Beersel, and Girardin), and we tried them all. But there just wasn’t any more to be found. And we’d had even less kriek — we’d tried some fruit beers (frambozen perhaps) and didn’t like it much at all. So we came into gueze and kriek with pretty open minds (which is to say, pretty ignorant, since I didn’t really understand how different lambic is until I started reading up on Geuze). But I’d heard great things, especially about Cantillon, so I was excited to find a geuze section at Bert’s.
We’ve grabbed a few bottles each time we’ve been, and found a wide range among the ones we’ve tried:
- My least favorite was probably Boon’s Oude Geuze, which was very strange — it started tart, but then fizzled into a mildly sappy blandness.
- I’ve also had a geuze that was sweet enough that I think it must be sweetened (Mort Subite). Didn’t like this nearly as much as the others. Though I can imagine wanting this in the warmer months, since it was very much like cider.
- Timmermans Gueuze was sweet and mild, with subdued tartness and some apple and Champagne.
- Boon Oude Geuze Mariage Parfait was nice, but nothing special (which is really too bad, since the name sounded so promising).
- I really liked De Cam Oude Geuze — very nice, sour and dry.
- Though my favorite was Cantillon Gueuze — tart but delicate. I’m definitely planning on visiting their brewery in Brussels, which uses the same brewing system as they did 100 years ago.
We were having so much fun with the gueze that we decided to give kriek another chance, and found them pretty interesting and more consistent:
- Boon Kriek and Delirium Red were both pretty sweet (the Delirirum more so), with just a little sourness. The cherry flavor was less pronounced than expected, with these beers mostly being more mellow than geuze.
- Cantillon Kriek was nicely tart, though again not overly fruity (despite rich red color). It seemed more similar to their geuze, and not as sweet.
- Girardin Kriek 1882 was the outlier (and probably my favorite) — it was much less transformed than the other kriek (still sharply sour like the geuze). It also had a noticeable cherry flavor. So it was more like two complementary notes side-by-side.
I haven’t been able to find any straight lambic, which I’d really like to try. Cantillon makes a lambic called Grand Cru Bruocsella, though I haven’t seen it yet. There are also several other fruit-infused lambics (apple, raspberry, pear, etc.) and faro (sweetened lambic), which we might try if the mood strikes us.
